By the Numbers: 25
Allegations of racial profiling have dogged San Jose police for years. Media probes and independent audits have highlighted the discrepancies showing that African Americans and and Latinos are singled out disproportionately in arrests and traffic stops. Yet citizen complaints suggesting misconduct are overwhelmingly dismissed and there’s not much comprehensive data to show the extent of the problem.
To get a clearer idea of police behavior “in an effort to combat police brutality,” the National Bar Association has filed open records requests in 25 cities, including San Jose, which has charged more people with resisting arrest than any other major California city.
Pamela Meanes, president of the black lawyers and judges group, called police brutality the civil rights issue of this era.
Meanes selected the cities based on their black populations and reported cases of excessive force. Information sought includes the number of people killed, racially profiled, wrongfully arrested or hurt while pursued or in police custody. Her group also wants videos and photos related to misconduct incidents as well as background info for all officers involved.
They may just discover that over the last few years, no one has been detained at all except during calls for service.
Will Meanes present statistical evidence of minorities committing crimes in proportion to relative racial makeup of population? If not, why not? It’s my understanding that some minorities in San Jose commit violent felonies up to 20X their demographic representation, which accounts for police attention.
“black lawyers and judges group”?!?
As opposed to what? “freckled lawyers and judges group”? Or perhaps a “scandinavian lawyers and judges group”?
See pages 13 & 16: http://www.sccgov.org/sites/sccphd/en-us/Partners/Data/Documents/Final_Violence%20Profile%20Report_6%2021%2012_PHD%20FINAL.pdf
Case Closed.
— Pamela Meanes, president of the black lawyers and judges group, called police brutality the civil rights issue of this era.
Ms. Meanes has it right. Due to the colossal failure of the black community to cure itself (of criminality, incivility, educational failure, etc.) and provide the American public with an acceptable level of return for its five decades of financial investment, self sacrifice, patience, and leniency, African American race hucksters have turned in desperation to blaming the one demon that is certain to gain them the support of the pukes in academia and the media, the local cops. The stakes are high: lose this campaign and maybe the American public will say, “Enough!” Lose this campaign and wannabe black lawyers and judges just might have to earn their way into the profession on nothing but their own merit. Imagine the horror if college applicants were all subjected to the same academic measure, or police chiefs were all expected to have IQs above 100, or have mastered the English language?
What would happen if the racial implications of LaDoris Cordell’s actions were no longer politically protected? Her use of race data represents the most egregious example of racial discrimination in local government. She has singlehandedly determined that certain minorities, regardless of their documented and disproportionate criminality, are to be assumed victims of police discrimination. Her attitude toward police officers in general is, in nature, no different than was a Jim Crow sheriff’s toward a black rape suspect: just hang him. She is as immoral and offensive as they were, and, in a truly impartial America, it would be her who would be answering to charges of racism.
“Judge” Cordell has some very tough explaining why there are no “males” in her Office. So much for, “equality.”
Check out: http://sanjoseca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/35355
Mayor Reed can also explain why only “women” have been chosen for the position of IPA since this Office was created over twenty (20) years ago.
As to Ms. Meanes concerns, “Go pound salt.”
David S. Wall
It’s a safe bet that Ladoris Cordell and Pamela Meanes have each other’s contact numbers srt to speed dial … I smell an IPA end-around being played under the cover of the “25 city record request.”
Officers and proponents of policing as it is today need to take a step back to understand that the public’s perception of the increasing aggressiveness of police behavior towards persons of color, the mentally ill, the homeless and the poor. And this not the only thing that is of concern. Attitudes, such as expressed here matter just as much to the public, no matter what the public’s identities are or the identity of the writers above are. Trust is the most significant issue of concern between police and the public today. And in that context do you really think these remarks are contributing to enhancing that trust? I for one doubt it. Public service, especially when carried out with tools of extreme authority and potential violence that can result in physical injury or death is not a role that can be compared with any other public service role. Yet the public is hearing very little from police officers about how to gain the public’s trust. Instead the public is belittled for their concerns and the Office of the Independent Police Auditor is demeaned by gender references that have nothing to do with the office’s mission, effectiveness or the public respect that it has engendered under Judge Cordell’s leadership.
In the battle of public opinion these types of remarks are not helpful. In the effort to win public trust these types of remarks are self serving rather than the professional reflections of dedicated public servants.
— “Officers and proponents of policing as it is today need to take a step back to understand that the public’s perception of the increasing aggressiveness of police behavior towards persons of color, the mentally ill, the homeless and the poor.” —
And exactly how, D. Mckee-Stovall, have you taken measure of the public’s perception? Is it by the number of chiefs that have been fired due it, or its importance in the upcoming local elections? Can’t be that, so either you’ve got some solid data from a citywide polling of the citizens or you’re just spewing the same tired, overused generalizations to blame the police for the ugly outcomes occasionally inevitable when applying law and order to lawbreakers and the deranged.
— “Trust is the most significant issue of concern between police and the public today.” —
It is impossible to earn the trust of those who withhold their trust as part of a political or socioeconomic strategy, as evidenced by law enforcement’s forty-plus year campaign to appease the unappeasable. In the name of increasing trust police agencies have: raised their education requirements; recruited, hired, and promoted based on color and gender; inserted community members into the hiring process; instituted psychological screening; lengthened academies and street training; increased street supervision; tightened-up use of force guidelines; added cultural sensitivity and mental health crisis training; banned controversial tactics and weapons; relaxed enforcement on select violations; introduced neighborhood meetings; reached-out to the public on the web; expanded and publicized the citizen complaint process. And this partial list doesn’t include the regular meetings the chief and his command staff hold with representatives of the various communities and social organizations, or the fact that the city hired a black, racist lesbian to monitor the police.
So the question becomes, what more can police do? The answer is nothing; the trust issue will disappear only after two things happen:
1. It ceases to be politically and economically profitable for identifiable groups to distrust the police. Trust is only given in exchange for goodies, and it has a very short shelf-life. Black and Hispanic distrust of the police is a business, just as is the ever-present threat of their rioting.
2. Members of these disaffected groups learn to rely on reason and evidence and overcome their inclination to put belief first and judge with their emotions (for an estimation of when this might happen, see “When Hell Freezes Over”).
Seems that “D. McKee-Stoval” is probably the head of the County Human Relations Office. One local Government Department Head feeling the need to come to the defense of another or a member of any number of “protected classes” of person defending another….or both?
Quite a network at work here.
As someone who has access to just such public data going as far back as the 1960s, I have to say some of the commentary here is both as misinformed as it is asinine.
1960s? Why not early 1900s? Heck, let’s revert back to the “public data” from 1800s!
What is your point?
Allegations of racial profiling in one of the most racially cohesive and diverse places on the planet are virtually impossible to avoid and will keep resurfacing as long as we have groups of people who associate solely on the basis of their race, in this case, legal professionals. I’m mean, come on, what’s next? “black clowns and circus performers group”?