- Originally published in The Montgomery Advertiser March 25, 2005 Copyright 2005 The Montgomery Advertiser
By Jannell McGrew Montgomery Advertiser,
jmcgrew@gannett.com
Alabama
minorities, particularly blacks, are more than five times more likely
than whites to say they've been stopped by a police officer because of
the color of their skin. So says a recent poll released this week by
the Center for Governmental Services at Auburn University.
According to
the Ask Alabama statewide public opinion survey, more than half (54
percent) of all respondents said racial profiling by local law
enforcement officers occurs regularly. The poll of 629 Alabamians also
showed that 33 percent of minority respondents believe the practice is
widespread, compared with 14 percent for nonminorities. Blacks
represented 22 percent of those surveyed.
"Law enforcement agencies
have to be constantly aware that young males or young African Americans are looking at their actions through the prism of racial
profiling," said Jim Seroka, director of the Center for Governmental
Services. The center's most recent survey results go beyond race.
According to the report, minorities were four times more likely to
report having been stopped by a police officer because of their attire
and three times more likely to report being stopped because of their
age. The survey comes just weeks after state Rep. Alvin Holmes,
D-Montgomery, filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice,
asking U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to investigate the
Alabama Department of Public Safety, all state troopers and other city
and county law enforcement agencies across the state for racial
profiling. The results of the AU poll did not surprise the lawmaker.
"Racial
profiling in the state of Alabama by certain law enforcement people is
worse than what the polls would show," said Holmes, also head of the
civil rights section of the state Legislative Black Caucus. "This
doesn't include all law enforcement in the state of Alabama because we
have some fine law enforcement people who do a good job, but you have
some law enforcement people in the state that are rotten to the core."
Holmes pointed to an incident during which he said a white Alabama
state trooper issued a speeding ticket to a black male
driver. However, Holmes said the officer noted on the traffic ticket
that the male driver was white. Holmes believes the officer
deliberately falsified the driver's race in the report. The Alabama
Department of Public Safety has since investigated the matter and
concluded there was no wrongdoing on the part of the officer, said Col.
Mike Coppage, DPS director. The officer in question has since received
training and has been counseled to "make sure information on his
citations is accurate," Coppage said. "It was an honest mistake. There
was no intention to mask the demographic data or to skew anything."
In
addition, DPS directed all troop commanders to reiterate to their
personnel "the importance of accurately entering all information on a
traffic ticket, whether it's race, date of birth, sex any of the
information that's required for a citation," Coppage said. As of March
1, there were 332 state troopers assigned to the department's highway
patrol division, of whom 242 are white and 90 are black. AU's latest
Ask Alabama poll, which has a margin of error of plus or minus 4
percent, also revealed that not all Alabamians oppose racial profiling.
While 60 percent of those surveyed said they disapproved of the practice, 9 percent "strongly approved" of racial
profiling. Twenty-seven percent of respondents said they approved.
Charles Steele, national president and CEO of the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference, said the civil rights group has launched a
program to develop several "conflict resolution centers" to work with
law enforcement and serve as sites where residents can report such
instances of racial profiling. "We still have those
discriminatory practices in our system," Steele said Thursday. "That's
why we need conflict resolution centers." Centers in Birmingham and
Montgomery are expected to be up and running by the end of the year, he
said.
Coppage said DPS has received two complaints of racial
profiling since the first of the year. In one incident, the department
found no wrongdoing. In the other, there was insufficient evidence to
prove or disprove the allegation. In cases where allegations are
substantiated, disciplinary action ranges from counseling and training
to job termination, Coppage said.
There are more than 450 sworn police
officers in the city of Montgomery. Since January, there have been no
reports of racial profiling filed with the Montgomery Police
Department, said Sgt. Mark Drinkard, an MPD spokesman. Like the state
troopers, local police officials say they will not tolerate racial
profiling. "We do not have a specific policy that relates directly to
racial
profiling," Drinkard said. "In the Montgomery Police Academy, they are
taught vehicle stops. We have a code of ethics that stresses fairness
through respecting the constitutional rights of all men."