The Long Arm (and Heavy Hand) of the Law in Baltimore

nighttimer

No Gods No Masters
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 4, 2006
Messages
11,629
Reaction score
4,103
Location
CBUS
The U.S. Justice Department issued its findings how The Baltimore Police Department handles policing. It's not good and it's terrible if you're Black.

“BPD Conducts Unconstitutional Strip Searches”

“Numerous Baltimore residents interviewed by the Justice Department recounted stories of BPD officers ‘jumping out’ of police vehicles and strip-searching individuals on public streets. BPD has long been on notice of such allegations: in the last five years BPD has faced multiple lawsuits and more than 60 complaints alleging unlawful strip searches. In one of these incidents — memorialized in a complaint that the Department sustained — officers in BPD’s Eastern District publicly strip-searched a woman following a routine traffic stop for a missing headlight. Officers ordered the woman to exit her vehicle, remove her clothes, and stand on the sidewalk to be searched. The woman asked the male officer in charge, “I really gotta take all my clothes off?” The male officer replied “yeah” and ordered a female officer to strip search the woman. The female officer then put on purple latex gloves, pulled up the woman’s shirt and searched around her bra. Finding no weapons or contraband around the woman’s chest, the officer then pulled down the woman’s underwear and searched her anal cavity. This search again found no evidence of wrongdoing and the officers released the woman without charges. Indeed, the woman received only a repair order for her headlight. “


“BPD Ignored Prosecutors’ Warnings Against Problem Officers”


“Even where prosecutors have provided BPD with specific information on problematic officers who routinely make improper arrests, searches, or seizures, the Department has failed to meaningfully investigate the information or take appropriate action. For several years, the State’s Attorney’s Office maintained a ‘Do Not Call’ list of officers that prosecutors should not subpoena to testify because prosecutors determined that the officers did not testify credibly about their enforcement actions. Although the State’s Attorney’s Office regularly shared this list with BPD, the Department rarely used the information to identify officers who may need support or discipline. As a result, problematic officers remain on the street, detaining, searching, and arresting people even though the State’s Attorney’s Office has determined that it cannot prosecute a crime based on the officers’ testimony. The State’s Attorney’s Office no longer maintains a written ‘Do Not Call’ list, but prosecutors informally maintain a registry of problematic BPD officers who cannot be used to support criminal prosecutions. In recent years, the State’s Attorney’s Office has contacted BPD leadership on several occasions to identify officers that prosecutors determined can no longer testify credibly due to misconduct. In most of these cases, BPD leadership took no action against the identified problem officers.”


“BPD Arrests People Lawfully Present on Baltimore Streets in Violation of Due Process”

“We found evidence that BPD supervisors have explicitly condoned trespassing arrests that do not meet constitutional standards, and evidence suggesting that trespassing enforcement is focused on public housing developments. A shift commander for one of BPD’s districts emailed a template for describing trespassing arrests to a sergeant and a patrol officer. The template provides a blueprint for arresting an individual standing on or near a public housing development who cannot give a ‘valid reason’ for being there—a facially unconstitutional detention. Equally troubling is the fact that the template contains blanks to be filled in for details of the arrest, including the arrest data and location and the suspect’s name and address, but does not include a prompt to fill in the race or gender of the arrestee. Rather, the words “black male” are automatically included in the description of the arrest. The supervisor’s template thus presumes that individuals arrested for trespassing will be African American.

“One African-American man in his mid-fifties was stopped 30 times in less than four years. The only reasons provided for these stops were officers’ suspicion that the man was ‘loitering’ or ‘trespassing,’ or as part of a ‘CDS investigation.’ On at least 15 occasions, officers detained the man while they checked to see if he had outstanding warrants. Despite these repeated intrusions, none of the 30 stops resulted in a citation or criminal charge.”


No good reason for a stop? “Then make something up”


Officers often targeted black pedestrians for stops without reasonable suspicion. Based on a sample of about 7,200 cases, only 1 out of every 27 pedestrian stops resulted in a citation or arrest.

Such stops would often occur under a supervisor’s directive’s to “clear corners,” a practice of stopping and questioning a group and ordering them to scatter. During a ride-along with Justice Department officials, a sergeant told a patrol officer to “clear a corner,” but the patrol officer said he had no reason to stop them.

