Excessive Use of Force

by Loretta P. Prater

  In part, this book was written as a warning that any one of us or a member of our family can become a victim of police brutality. We could merely be at the wrong place at the wrong time or encounter the wrong police officer, especially if we are alone. No matter your status, income, or accomplishments, you could be at risk of harassment, arrest, injury, or death by those employed to protect the public peace. We must not continue to blindly accept what David Feige refers to as “The Myth of the Hero Cop.” Feige states that police unions have created a perception that all police officers are heroic public figures, valiantly trying to protect us. According to Feige, since September 11, the story of the hero cop has become so powerful and pervasive that even questioning police behavior is decried as disloyal, un-American, and dangerous.85

  Yes, I do believe that Leslie’s death resulted from police brutality. This is a theme that you will find throughout this book. My feelings on the matter of police maltreatment are clearly summarized. No one should have to wonder what I think. We are either victims or silent partners in the brutal and racist acts of some police officers. We all pay in some way when even one of us is denied his or her constitutional rights. Silence is not a friend; silence is the enemy. We do not live in a post-racial society, and there is work to do. As Leslie stated in his last words, “It’s not over.”

  3

  Profiling

  Reported Research and Personal Experiences

  The purpose of this chapter is to explore a suspected relationship between racial profiling and police brutality. Profiling is complex and multidimensional and involves using specific characteristics as a guide to perceptions and actions. These perceptions and actions advantage some and disadvantage others. Profiling is not a simple concept, which might explain why there are so many social dynamics related to this discriminate behavior. We all engage in profiling on some level; all profiling is not bad. A “Handicapped Only” sign in a parking lot is a kind of profiling, but one that is positive for persons with special needs. One would doubt that anyone using a wheelchair would complain about having reserved parking near a building’s entrance.

  Individuals have complained of profiling while shopping. If you have seen the movie Pretty Woman, you may recall the experience of the character played by Julia Roberts. Because she was initially profiled as a non-desirable who could not afford clothing in a high-end boutique, she was treated badly in that store. When she later returned and was profiled as a woman with obvious financial means, she was treated much differently and with respect. My African American friends and I have been followed and profiled in stores, as though the salesclerk expected us to steal merchandise. We have also been ignored by clerks, who assumed that we could not afford anything in their upscale store.

  From among many personal examples of profiling while shopping, I will share one that is still memorable. More than twenty years ago, my friend Phyllis and I were shopping in a boutique mall in the exclusive Buckhead area of Atlanta. We were dressed casually and were not carrying signs that said, “We are college professors and can afford to shop here.” Phyllis, a professor of fashion design and merchandising, was shopping for a comforter for her bed. We went into a store that sold comforters made with fabrics imported from various countries. As a professor of merchandising, Phyllis was familiar with the characteristics of quality linens. At first, the white male clerk ignored us, as we looked at almost every comforter in the store. Finally, Phyllis saw a comforter that interested her, but it was on a high shelf and enclosed in a plastic bag. When she motioned for the clerk to assist us, he came over but appeared to be annoyed. She asked him to retrieve the comforter from the high shelf and take it out of the packaging. She wanted the entire design exposed. His first response was “Why should I take it down?” Phyllis asked, “Why shouldn’t you take it down?” He replied, “Because I will just have to put it back, because you’re not going to buy it anyway,” He further stated, “I’m not going to take the comforter out of the packaging, because that would mean that I would have to refold it to put it back in the bag.” He then immediately left the store for his lunch break.

  This was a small store and there was only one other person working there, who was behind the counter. Phyllis went over to this gentleman and found out that he was the owner. She told him what happened, and he appeared shocked and angry. He apologized and said he would be happy to show her the comforter and any other item in the store, plus give her a 20 percent discount. He was very helpful and accommodating in every way. Because of his behavior, and the fact that Phyllis really liked the comforter, she purchased it and the coordinating pillows and dust ruffle. He was able to complete the $900 sale. I remember Phyllis saying to me later, “If possible, it is always better to deal directly with the owner.” Unless a salesperson is working on commission, it doesn’t matter to them if they make the sale. I could not help but wonder if that salesclerk treated white women shoppers the way we were treated.

  As an African American, I know that profiling occurs in restaurants. I have experienced many of those incidents. One that was the most amazing was in Savannah, Georgia. While there attending a national conference, several other participants and I decided to go to dinner at a nationally known Savannah restaurant. The group consisted of about nine African American women and one white participant, a friend traveling with me. When we arrived, the staff person at the podium, near the outside entrance, put us on the wait list. That was the procedure, because they didn’t take reservations. We noticed that there were several groups ahead of us and we were okay with that. What alarmed us was that even after waiting for more than an hour, several groupings of white people who came after us gave their information and were seated. This happened more than once. When we questioned the staff member, she would simply say that we were next, but she lied. We were finally seated.

