New numbers show Portland’s police are pointing their guns at
African Americans more often than they are at the city’s white
residents, and that per capita, African Americans are five times more
likely to have force used against them in a police encounter than
whites.
Of 87,004 arrests made citywide between September 2004 and December
2006, 23,351—or 27 percent—of suspects were African
American, though they make up seven percent of Portland’s population,
according to the 2000 census. Meanwhile, 29 percent of the cops’ 9,140
use-of-force incidents over the same period involved African Americans,
according to numbers Chief Rosie Sizer gave to the city’s Racial
Profiling Committee on December 20.
Over the same period, 51,529 white people were arrested citywide,
accounting for 59 percent of total arrests; 75 percent of Portland’s
population is white. Force, however, was used against white people in
just 56 percent—or 5,125—of all use-of-force incidents.
African Americans were also more likely than whites to have a gun
pointed at them instead of a Taser, in a use-of-force incident: They
faced firearms 1,039 times over the period—or 30 percent of all
gun encounters—and faced Tasers 421 times, or 28 percent of all
Taser encounters. Meanwhile, whites faced guns 1,942 times, in 55
percent of gun encounters, and Tasers 881 times, in 59 percent of such
encounters.
“Deadly force is the most serious force an officer can use,” says
Copwatch activist Dan Handelman. “And it appears, for whatever reason,
officers feel more threatened by African American suspects than they do
by white suspects.”
Hispanics, too, had guns pointed at them more often than
Tasers—accounting for 11 percent and eight percent of such
encounters, respectively. Hispanics are seven percent of Portland’s
population.
The statistics are important because the Portland Police Bureau’s
representatives have often tried to justify higher rates of traffic
stops, person searches, and drug-free zone exclusions of African
Americans by saying that statistically in Portland, black people commit
more crimes. Based on that logic, the new stats suggest cops may feel
that black criminals are more frightening and violent, too.
Handelman is concerned that a report on use of force released last
spring by the Independent Police Review (IPR) chose not to include data
on race for this reason.
“I just hope the IPR and the police bureau didn’t keep hold of this
data for so long because the numbers are so skewed,” he says.
IPR Director Leslie Stevens and City Auditor Gary Blackmer declined
to comment.
Meanwhile, Police Chief Rosie Sizer was slated to present a report
to council on Wednesday, January 16, regarding the progress of the
mayor’s Racial Profiling Committee since it first convened a year ago.
She was also unavailable for comment on Tuesday.
“I haven’t looked at this latest round of statistics,” says Jo Ann
Bowman of Oregon Action, who is due to co-present to council along with
Sizer this week. “But I’m going to assume they are like every other set
of statistics collected by the police bureau in that people of color
are over-represented.
“But if we take the police at their word,” she continues, “then we
have to look not just at these numbers but behind them, into what they
might mean.”
On that front, Bowman says the committee is making progress. “I’d
say we’re getting to the place we can have conversations about specific
incidents without it being ‘all cops are racist’ or ‘the community
doesn’t know what’s going on.'”