“The sergeant replied, ‘Then make something up.’”
 

waylander

Who's going for a beer?
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 24, 2005
Messages
8,278
Reaction score
1,567
Age
65
Location
London, UK
What percentage of BPD officers are black?
 

regdog

The Scavengers
Staff member
Moderator
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Apr 27, 2008
Messages
58,075
Reaction score
21,013
Location
She/Her
Perhaps at some point in my life I'll understand the necessity for an anal cavity search in relation to a missing headlight. But I doubt it.



This gives some comparison of national police departments.

New York Times Link
 

rugcat

Lost in the Fog
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Sep 27, 2005
Messages
16,339
Reaction score
4,110
Location
East O' The Sun & West O' The Moon
Website
www.jlevitt.com
What percentage of BPD officers are black?
About half of Baltimore's police officers are African-American. Since Baltimore is a majority African-American city, that still means they are under- represented, but not by much.

Baltimore’s police department has a lower percentage of blacks than the population it serves. But in contrast to other cities that have been wracked by tension and protests over police confrontations with black men, the city’s mayor, its police commissioner, the state’s attorney are all black, giving a somewhat different tenor to clashes between the power structure and its critics.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/09/03/us/the-race-gap-in-americas-police-departments.html

Also, the power structure in Baltimore – the mayor, police chief, etc. are African-American. So the problem is not really as simple as white cops who are racist and treating black people badly.

What I keep harping on is that we as a society are creating a permanent underclass composed of minorities , especially African-Americans – and this underclass, lacking in opportunity, education, and even the possibility of financial stability, is more prone to criminality than middle-class society.

The police, both black and white, begin to view that community as lesser than "normal citizens, not worthy of protection or even constitutional rights. The african-American community as a whole is rapidly becoming seen by police as "the enemy," the other, who need to be controlled by any means necessary. Not surprisingly, the African-American community views the police as the enemy as well.

I remember reading a quote from a black lieutenant in Baltimore who admitted developing some racial bias saying it's hard to keep an objective view when all day long on the police radio you hear "armed robbery, suspect described as black male."

The Baltimore Police Department sounds really terrible. And it certainly needs to be reformed.

But I still say the ultimate problem is one where minorities are, as I said, becoming a permanent underclass, and reforming police departments is not going to change things all that much. There needs to be a comprehensive social change before it's too late and we really do become two separate and unequal societies with no way out.
 

nighttimer

No Gods No Masters
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 4, 2006
Messages
11,629
Reaction score
4,103
Location
CBUS
What I keep harping on is that we as a society are creating a permanent underclass composed of minorities , especially African-Americans – and this underclass, lacking in opportunity, education, and even the possibility of financial stability, is more prone to criminality than middle-class society.

The police, both black and white, begin to view that community as lesser than "normal citizens, not worthy of protection or even constitutional rights. The african-American community as a whole is rapidly becoming seen by police as "the enemy," the other, who need to be controlled by any means necessary. Not surprisingly, the African-American community views the police as the enemy as well.

I remember reading a quote from a black lieutenant in Baltimore who admitted developing some racial bias saying it's hard to keep an objective view when all day long on the police radio you hear "armed robbery, suspect described as black male."

The Baltimore Police Department sounds really terrible. And it certainly needs to be reformed.

But I still say the ultimate problem is one where minorities are, as I said, becoming a permanent underclass, and reforming police departments is not going to change things all that much. There needs to be a comprehensive social change before it's too late and we really do become two separate and unequal societies with no way out.

I don't disagree with the suggestion both sides need to change and reform, but the immediate problem is how police like the ones in Baltimore must reform. It is far easier to reform how police work with communities of color than it is to reform decades of poverty, lack of opportunity for upward growth, broken schools, busted families, drugs, addiction and all the other ills than plague Black and Latino citizens. Fixing this would take an inner city version of the Marshall Plan and nobody's proposing one. Not Clinton and certainly not Johnson or Trump.

Yet even if there were massive investment of money and resources to fix the urban dysfunction of the cities, it would not remedy the sorry state of the Baltimore Police Department whose problems go beyond their racially discriminatory approach to law enforcement. Just as troubling is how the BPD handles sexual assault victims with a mixture of disdain and contempt from Page 122 of the Justice Department report:

Our investigation also raised serious concerns about how BPD responds to and investigates reports of sexual assault.

