Ralph Martin is 27, Black and wears dreadlocks. He estimates he’s been in a car that’s been pulled over in New Orleans at least 20 times since he was a teenager. Almost every time, an officer has asked him for identification, even if he’s not driving. When he hasn’t had his driver’s license on him, New Orleans Police Department officers have handcuffed him while they ran his name through the computer. The explanation for the handcuffs? Martin, who does not have a felony record, said police told him they needed to make sure he wasn’t a fugitive. “The best thing to do is just comply. ‘Yes, officer. OK, officer. All right. All right officers. You got that officer, thank you officer.’ And go about your business,” Martin said.But that doesn’t mean the hassle doesn’t frustrate Martin when officers stop him and his young Black friends. “They wonder why we’d be mad, why we don’t like the police. Cause y’all be messing with us for nothin’,” Martin said. “Ain’t even doing nothin.’”Bias difficult to prove George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police injected new life into a racial reckoning across the country, including in New Orleans. His homicide on the heels of the deaths of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery sent demonstrators to the streets this summer to demand equal justice and police reform. The New Orleans Police Department has touted itself as a national model for police reform as it enters its eighth year operating under a federal consent decree. The federal judge who implemented the decree hinted last year the department was nearing full compliance with its constitutional policing mandates. One of the few requirements the NOPD hasn’t fully met involves stops, searches and arrests.The most recent NOPD analysis shows the racial disparity between its stops of Black subjects and other races has grown, even under federal oversight. The data also show that once stops occurred, officers were more likely to search Black people and slightly more likely to arrest them in 2018. As a result, four times more Black people were arrested than white people.In an email response to WDSU’s questions, NOPD spokesman Ken Jones said the department “can’t audit what the officers think.” Its internal audits of the constitutionality of stops and searches “have not found systemic forms of unconstitutional policing,” he added. According to an official from the Orleans Public Defender’s office, lawyers hear from their clients on a daily basis that police stopped or searched them for no good reason. “It is very, very common for us to raise to the court concerns that our clients were searched without cause,” OPD Litigation Director Colin Reingold said. A police encounter made headlines in May after body camera video showed task force officers in the French Quarter allegedly talking to each other about how to justify, after the fact, the stop and search of a man they had arrested. Acknowledging the caught-on-camera incident at a news conference, NOPD Superintendent Shaun Ferguson said, “the public should be just as disturbed as I am,” and announced a criminal probe into the officers. At least four other cases involving the same group of officers fell apart because of constitutional issues with stops, searches or arrests, court records show. “What worries us is the number of times when we hear from our clients that they’re being stopped without appropriate cause from the constitution, but we can’t prove it,” Reingold said. Stops of Black people ‘out of whack’ with populationThe share of Black people New Orleans police stopped in 2018 was the highest since the department started tracking the data three years earlier, according to the NOPD’s own report. The federal consent decree requires NOPD to publish a report on its own stop, search and arrest data each year. The data comes from field interview cards officers use to document each stop.For 2018, about three of every four people NOPD stopped – 74% — were Black. U.S. Census Bureau statistics show Black people make up about 60% of New Orleans’ population. “It shows clearly that African Americans are being stopped above their population percentage,” New Orleans Independent Police Monitor Susan Hutson said. “You could say it’s slightly out of whack with that.” The report also shows: Stops of Black subjects increased three out of the four years for which statistics are available: 69% in 2015; 67% in 2016; 71% in 2017; and 74% in 2018. Officers conducted discretionary searches, or searches that aren’t required under NOPD policy, on 13% of Black people they stopped and 8% of white people in 2018. Discretionary searches on Black people turned up evidence 21% of the time, compared to 17% for White people. Stops of Black people in 2018 ended in an arrest 16% of the time, compared to 14% for white people. Stops of White people ended in a citation 32% of the time, compared with 26% for Black people. Traffic stops accounted for 71% of all stops. Hutson, speaking generally, said using traffic stops as a pretext to find other criminal behavior, while legal, can lead to racial disparities. 