NEW JERSEY
Gov't admits police target Black, Latino drivers
By Greg
Butterfield
Protest is growing in New Jersey over the now-admitted State
Police policy of "racial profiling"--the singling out of Black
and Latino motorists for abuse. It has been the common practice
of state troopers--not only in New Jersey, but nationwide--for
many years.
But the now-blossoming movement to end this form of police
brutality was sparked by the April 23, 1998, shooting of four
unarmed young men--three Black and one Latino--by two white New
Jersey troopers.
The Black Ministers Council of New Jersey organized a
demonstration outside the State Capitol in Trenton on the
anniversary of the shooting. The Rev. Al Sharpton, who led mass
civil-disobedience actions against police brutality in New
York, said he would conduct similar protests in Trenton if
community demands are not met by May 10.
The four men were on their way to a basketball camp in North
Carolina when they were pulled over on the New Jersey Turnpike
and shot at by the cops. Two of the men, Rayshawn Brown and
Leroy Grant, were asleep in the van when they were shot.
Keyshon Moore and Danny Reyes were shot while raising their
hands.
Afterward, the men were forced to lie in a ditch and were
strip-searched before paramedics were allowed to help them,
according to a civil-rights lawsuit filed on their behalf April
23. The two cops also face criminal charges, but have not been
indicted.
"It's been a hard-fought year for all of us," Leroy Grant
told the Associated Press. "We don't know why we got shot. We
still don't know why the van got stopped."
Racism: a state policy
On April 21, Republican Gov. Christine Todd Whitman and
state Attorney General Peter G. Verniero released an official
study which found that "Minority motorists have been treated
differently than non-minority motorists during the course of
traffic stops on the New Jersey Turnpike. We conclude the
problem of disparate treatment is real--not imagined."
According to the report, 77.2 percent of motorist searches
were of Black and Latino drivers, and only 21.4 percent were of
whites.
"We do not believe that any reasonable person in New Jersey
is surprised at all today to hear this acknowledgment," said
the Rev. Reginald Jackson, executive director of the Black
Ministers Council.
Verniero continues to deny any prior knowledge of the racist
abuses of the State Police, who are under the direction of his
office. For years--first as Governor Whitman's chief of staff,
and later as attorney general--Verniero aggressively defended
the police against brutality charges.
Before the Senate Judiciary Committee in Trenton April 26,
Verniero refused to take responsibility. "Based on briefings I
received, I did not consider [`racial profiling'] important,"
Verniero testified.
The next day, he angered Black and Latino legislators by
boycotting a hearing they organized to gather community
testimony about "racial profiling." But damning evidence
continued to spill out.
Philip J. Moran, the attorney for State Trooper Emblez
Longoria, testified there. Two months before the shooting of
the men in the van, Moran said, his client heard a police
supervisor coaching the same two cops to stop Black
motorists.
Longoria could not appear himself. Under State Police
regulations, he is restricted from speaking publicly about the
matter.
DeShantel Tribbet, a Black woman, told of her experience at
the hands of state troopers. Tribbet was verbally abused,
thrown against a police van and arrested in front of her
frightened 4-year-old son.
Union opposes motel `profiling'
On April 27, the Newark Star-Ledger broke the story of a
State Police program enlisting motel employees to snitch on
"suspicious" guests--particularly Latinos and Spanish-speaking
people, hotel workers said.
David Feeback, president and business manager of Hotel and
Restaurant Employees Local 69 in Seacaucus, said his members
protested when hotel management tried to force them to join the
program several months ago.
"We didn't want our members participating in anything that
had any undertone of racial profiling," Feeback told the
Star-Ledger.
Meanwhile, the NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union and
other groups called on Congress to enact the Traffic Stops
Statistics Study Act introduced by Rep. John Conyers to help
curb "racial profiling" nationally.
The Conyers bill would require the U.S. Justice Department
to study routine traffic stops by local police. Preliminary
studies have shown that African Americans make up less than 15
percent of drivers, but account for 72 percent of all routine
traffic stops, said the April 17 Amsterdam News.
The United States Justice Department concluded its own
investigation of the N.J. State Police in late April. The
federal study found enough evidence to sue the State Police for
violations of civil rights. But on April 30, Washington
announced it was entering negotiations with New Jersey
officials to reach a quiet out-of-court settlement.
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