  The most significant outcome of that experience was the “eye-opening” realization and subsequent reaction from my white friend. She was amazed and incensed when she stated, “I don’t know how you all can deal with this; I just couldn’t be black in America.” Of course, we don’t have a choice, and we have dealt with a lot of unfairness and disparities over the years. One might wonder, “Why didn’t you all just leave?” The reason we didn’t leave was because we were too weak from hunger to start all over with a long wait at another restaurant. This was the same friend with me when I was continuously stopped for additional scanning at airport checkpoints, mentioned previously.

  Profiling, whether intentional or unintentional, is quite common in relation to employment outcomes. If you have ever attended an interview skills workshop, you are probably aware of situations that could potentially disadvantage an applicant. The way you dress, wear your hair, walk, and talk are some variables to consider.

  Males who insist on wearing sagging pants, revealing their underwear, have a more difficult time gaining employment than others who dress more conservatively. I recall a situation in which my husband placed an order at a fast-food drive-through restaurant. When we got to the window, he noticed that the person preparing the sandwiches wore sagging pants. He canceled our order. That was profiling, because he equated the display of the worker’s underwear with being unsanitary.

  There have been studies that suggest that persons perceived as physically attractive have a better chance of employment, in comparison to those perceived as less physically attractive, by whatever measure one uses. For example, very few Fortune 500 male CEOs have beards.1 Years ago, an airline stewardess was required to be of a certain age and weight to be considered for initial and continued employment. The cliché that “blonds have more fun” is a stereotype meant to imply that female blonds may be less serious or intelligent than brunettes. In stereotyping, there is a standardized mental representation of people. The subtype of the “blond bombshell” is often associated with attractive blond-haired women. In some media presentations, blonds are portrayed in images that undermine the power of wom
en.2 As with most profiling and stereotyping, the characterization of these women is unfair and prejudicial. An excellent example of the attitude is portrayed in the movie Legally Blonde. Reese Witherspoon’s character is portrayed as a joke for enrolling in law school at Harvard University.

  Profiling is applied to the way we speak and write. In the United States, Standard English is preferable to Ebonics, and especially during job interviews. The term Ebonics was originally coined in 1973 to refer to a colloquial dialect, or variation of Standard English, spoken by some African Americans.3 It was outrageous that there were some educators, working primarily with black children in inner-city schools, who endorsed the teaching and use of Ebonics. In 1996, the Oakland California Unified School District passed a resolution declaring Ebonics the primary language of the African American students in its schools.4 Although there has been a national Ebonics debate, the use of Ebonics in “the real world” could limit future professional opportunities. Fortunately, the Oakland Ebonics resolution was later retracted. Overall, the way we speak is transferred to our writing. Persons are stigmatized if their written expressions are at variance with traditional or Standard English.

  There are other terms closely related to profiling. Discrimination is a more structured term for describing collective situations and attitudes of profiling, which is a less overt term. We may have our own unique idea of what should be classified as discrimination. When I think of that word, I think of isolating differences. A formal definition is that discrimination is the process by which two stimuli differing in some aspect are responded to differently. This difference in response is identified as prejudice when there is a different treatment or favor on a basis other than individual merit.5 Much has been written about the concepts of racism, prejudice, and discrimination; they have been talked about extensively within popular media and social science circles; and numerous laws have been designed to address these issues. Yet it is easy to confuse racism and prejudice. I favor the distinction proposed by researcher Wornie Reed. She reports that racial prejudice and racism both refer to ways in which people devalue, demean, and disadvantage others. She further proposes that racial prejudice is a negative attitude, judgment, or feeling about a person and is generalized from beliefs about the group to which the person belongs. Racism is the behavioral manifestation of that racial prejudice.6 A related conclusion, proposed by Pat Bido, is that power plus prejudice equals racism.7

  If I detailed descriptions of all of the laws aimed at voiding society of discrimination based on race, I would need to produce volumes of books. In this chapter, I will discuss those situations related to police brutality in opposition to the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, adopted on July 9, 1868. This amendment addressed citizenship rights and equal protection of the laws, in response to the treatment of former slaves after the American Civil War.8 This amendment, which has generated more lawsuits than any other, is fascinating to me. Brown v. Board of Education is one such lawsuit that claimed a violation of citizenship rights. In that decision, the Supreme Court ruled that segregated public schools for blacks and whites were “inherently unequal” and that African Americans were denied “equal protection under the laws.” Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment is especially relevant to this discussion: It reads as follows:

  All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.9

  Can you imagine the positive social environment that would exist if all persons and organizations abided by Section One of that amendment? Society would not have needed the controversial and misunderstood law of affirmative action, established as an attempt to mandate fairness. Also, the collective “isms” of sexism, racism, ageism, and classism, some of the more visible signs of discrimination, would be nonexistent. But the law is ignored too often, resulting in a seemingly endless number of lawsuits.