911 calls accounted for 11% of stops. From 2015-2018, civilians filed 117 complaints of bias or discrimination against NOPD officers. The department’s internal investigations did not sustain any of them, and only one allegation led to consequences for the accused officer: counseling. Police must have reasonable suspicion someone committed a crime or is about to commit a crime to stop them. Jones said factors such as demographics and the location of 911 calls play a role in stops. NOPD officers have for years have taken implicit bias training, Jones said, and emphasized a racial disparity “does not equate to bias.” Jones also characterized the variance in Black and white arrest rates as a “small difference (that) may not be a statistical difference.” Once finding probable cause, he said, officers have little to no choice whether to make an arrest. A more staggering comparison is drawn when looking at the actual number of Black people NOPD arrested during stops in 2018: 7,365 versus 1,842 for white people in 2018. A more recent analysis of field interview card data hasn’t been published. Jones said NOPD is working with federal monitors on a more sophisticated disparity study and an updated stop, search and arrest audit. ‘Jump out boys’ Following a string of incidents, including a March 2019 unauthorized police chase that ended in a deadly crash and fire at a Broadmoor hair salon, federal consent decree monitors completed a comprehensive review of NOPD task forces. Officers in the units were instructed to use proactive policing methods. The monitors’ audit included reviews of a week’s worth of body-worn and in-vehicle camera video, daily activity logs and other documentation from four of NOPD’s eight district task forces. The review found that in three of the four task forces audited from Nov. 17 to Nov. 24, 2019, “one or more task force officers engaged in questionable stops searches or arrests.” At least five incidents were questionable enough for monitors to refer them to NOPD’s Public Integrity Bureau for internal investigation. The report noted community members’ concern about the task forces, who were known among residents “and colloquially within the police department” as “jump out boys.” Monitors recommended a “meaningful review” of each district’s culture.The findings came as little surprise to Reingold, who said most complaints public defenders received about unwarranted stops or searches were from clients who had encounters with a task force or some other proactive policing unit. Police Chief Ferguson announced last month district task forces, which he suspended in May, would not return. Though district task forces were dismantled, the officers who were in them remain on the streets. Hutson said since then, she has seen the names of former task force officers appear as the target of complaints from the public. ‘A wrench in your life’By the end of 2020, New Orleans taxpayers will have spent an estimated $59.6 million on NOPD consent decree compliance, according to a city spokeswoman. Mandates related to constitutional stops searches and arrests were always among the last goals monitors expected NOPD to reach, said David Douglass, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who serves as deputy consent decree monitor. Policy, training and culture changes take time to trickle down to reach the street, he said. But those mandates are among “the most important elements of the consent decree,” Douglass told WDSU last year. “You could have the best (police) academy in the world, but if it’s not resulting in better officer performance on the street or the perception of better officer performance on the street, what’s the point?” Douglass said. Asked why officers handcuff passengers at traffic stops for lacking identification, Jones said officers are authorized to handcuff someone if they have reasonable suspicion the person committed a crime, will flee or will be physically uncooperative. Martin has a slight build and walks with a prominent limp, the result of taking a stray bullet in the knee while at a wuashateria. He said he’s never so much as copped an attitude during a traffic stop much less tried to flee.That didn’t help him, though, after an officer tapped on the passenger window of his friend’s car on Sept. 30, 2018, and asked Martin for ID. The night ended with Martin handcuffed in a police car and then sleeping in jail after his name matched warrants in states Martin had never visited. Records show a judge ordered his release the following day upon finding it was an instance of mistaken identity. If the officer gave a reason for the stop, Martin said, he can’t recall it. He said he knows better than to question a cop. He doubts the officer who initiated the stop of him and his friend while they were parked at a gas station on the outskirts of the French Quarter would ever be held accountable for the encounter. Since NOPD classified the arrest as “necessary action taken,” the officer didn’t have to write a police report. “You know, just this little bitty thing put a wrench in your life,” Martin said. “Stuff like that matter.”–Read NOPD’s 2018 stop, search and arrest report here.Read federal monitors’ special report on task forces here.
Ralph Martin is 27, Black and wears dreadlocks.
