The Bad Apples of Baltimore
http://www.vox.com/2016/8/10/1241842...artment-report
Quote:
The Baltimore Police Department is a complete and utter disaster.
That’s the only possible takeaway from reading the US Department of Justice’s 163-page report into Baltimore police, leaked on Tuesday. The report found major flaws in even the most basic modern policing practices, from arrests to use of force to basic interactions with the community. To make it worse, these findings are compounded by what appears to be purposeful, disproportionate targeting of the city’s black residents.
“Racially disparate impact is present at every stage of BPD’s enforcement actions, from the initial decision to stop individuals on Baltimore streets to searches, arrests, and uses of force,” the report concluded. “These racial disparities, along with evidence suggesting intentional discrimination, erode the community trust that is critical to effective policing.”
The Justice Department’s conclusions come after an investigation that lasted more than a year, launched swiftly after protests and riots over the death of Freddie Gray while in Baltimore police custody and, more broadly, over racial disparities in policing and the criminal justice system. Federal investigators pored through data and police reports, as well as attended in-person events, including ride-alongs, to conduct their investigation.
The report essentially validates many of the protesters’ claims. Baltimore police stop people for essentially no reason, particularly black residents. They are far too quick to use force. Charges are often dropped due to a lack of merit for any prosecution. Cops regularly violate people’s rights, including those protected by the First Amendment and Fourth Amendment. And virtually everyone is aware of these types of problems — officials within and outside the police department, members of the community, and even police union representatives acknowledge the desperate need for reform.
The Justice Department is also clear in where the blame lies: This is not the story of a few bad apples in the police department; these are systemic issues propagated by leadership, poor guidance, shoddy training, and essentially no accountability to speak of — and these issues go back to at least the 1990s, when city leaders in Baltimore stated “zero tolerance” anti-crime policies. To remedy these issues, federal officials plan to set up a “consent decree” in which they would oversee reforms at the Baltimore Police Department with the cooperation of local officials.
(Baltimore isn’t the only city under investigation by the Justice Department. So are more than two dozen others.)
Here are nine findings from the report that speak to the absolute disaster that is the Baltimore Police Department:
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And the report: https://cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/cho...partment.0.pdf
Bizarre:
Quote:
BPD disproportionately stops African-American pedestrians. Citywide, BPD stopped African-American residents three times as often as white residents after controlling for the population of the area in which the stops occurred. In each of BPD’s nine police districts, African Americans accounted for a greater share of BPD’s stops than the population living in the district. And BPD is far more likely to subject individual African Americans to multiple stops in short periods of time. In the five and a half years of data we examined, African Americans accounted for 95 percent of the 410 individuals BPD stopped at least 10 times. One African American man in his mid-fifties was stopped 30 times in less than 4 years. Despite these repeated intrusions, none of the 30 stops resulted in a citation or criminal charge.
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One telling example: During a ride-along with Justice Department officials, a sergeant told a patrol officer to stop a group of young black men. The officer protested, saying he had no valid reason for the stop. The supervisor responded, “Then make something up” — again, in the middle of a ride-along with federal investigators.
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This suggests of course that BPD isn't good at framing people by planting evidence :o
D'oh.
