Based on the provisions of the St. Paul racial profiling agreement reported, it seems hard to believe that even the mostly superficial mainstreatm media could be giving such enormous hype to such small measures that avoid directly addressing the problem. It seems that the media's agenda is to make it appear that the problems are being addressed, and establishment politicians are eager to take the cues and embrace "changes" that have such little cost and little effect. It is also interesting that both the community leaders and police representatives involved in the St. Paul agreement who were interviewed on TV did not claim that the changes were all that significant. I do not intend at all to criticize the St. Paul civil rights leaders who have a lot of commitment, independence and integrity, and unlike some of the Minneapolis "leaders", would not attempt to do a snow job on the community. As Tim Conolly pointed out, however, the police and community are not on equal footing. The community leaders have no power to make the police implement any changes. An equal power situation might be if some sort of independent commission representative of the community was actually empowered to hear everyone's point of view and then decide on changes. All of the reports confirm that there are two provisions in the agreement: 1) Police officers will hand out business cards to all motorists stopped, and information about who to contact to make a complaint. 2) In cases where the officers want to search a person or vehicle but do not have probably cause, officers will have to read through a brief script informing the person that they can refuse permission and anything illegal found will be used against the person. The first change is a marginal improvement that might marginally encourage more professionalism. Anyone being stopped can currently view and write down the officers name and badge number. However, most people who are stopped by police have too much anxiety to think of recording this information. If there is an arrest or citation or warning, the identity of the officer will be on the citation, warning or arrest report anyway. Dave Brauer's previous post indicated that the agreement includes community organizations being able to take complaints which might be less intimidating than goint to the police station. Again, presumably a police investigator will still be conducting the interview, and an advocate from a community organization could have already accompanied a complainant to an interview. The second provision, a script to advise people of the right to refuse a search where the police lack probable cause and therefore need consent, has even less impact. First of all (as Tim Conolly articulately pointed out), it is unusual for a police officer not to come up with some sort of creative excuse to find "probable cause" for a search. In the instances where consent is needed, it would have been much more effective to use a written form, that has a space for a person to sign initials next to each sentence in the script, and then provide a full signature at the bottom. This is how a consent is given before submitting to a blood-alcohol test after a DWI arrest. THe previous post that there is a question about whether an oral consent is less intimidating really lacks any basis. If the consent is only oral, then there is no way to verify the officer really read the script and that the person being searched really consented. If there is a written form, the officer can to read it anyway, and it is much harder to intimidate someone into signing something than to orally acquiesing. The other meaningful safeguard for consent searches would have been to require a tape recording. Almost every Miranda warning in Minnesota is either accompanied by a written form that is signed or is done on tape. Many police departments already have consent forms for searches, although the Minneapolis police consent form is very short and lacks explanation of the constitutional rights involved (it is a short paragraph rather than three pages as a previous post claimed), and I have heard many claims that the police intimidate people into signing them. Examples include threats to put people in jail unless they cooperate. Not only do the St. Paul agreement do little to advance protections of civil rights but it does not come close to implementing policies and practices that will have any impact on the huge racial disparities in stops, searches, arrests, and other police intrusions. The following are but a few examples of many simple measures that could have had more impact and should be done in Minneapolis: 1) installing video/audio cameras on all sqaud cars so anyone could review and evaluate the police encounter. This has been done in police departments around the country and in a few Minnesota municipalities such as Brooklyn Center; 2) Agreeing not to conduct searches or make arrests at all unless there is actual probable cause to believe that there a crime more serious than a traffic violation (this has been the requirement for non-consent searches under Minnesota case law - it remains to be seen whether this will continue after the recent US Supreme Court decision of Atwater v. Lago Vista which allows searches and arrests for ANY violation); 3) continuing to keep detailed data on the races of everyone who is stopped and the reasons for all stops, along with the identities of officers, so that objective evaluations can be made; 4) establish an truly independent (elected) civilian review authority with actual power to subpoena witnesses and evidence and decide on discipline (St. Paul does not have such a body, and the Minneapolis CRA lacks subpoena power, can only recommend discipline to the police chief, and its members are chosen by the city council who mostly do not want to offend police); 5) establish a program for mediation in any situation where a citizen feels that rights were violated so that the police officers actually have to address concerns of the community members (it is interesting that I observed the St. Paul police representative actually recommending such a program when he was intereviewed on television); 6) include training programs where police officers actually hear from civilian community people who can talk about racism; 7) establish a civilian policy advisory board (again with independent representation from the community) to be consulted and asked for input on police practices. Here are also a few suggestions for structural changes that could really have more effect, but the establishment is unlikely to respect: A) decentralize the police department so that there are different departments for each community, and give ultimate policy making authority to local elected community boards; B) require that police live in the neighborhoods that they patrol; C) establish requirements that police departments eliminate ANY racial disparities in stops, searches, arrests, detentions, incarcerations, and other encounters between citizens and the criminal justice system; D) pass a law than any racial disparities described in suggestion #C give rise to a presumption of unlawful discrimination for purposes of criminal charges or civil lawsuits. In summary, the problems have not yet begun to be seriously addressed. Jordan Kushner Powderhorn _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - Minnesota E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