He estimates he’s been in a car that’s been pulled over in New Orleans at least 20 times since he was a teenager. Almost every time, an officer has asked him for identification, even if he’s not driving.
When he hasn’t had his driver’s license on him, New Orleans Police Department officers have handcuffed him while they ran his name through the computer. The explanation for the handcuffs? Martin, who does not have a felony record, said police told him they needed to make sure he wasn’t a fugitive.
“The best thing to do is just comply. ‘Yes, officer. OK, officer. All right. All right officers. You got that officer, thank you officer.’ And go about your business,” Martin said.
But that doesn’t mean the hassle doesn’t frustrate Martin when officers stop him and his young Black friends.
“They wonder why we’d be mad, why we don’t like the police. Cause y’all be messing with us for nothin’,” Martin said. “Ain’t even doing nothin.’”
Bias difficult to prove
George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police injected new life into a racial reckoning across the country, including in New Orleans. His homicide on the heels of the deaths of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery sent demonstrators to the streets this summer to demand equal justice and police reform.
The New Orleans Police Department has touted itself as a national model for police reform as it enters its eighth year operating under a federal consent decree. The federal judge who implemented the decree hinted last year the department was nearing full compliance with its constitutional policing mandates.
One of the few requirements the NOPD hasn’t fully met involves stops, searches and arrests.
The most recent NOPD analysis shows the racial disparity between its stops of Black subjects and other races has grown, even under federal oversight. The data also show that once stops occurred, officers were more likely to search Black people and slightly more likely to arrest them in 2018. As a result, four times more Black people were arrested than white people.
In an email response to WDSU’s questions, NOPD spokesman Ken Jones said the department “can’t audit what the officers think.” Its internal audits of the constitutionality of stops and searches “have not found systemic forms of unconstitutional policing,” he added.
According to an official from the Orleans Public Defender’s office, lawyers hear from their clients on a daily basis that police stopped or searched them for no good reason.
“It is very, very common for us to raise to the court concerns that our clients were searched without cause,” OPD Litigation Director Colin Reingold said.
A police encounter made headlines in May after body camera video showed task force officers in the French Quarter allegedly talking to each other about how to justify, after the fact, the stop and search of a man they had arrested. Acknowledging the caught-on-camera incident at a news conference, NOPD Superintendent Shaun Ferguson said, “the public should be just as disturbed as I am,” and announced a criminal probe into the officers.
At least four other cases involving the same group of officers fell apart because of constitutional issues with stops, searches or arrests, court records show.
“What worries us is the number of times when we hear from our clients that they’re being stopped without appropriate cause from the constitution, but we can’t prove it,” Reingold said.
Stops of Black people ‘out of whack’ with population
The share of Black people New Orleans police stopped in 2018 was the highest since the department started tracking the data three years earlier, according to the NOPD’s own report. The federal consent decree requires NOPD to publish a report on its own stop, search and arrest data each year. The data comes from field interview cards officers use to document each stop.
For 2018, about three of every four people NOPD stopped – 74% — were Black. U.S. Census Bureau statistics show Black people make up about 60% of New Orleans’ population.
“It shows clearly that African Americans are being stopped above their population percentage,” New Orleans Independent Police Monitor Susan Hutson said. “You could say it’s slightly out of whack with that.”
The report also shows:
- Stops of Black subjects increased three out of the four years for which statistics are available: 69% in 2015; 67% in 2016; 71% in 2017; and 74% in 2018.
- Officers conducted discretionary searches, or searches that aren’t required under NOPD policy, on 13% of Black people they stopped and 8% of white people in 2018. Discretionary searches on Black people turned up evidence 21% of the time, compared to 17% for White people.
- Stops of Black people in 2018 ended in an arrest 16% of the time, compared to 14% for white people. Stops of White people ended in a citation 32% of the time, compared with 26% for Black people.
- Traffic stops accounted for 71% of all stops. Hutson, speaking generally, said using traffic stops as a pretext to find other criminal behavior, while legal, can lead to racial disparities. 911 calls accounted for 11% of stops.