1. Evidence of Gender Bias in BPD’s Response to Sexual Assault
a.Treatment of Victims of Sexual Assault


By its very nature, sexual assault is a crime about which it can be difficult to ascertain the facts: for example, sexual assault often occurs in a private setting, with no witnesses other than the people involved as the victim and suspect, and victims of sexual assault are often reluctant to report the assault, particularly to law enforcement. For that reason, victim advocates—who act as confidantes and guides for victims as they navigate the criminal justice system, and whose role affords them a unique perspective from which to identify patterns in their clients’ experiences—play a critical role in providing information about sexual assaults to BPD.

The information provided to us by victim advocates, and, in some cases, by victims of sexual assault themselves, together with our review of BPD’s sexual assault case files and related documents, raise serious concerns about gender bias in BPD’s treatment of victims of sexual assault. For instance, officers and detectives in BPD’s Sex Offense Unit often question victims in a manner that puts the blame for the sexual assault on the victim’s shoulders—for example, with questions suggesting the victims should feel personally responsible for the potential consequences of a criminal report on a suspect or for having engaged in behavior that invited the assault. In their interviews of women reporting sexual assault, for example, BPD detectives ask questions such as “Why are you messing that guy’s life up?” BPD officers and detectives also asked questions suggesting that they discredit the reports of victims who delayed in reporting the assault to the police. This type of questioning is inappropriate in a detective interview of a potential victim of sexual assault and suggests gender bias by the detectives.

We were also troubled by statements of BPD detectives suggesting an undue skepticism of reports of sexual assault. One victim advocate told us about a detective in the BPD Sex Offense Unit making comments at a party, in the company of BPD officers and victim advocates, that, “in homicide, there are real victims; all our cases are bullshit.” When another person suggested the detective soften the statement, the detective added, “Ok, 90 percent.” We also reviewed e-mail correspondence between a BPD officer and a prosecutor in which they openly expressed their contempt for and disbelief of a woman who had reported a sexual assault: the prosecutor wrote that “this case is crazy. . . I am not excited about charging it. This victim seems like a conniving little whore. (pardon my language).”; the BPD officer replied, “Lmao! I feel the same.”

The rot and decay of the Baltimore Police Department cannot be addressed by shifting the blame on the Black community. To be certain, communities of color need to clean up their own house in order not to make the job so difficult and dangerous for law enforcement. But those charged with the responsibility of enforcing the law and protecting the citizens cannot shirk their own need for a good through cleaning with a broom, dustpan and mop from the brass at the top to cop on the beat.
 
Last edited:

Don

All Living is Local
Super Member
Registered
Joined
May 28, 2008
Messages
24,567
Reaction score
4,007
Location
Agorism FTW!
I don't disagree with the suggestion both sides need to change and reform, but the immediate problem is how police like the ones in Baltimore must reform. It is far easier to reform how police work with communities of color than it is to reform decades of poverty, lack of opportunity for upward growth, broken schools, busted families, drugs, addiction and all the other ills than plague Black and Latino citizens. Fixing this would take an inner city version of the Marshall Plan and nobody's proposing one. Not Clinton and certainly not Johnson or Trump.
I agree with all you had to say about the BPD. It's a disgrace.

It's worth noting that Bill Weld, Johnson's VP pick, served as the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts from 1981 to 1986 and as the head of the Department of Justice Criminal Division from 1986 to 1988, so he may have a better handle on the issue than either of the other parties. While they didn't propose a Marshall Plan, they do recognize the seriousness of the situation. Here's a bit from the CNN Town Hall on 8/3.
Shetamia Taylor:How do you feel about the Black Lives Matter movement?

Johnson: What it has done for me is that my head has been in the sand on this, that's what it's done for me. I think we've all had our heads in the sand. Let's wake up. This discrimination does exist, it has existed, and for me personally; slap, slap, wake up.

Weld: I think we have a national emergency in the number of male black youth who are unemployed without prospects. They're four times as likely to be incarcerated if they have intersection with law enforcement as white people are, their educational opportunities are not there. We have to get them into education and just concentrate the power of the government trying to make sure there are jobs available for them. It's a national emergency and when there's a national emergency, the government has to respond, libertarian or no libertarian.
It's perhaps also worth noting that the Libertarian Party and libertarians in general have been very supportive of criminal justice reform since long before it became a blip on the major parties' radar. They noted, and lamented, the disparity in sentencing between cocaine and crack cocaine, and the racial element of that sentencing, back in the days when Hillary supported those same sentencing guidelines.
 
