Racial profiling is a
longstanding and deeply troubling national problem despite claims that the
United States has entered a “post-racial era.” It occurs every day, in cities
and towns across the country, when law enforcement and private security target
people of color for humiliating and often frightening detentions,
interrogations, and searches without evidence of criminal activity and based on
perceived race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion.
Perceptions of Black
women as unworthy and unfit mothers inform police violence against pregnant
women like Malaika Brooks, who was shocked multiple times with 50,000 volts of
electricity by police TASERS pointed directly at her belly when she was seven
months pregnant during a traffic stop.
Indeed, Black women are perceived
by police to be both inherently inviolable and inherently violent, no matter
what their circumstances. As a result, police response to domestic violence all
too often proves deadly to Black women like Janisha Fonville, killed in early 2015
by a Charlotte police officer responding to a call for assistance during a
fight with her girlfriend, 41 or Aura Rosser, killed by Ann Arbor police
responding to an incident of domestic violence.
Reliance on police as
first responders to people in mental health crises similarly results in police
brutality, as was the case for Tanisha Anderson 43 and for Kayla Moore – a Black
transgender woman killed by Berkeley Police responding to a request for
assistance. 44 Kayla was calm when they arrived, but instead of offering her
the help she needed, the officers decided to arrest her on a warrant for a
person who bore the male name she was assigned at birth but who was 20 years
older. She died as police piled on top of her to place her under arrest until
she stopped breathing, and then refused to give her CPR. Kayla’s family
believes this was because she was trans.
Transgender and gender
non-conforming Black women routinely experience profiling, homophobic and
transphobic harassment and abuse, as well as physical, sexual and sometimes
deadly violence or neglect by police. That was the case for Duanna Johnson,
who, like so many Black women, including of course Black trans women, was
profiled for prostitution as she was walking down the street in Memphis and
arrested. She was then brutally beaten in the police station because she
wouldn’t answer to “faggot” when an officer called her over to be
fingerprinted. Like Rodney King’s, her beating was caught on video – but it
didn’t spark a national uprising.
Racial profiling is patently
illegal, violating the U.S. Constitution’s core promises of equal protection
under the law to all and freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. Just
as importantly, racial profiling is ineffective. It alienates communities from
law enforcement, hinders community policing efforts, and causes law enforcement
to lose credibility and trust among the people they are sworn to protect and
serve.
We rely on the police to protect
us from harm and promote fairness and justice in our communities. But racial
profiling has led countless people to live in fear, casting entire communities
as suspect simply because of what they look like, where they come from, or what
religion they adhere to. Unfortunately, sometimes calling cops for help can
lead to your own death or incarceration.
These women are few of the cases
that sparked an outcry on social media for justice to be done. However, the
legal system is broken and we’ve got a long way to go. Talking about it on
social media does help to spread the way which may not be reported on local
news. https://www.facebook.com/KilledByPolice/posts/934348779926593
Unfortunately, sometimes calling cops for help can lead to your own death or
incarceration.