- From 2015-2018, civilians filed 117 complaints of bias or discrimination against NOPD officers. The department’s internal investigations did not sustain any of them, and only one allegation led to consequences for the accused officer: counseling.
Police must have reasonable suspicion someone committed a crime or is about to commit a crime to stop them. Jones said factors such as demographics and the location of 911 calls play a role in stops.
NOPD officers have for years have taken implicit bias training, Jones said, and emphasized a racial disparity “does not equate to bias.”
Jones also characterized the variance in Black and white arrest rates as a “small difference (that) may not be a statistical difference.” Once finding probable cause, he said, officers have little to no choice whether to make an arrest.
A more staggering comparison is drawn when looking at the actual number of Black people NOPD arrested during stops in 2018: 7,365 versus 1,842 for white people in 2018.
A more recent analysis of field interview card data hasn’t been published. Jones said NOPD is working with federal monitors on a more sophisticated disparity study and an updated stop, search and arrest audit.
‘Jump out boys’
Following a string of incidents, including a March 2019 unauthorized police chase that ended in a deadly crash and fire at a Broadmoor hair salon, federal consent decree monitors completed a comprehensive review of NOPD task forces. Officers in the units were instructed to use proactive policing methods. The monitors’ audit included reviews of a week’s worth of body-worn and in-vehicle camera video, daily activity logs and other documentation from four of NOPD’s eight district task forces.
The review found that in three of the four task forces audited from Nov. 17 to Nov. 24, 2019, “one or more task force officers engaged in questionable stops searches or arrests.” At least five incidents were questionable enough for monitors to refer them to NOPD’s Public Integrity Bureau for internal investigation.
The report noted community members’ concern about the task forces, who were known among residents “and colloquially within the police department” as “jump out boys.” Monitors recommended a “meaningful review” of each district’s culture.
The findings came as little surprise to Reingold, who said most complaints public defenders received about unwarranted stops or searches were from clients who had encounters with a task force or some other proactive policing unit.
Police Chief Ferguson announced last month district task forces, which he suspended in May, would not return.
Though district task forces were dismantled, the officers who were in them remain on the streets. Hutson said since then, she has seen the names of former task force officers appear as the target of complaints from the public.
‘A wrench in your life’
By the end of 2020, New Orleans taxpayers will have spent an estimated $59.6 million on NOPD consent decree compliance, according to a city spokeswoman. Mandates related to constitutional stops searches and arrests were always among the last goals monitors expected NOPD to reach, said David Douglass, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who serves as deputy consent decree monitor.
Policy, training and culture changes take time to trickle down to reach the street, he said. But those mandates are among “the most important elements of the consent decree,” Douglass told WDSU last year.
“You could have the best (police) academy in the world, but if it’s not resulting in better officer performance on the street or the perception of better officer performance on the street, what’s the point?” Douglass said.
Asked why officers handcuff passengers at traffic stops for lacking identification, Jones said officers are authorized to handcuff someone if they have reasonable suspicion the person committed a crime, will flee or will be physically uncooperative.
Martin has a slight build and walks with a prominent limp, the result of taking a stray bullet in the knee while at a wuashateria. He said he’s never so much as copped an attitude during a traffic stop much less tried to flee.
That didn’t help him, though, after an officer tapped on the passenger window of his friend’s car on Sept. 30, 2018, and asked Martin for ID. The night ended with Martin handcuffed in a police car and then sleeping in jail after his name matched warrants in states Martin had never visited. Records show a judge ordered his release the following day upon finding it was an instance of mistaken identity.
If the officer gave a reason for the stop, Martin said, he can’t recall it. He said he knows better than to question a cop. He doubts the officer who initiated the stop of him and his friend while they were parked at a gas station on the outskirts of the French Quarter would ever be held accountable for the encounter. Since NOPD classified the arrest as “necessary action taken,” the officer didn’t have to write a police report.
“You know, just this little bitty thing put a wrench in your life,” Martin said. “Stuff like that matter.”
—
Read NOPD’s 2018 stop, search and arrest report here.
Read federal monitors’ special report on task forces here.
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