  Affirmative action refers to various government policies aimed to increase the proportion of African Americans, women, and other minorities in jobs and educational institutions historically dominated by white men.10 I hasten to add that many think that affirmative action is designed to hire unqualified persons to “colorize” the office. My personal attitude is that intelligence and talent are distributed among all categories of people. When we discriminate solely based on skin color, we may eliminate the one person who has the cure for cancer, for instance. I have heard some people, even women, say, “I would never vote for a woman to become president of the United States.” That is a clear example of sexism. A female candidate could be the most qualified potential leader. So far in America, unlike in some other countries, this theory has not been tested. Many believe that African Americans have been overwhelmingly advantaged by affirmative action. The fact is that the persons most advantaged by affirmative action are white females.11

  Based on the intent of the Fourteenth Amendment, the government required that all persons be treated with equal concern and respect. Throughout the years, there have been actions to circumvent the law. After the Civil War, the Southern states began enacting the Black Codes in 1865 and 1866 to deprive African Americans of many basic rights afforded to white Americans. The laws were specifically designed to replace the social controls of slavery and ensure continuance of white supremacy.12 Essentially, these laws would trump the provisions of the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery. The Black Codes authorized more severe punishments for African Americans than would be imposed on white persons for committing the same criminal offense. African Americans continue to complain about that practice because it still exists. The label “Black Codes” has gone away. Today, it is called “justice” and sometimes feels like “just us.” According to Nkechi Taifa, during the past fifty years, the United States has moved from overt racist lynchings and blatant discrimination to mass incarceration as its punishment of choice.13

  Black prisoners are given nearly 20 percent longer sentences than whites for the same crime. The research confirms that the racial divide in sentencing has even widened since the US Supreme Court struck down the Booker ruling in 1984, a law requiring judges to impose sentences within the predetermined sentencing guidelines. After that ruling, judges were allowed personal discretion in determining the length of sentences. That change has resulted in a resurgence of the Black Codes, because blacks, on average, received longer sentences than whites did for similar offenses.14 Overall, black males were treated differently by the criminal justice system, in comparison to white males.

  At this juncture, the discussion of profiling, prejudice, and racial inequities may not necessarily imply behavior that leads to death. However, my review of some historical events in America has caused me to pause and ponder certain questions that continue to haunt me. Did Leslie’s race precipitate the outcome of his interaction with police officers? Could he have been a victim of behaviors guided by a modern-day version of the Black Codes? I suspect the fact that Leslie was a young, African American male contributed to his death. Attitudes are deeply ingrained and can be difficult to change, including attitudes of police officers. These attitudes, whether positive or negative, can impact one’s behavior in the workplace, regardless of the chosen profession. Decisions and behaviors are influenced by attitudes.

  Unlike in some other professions, the decisions and actions of law enforcement officials can directly and instantly affect matters of life or death. A police officer’s attitudes comprise a serious component of that officer’s effectiveness. More precisely, negative attitudes by some police officers toward certain populations impact their selection of strategies to maintain law
and order. Attitudes formed by police officers in the treatment or maltreatment of black men, especially, are the result of years of input and complexity of experiences.15 Those who have internalized these negative attitudes are prone to actions commonly labeled as racial profiling, which can lead to police brutality.

  As a social scientist and an African American mother of two African American sons, I had long been aware of the general stereotype of racial profiling, the concept of attributing negative attitudes toward persons of color. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, racial profiling refers to the discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual’s race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin.16 This suspicion is often used as an excuse to assume that an individual is engaging in criminal behavior or preparing to participate in criminal activities. Some may even applaud racial profiling as a proactive strategy in decreasing possible criminal acts.

  It is unfortunate that people make assumptions about others merely because of skin pigmentation. Beginning with my childhood years, I had always been socialized to not worry about what people thought about me because of the color of my skin. I was raised in Tennessee by strong grandparents, originally from rural Alabama, who provided a foundation for me to develop a positive self-concept that did not allow others to define me. In many instances, including within my subsequent professional experiences, I determined that their advice was good to follow. It served me well throughout the years, and allowed me to thrive within environments in which there were few, if any, other persons of color.