91172.pdf

82 3 Police and Law Enforcement—Civil Forcnsics

Suggestions for Future Research

Ciiven the increasing public awareness and citizen complaints regarding police use of

force, brutality, and "attitude," such nonconventional tactics are worthy of additional

research and consideration on the policy level. Certainly, additional research needs

to be done on the effectiveness of nonconventional tactics and their applicability to

various situations. The lack of officer training in nonconventional techniques and

communication skills in general makes them difficult to employ and even more dif-

ficult to measure in terms of their effectiveness. Situations such as Henry's provide

convincing evidence of the positive benefits of communication and nonthreatemng

and nonforceful measures by the police. The fact that, as of yet, appropriate edu-

cation and training is often not supplied renders only speculative accounts of the

effectiveness and usefulness of these methods.

POLICING MINORITY POPULATIONS

Introduction

Research has demonstrated that police officers are given discretion in enforcing
victimless crimes such as traffic violations (Hecker, 1997; SchifFerle, 1997). As a
result, a police officer's personal biases may have an effect on whom he or she
chooses to stop. Research from the 1970s indicates that in predominantly African
American precincts in Boston, Chicago, and Washington, over three-quarters of the
Caucasian policemen expressed highly prejudiced attitudes (Wintersmith, 1974).
More recent occurrences do not indicate that police attitudes toward minorities,
particularly African Americans, have changed. Despite ex-Los Angeles Police De-
partment (LAPD) officer Mark Fuhrmans outward expression of racism, making
statements such as "Anything out of a nigger's mouth for the first five or six sen-
tences is a f... lie.. ." (Texeira, 1995, p. 235), he was not fired from the police
department. Instead, Mark Fuhrman was promoted and given the best assignments
(Texeira, 1995).
Although not all police officers share the same racist attitudes, many officers say
that there is a code of silence to which they must conform, or at least pretend to
conform, based on the beliefs of other officers (Texeira, 1995). Police recruits do
not necessarily bring a racist attitude to the job with them; they learn it from older,
more experienced officers who expect the new officers to conform (Wintersmith,
1974). Because many police organizations foster racist attitudes, it is not surprising
that minorities tend to be targeted for traffic stops and for suspicion of criminal
activity (Hecker, 1997; SchifFerle, 1997; Texeira, 1995). In fact, African Americans
are targeted so much more than Caucasians that there is a violation many African
Americans refer to as D.W.B., that is, "driving while black" (Hecker, 1997). The
following scenario is an example of a traffic stop based on race, which clearly outlines