Last edited:

nighttimer

No Gods No Masters
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 4, 2006
Messages
11,629
Reaction score
4,103
Location
CBUS
About half of Baltimore's police officers are African-American. Since Baltimore is a majority African-American city, that still means they are under- represented, but not by much.

Also, the power structure in Baltimore – the mayor, police chief, etc. are African-American. So the problem is not really as simple as white cops who are racist and treating black people badly.

I don't think it is as easy as falling back on a pat line like "the cops are racist." That's too broad a brush to paint with. However, there is a culture within cop shops making it hard for cops who don't want to conform to the dominant paradigm to co-exist with their brothers and sisters in blue that do.
The Department of Justice report on the Baltimore Police Department chronicled a history of abusive behavior from law enforcement. But one anecdote in the lengthy document released this week showed that when some cops try to hold their colleagues accountable, they better be prepared for backlash.

According to the DOJ, a black police sergeant, known for calling out wrongdoing among his peers, was consistently harassed with passive-aggressive signs by a lieutenant:

In 2014, a BPD lieutenant placed several signs next to the desk of an African-American sergeant with a reputation for speaking out about alleged misconduct in the Department. Among the signs were warnings to "stay in your lane," "worry about yourself," "mind your own business!!" and "don’t spread rumors!!!" After the sergeant filed a complaint about the signs, the lieutenant admitted to creating them and placing them next to the sergeant’s desk. Yet BPD took no meaningful corrective action. Though the complaint was sustained, the lieutenant received no suspension, fine, or loss of benefits. Instead, he was given only "verbal counseling" instructing him that such behavior is "unprofessional and inappropriate." This minimal response to admitted allegations that a supervisor warned his subordinate to "mind your own business" rather than report misconduct underlines BPD’s failure to create a culture of accountability.

The anecdote highlights a widespread problem many critics have pointed out among police departments: the "blue wall of silence," an unofficial code among cops that when a fellow officer is accused of wrongdoing, it’s better to say nothing than to condemn a fellow officer.


On the surface, it’s a tactic to build camaraderie: If someone finds himself facing charges of misconduct, the blue wall of silence creates a kind reprieve that he won’t face problems because his fellow officers have his back as long as he doesn’t turn his back on them.


But as the report showed, without accountability, the kinds of unadulterated racial biases that erode community trust in police and police credibility fester into the endemic problems the department faces today.

It's not only Black officers who learn quickly to keep their mouths shut and their opinions to themselves. White cops quickly learn its better to go along and get with the program. The nail that sticks up gets hammered down.
 

DancingMaenid

New kid...seven years ago!
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Aug 7, 2007
Messages
5,058
Reaction score
460
Location
United States
I think that while poverty is obviously a huge problem, part of the issue is that people notice and focus on the wrong things. Young black men joining gangs is a problem. Young black men wearing their hair in cornrows and wearing baggy pants and goodies isn't. There's a lot of bias against things like dress, speech, and even names that are considered "ghetto." Both white and black parents who give their kids unusual names are often mocked, but with white parents, the stereotype is that they're yuppie helicopter parents who want their kids to be special. With black parents, the stereotype is that they're "ghetto" and "welfare queens."

I think there's a lot of unfair bias against people who come across as being poor, even without high crime levels in poor neighborhoods. I think there's a big problem in the justice system, in general, with middle-class and affluent suspects/defendants being seen as more sympathetic and relatable, regardless of their crime.
 

rugcat

Lost in the Fog
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Sep 27, 2005
Messages
16,339
Reaction score
4,110
Location
East O' The Sun & West O' The Moon
Website
www.jlevitt.com
I think that while poverty is obviously a huge problem, part of the issue is that people notice and focus on the wrong things. Young black men joining gangs is a problem. Young black men wearing their hair in cornrows and wearing baggy pants and goodies isn't. There's a lot of bias against things like dress, speech, and even names that are considered "ghetto." Both white and black parents who give their kids unusual names are often mocked, but with white parents, the stereotype is that they're yuppie helicopter parents who want their kids to be special. With black parents, the stereotype is that they're "ghetto" and "welfare queens."

