By Associated Press
Racial profiling by police is nothing new. Indeed, the stopping of people of color is so common it has a name, DWB or driving while black (or brown). But for some students in Seattle, a more appropriate term might be WWY: walking while yellow.
The group of APA students — participants in the Summer Youth Leadership Program, sponsored by the Northwest Asian Weekly Foundation — on July 20 filed complaint with the mayor, the police chief and the Police Department’s new Office of Professional Accountability after police stopped them at an intersection July 9 for jaywalking and grilled them for 45 minutes. They say they were victims of racial profiling.
“There is no question that this was an illegal stop, an unconstitutional stop,” attorney Yvonne Kinoshita Ward said at a meeting on July 16 at the Asian Resource Center attended by about 50 people, including Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske, Mayor Paul Schell and several city councilmembers.
Chief Kerlikowske has apologized to the group. “I’ve told you how sorry I am that something like this occurred,” he said at the meeting, adding that he was looking into the incident.
Police say the officer was on the lookout for Japanese tourists, who were in town for the All-Star game festivities. Officers wanted to ensure the safety of foreign visitors who were unfamiliar with the city, Kerlikowske said.
“We’re not satisfied with the chief’s responses,” said Andrew Cho, a program instructor who was among those stopped. “We feel he avoided many of our questions instead of answering them directly.”
The students say they were walking to Pioneer Square across Fourth Avenue South and Main Street, near the city’s International District, when Officer Jess Pitts, using his patrol car’s loudspeaker, warned them they were jaywalking. The students say they couldn’t hear him over a passing train.
He lined 14 of the students single-file against the wall, they say, detaining them for 45 minutes. The group says he repeatedly asked them if they spoke English, even after many of them told him they were all Americans.
Cho said he tried to talk to a second officer, Greg Sackman. Cho, who was born in Indiana, said he was told, “I’ve been to your country before, when I was in the Army.”
Police say some of the students became aggressive, and several other officers arrived. Thao Le, 17, said she questioned the officers about their conduct and officer Greg Sackman grabbed her by the arm.
Eventually, Le was the only person to receive a $38 jaywalking ticket.
Members of the student group and others at the meeting called for an independent investigation, strict disciplinary action against the officer who stopped them, a public apology from officers involved and cultural-sensitivity training for all officers.
Kerlikowske said he had not talked directly to the officers involved. He said he hoped the meeting would be a “dialogue” between the department and students.
“We don’t target people,” the police chief said. “We don’t want to be accused of stereotyping people.”
IOWA
In separate news, eight Asian men who were handcuffed and forced to kneel on the sidewalk as police searched for a suspect in an assault are filing a lawsuit against the city of Des Moines claiming they were victims of racial profiling.
Des Moines lawyer Alfredo Parrish is filing the lawsuit on behalf of the men who were handcuffed outside the Cafe Di Vang last month after police learned a suspect in the assault may have gone into the restaurant.
Parrish said the men were publicly humiliated by being grouped into a racial category. Police say the case is not about racial profiling.
City officials have been notified that the suit will be filed, but it has not yet been filed.
Police spokesman Sgt. Bruce Elrod said the suspects officers were seeking were described as Vietnamese males who were described as being in a Vietnamese restaurant.
Parrish said race and gender isn’t enough and police should also have taken into consideration other descriptions such as height, weight, and clothing.
Officers were trying to protect the men in case a gun battle broke out with a suspect inside the restaurant, Elrod said. An investigation is underway to determine if those tactics were appropriate, he said.
Elrod said police fear that anytime the department admits a mistake a lawsuit will follow.
Parrish said the police need to do better, especially since a similar incident happened at a restaurant less than two years ago.
He said racial profiling is a problem that will continue to haunt the city until it adequately addresses issues of sensitivity training.
Lawyers who make a living off filing lawsuits, Elrod contended, want the public to believe that anytime a minority member is arrested it’s a case of racial profiling.
“That’s not the case,” he said.
|
