Were They White, Black or Hispanic? Time to Retire the Question
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"Were they white, black or hispanic?" It turns out the first mention of race during the 911 call that led to the arrest of Henry Gates came from the operator, not the caller, who's always said that she never mentioned the race of the men she'd seen. It seemed like a legitimate question to me, but not to Delores Jones Brown, Director of the Center on Race, Crime and Justice at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, who told NPR's "Morning Edition" that the question itself "alerts me to the possiblity that the Cambridge police have an issue with racial ethnic identity."
My first reaction to that—as a white former Manhattan criminal prosecutor—was outrage. If this operator doesn't get enough information to allow the police to locate and question a possible criminal, she's not doing her job. You might not think it from stories like Marjorie's about her family's encounters with racist police officers, but the cops aren't actually supposed to stop anyone without some sort of probable cause—and a description of what a suspect looks like is a pretty basic part of that. You call 911 to tell them you see someone suspicious, you want them to find the guy, right?
It sounds reasonable enough when you put it like that. But as I stewed—and as I read the transcript of the call—it became clear that race meant nothing in the context of describing these "suspects." What they were wearing, what they were doing, what they were driving—any of those might have been more helpful. "Can you describe the men?" might elicit whatever information the caller had to offer. But that's not what was asked. That's not, I suspect, what's in the script. So maybe it's true that this particular question says more about the questioning authority than about the suspect it seeks. Maybe it's time for the Cambridge police department—and a few others, I suspect—to think about what it is they're really asking.
KJ Dell'Antonia Former Manhattan lawyer and prosecutor, Xxtra Small reviewer, parent of four. Lover of books and bacon.
Comments
Not the only way to ask
By: P Starling | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 21:38
When I was a police dispatcher, I was careful to ask for race by saying, "What else can you remember? For example, was he a white guy?" This was because our primary minority (and low-income) population was Hispanic, and the city wasn't one to which anyone has ever appended the title "People's Republic of." I found I got a much better outcome by asking race without suggesting categories that might have triggered preconceptions in my caller. It sounds almost bizarrely politically correct, but it worked--I'd get either a yes, a "no, I think he was [whatever]" or an "I'm not sure." I theorize that people are really trying to help, and memory is tricky, so suggesting categories makes people latch onto them just out of a desire to have something to give you.
You can't just hope your caller's going to give you all the information without asking questions, though. I remember a 9-1-1 call from a young lady reporting a prowler in her yard. He "just seemed suspicious." So I got his location, a basic description, and then started in on clothing. No hat, blue shirt. "Can you describe his pants?" I asked, not because I had any hope she could, but because I wanted to keep her on the line for her own safety until I had officers on scene and I didn't want to freak her out by telling her I was doing it. There was a pause. Then the caller said, "Oh, he's naked from the waist down!" She'd been so rattled by the situation that it didn't even occur to her that this was a great piece of descriptive information.
This was somewhat less funny the morning a hysterical caller gave us all the information about the ex-husband who had violated a protective order--including a good description of the car he was driving--before we found out that the precipitating factor in the call was not just that the ex had shown up at the house, but that he'd shot her new boyfriend point-blank in the chest. Yes, SHE wasn't injured (we asked that immediately), but maybe we could get an ambulance for him? No, you cannot count on your callers to volunteer the right information, especially not when they're shaken.
Asking follow-up questions for description--including race--is important, but how you do it makes all the difference. There are specific questioning protocols for medical calls, but no good questioning protocols for police work, simply because the possibilities are too broad. Training's where you learn how to do it right and wrong. Perhaps Cambridge PD could use some additional racial sensitivity trainers?