I think there's a lot of unfair bias against people who come across as being poor, even without high crime levels in poor neighborhoods. I think there's a big problem in the justice system, in general, with middle-class and affluent suspects/defendants being seen as more sympathetic and relatable, regardless of their crime.
I think a lot of what we see as racism is as much classism than is racism.

There are certainly out and out racists who denigrate African-Americans no matter what their individual attributes or accomplishments. But I think the majority of those with racist tendencies focus on the culture and appearance of poor urban blacks, (the underclass) as opposed to African-Americans in general.

@nighttimer:

I'm not saying that we shouldn't reform departments like Baltimore, top to bottom. That is indeed something specific that can and should be done. I'm only saying that anyone who believes that alone will solve the very basic problems of the black community/police disfunctional relationship will be disappointed.
 

Vince524

Are you gonna finish that bacon?
Super Member
Registered
Joined
May 8, 2010
Messages
15,903
Reaction score
4,652
Location
In a house
Website
vincentmorrone.com
I think a lot of what we see as racism is as much classism than is racism.

There are certainly out and out racists who denigrate African-Americans no matter what their individual attributes or accomplishments. But I think the majority of those with racist tendencies focus on the culture and appearance of poor urban blacks, (the underclass) as opposed to African-Americans in general.

@nighttimer:

I'm not saying that we shouldn't reform departments like Baltimore, top to bottom. That is indeed something specific that can and should be done. I'm only saying that anyone who believes that alone will solve the very basic problems of the black community/police disfunctional relationship will be disappointed.

Yeah, I didn't take your initial response as saying that either. Sometimes the driving force isn't racism. Either way, it needs to be addressed. And it's the actions we need to concentrate on. And the policies. Some departments are far, far worse. This seems to be one of them.

I mean, you're going to do searches when you arrest someone. I've been there back in my cadet days where they had a prisoner arrested on possession for crack (I think, it was a couple of decades ago.) And the cop was doing his normal search in the cell, and a blade was in their underwear. I've heard of other things being found in body cavity searches, but you don't do that type of search until after an arrest. A field search is different. You need to look for weapons most of all. Each dept. should have procedures in place.

Chicago:
II.Responsibilities

  • A.Members taking persons into custody or accepting custody from other members will be responsible for conducting a thorough search in accordance with established Department procedures.


  • B.Field searches will be conducted by a member who is the same gender as the arrestee; however, if a member of the same gender is not immediately available, officer or public safety is compromised, and it is imperative that an immediate search be conducted, members will not endanger themselves or the public to comply with this requirement.

    NOTE:A field search is defined in the Department directive entitled "Interrogations: Field and Custodial."

  • C.Lockup personnel will scan arrestees with a metal detecting device to ensure against concealment of weapons.


  • D.Strip Searches

    • 1.Arrestees will not be subjected to a strip search
      Strip SearchX
      The removal or rearrangement of some or all of the clothing of an arrestee to permit a visual inspection of the genitals, buttocks, anus, female breasts, or undergarments.

      for any offense unless specific factors are present which establish reasonable belief that the search will uncover a weapon or contraband.


    • 2.Discretion and good judgment will be used when conducting a strip search. The arrestee will not be required to remain unclothed any longer than is absolutely necessary.


    • 3.All strip searches will be conducted by a member of the same gender, in a secure area, and isolated from the view of others. No touching of body cavities, other than the mouth, is permitted by Department members.


    • 4.Strip searches will ordinarily be conducted in a police lockup and include prior written approval of the station supervisor using the Report of Strip Search (CPD-11.521).



If you have a person in your custody, you have to verify they have no weapon, not only for your protection, but the protection of other's in the cell. It's standard. But on the streets? I don't think I ever saw more than a pat down. Not removal of any clothing.

Poorer neighborhoods don't have the clout to raise the same stinks as well to do communities. If this is a common practice, a procedural one, it needs to be addressed and stopped. If it's not, but it's happening against procedure, then the officers doing it need to be disciplined.

From what's in the OP a lot of this seems to be SOP for that department. So the focus needs to be on the people setting the standards and creating that culture.