Was arrest of Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. an act of racism?

The policeman arrested him despite that he had verified his ID, to which people have been responding because it just seems way too much for anyone to happen. At the same time, I do not think it ever possible to determine if the police arrested him merely because he was African American.

According to Wikipedia, racial profiling is "the inclusion of racial or ethnic characteristics in determining whether a person is considered likely to commit a particular type of crime or an illegal act or to behave in a 'predictable' manner."

We statistically know that it happens. At the same time, it is very difficult to prove specific cases.

A pretty straightforward case that I personally know of is that I have two friends in Japan, one is White and another is South Asian, and when the two were together, the latter was stopped and asked to show his ID, whereas the former was not.

According to Wikipedia, racial profiling is "the inclusion of racial or ethnic characteristics in determining whether a person is considered likely to commit a particular type of crime or an illegal act or to behave in a 'predictable' manner."

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I'm sorry but I tend to just go with situations rather than defintions.

1. My questions are did the officer have a reasonable cause to stop by Gates house

Answer: Yes. There was a burglary call, and so he was obligated to go by.

2. Did the officer have a reasonable cause to ask Gates for an ID.

Answer is once again Yes. There was a burglary call.. All burglars are going to tell the cops they live in the residence. He's obligated to give the caller the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise.. So asking for the id is what the officer would do whehter or not the person there is white, black, Asian whatsover.

Now the rest of the stuff I don't know, but the above two things, the officer absolutely followed protocol.

Racial profiling would be if the officer was patroling saw Gates in the house, knew there was unspecificed burglaries, and asked him for id just because he didn't look like he belonged. THAT's racial profiling.

Now for the rest I don't know.

Officers should be able to respond to a burglary call, and ask for an id without being accused of racism.

Bennett said:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/education/2009506577_gates21.html?syndication=rss

Makes me think of racial residential segregation, too. I wonder if Prof Gates lives in a White neighborhood. Regardless of educactional attainment, AAs are a lot more subject to crimes like homicides than Whites partly due to the segregation.

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You seem to be still thinking 1940s. Cambridge is a totally integrated town: blacks, white, and Lesbians with children. Does this bring you up to date?

Joe, Cambridge is not an integrated town. It has its Indian neighborhoods, its black neighborhoods, and it has its affluent - read predominantly white - neighborhoods. Heterosexuals and homosexuals are, indeed, integrated in those affluent parts.

The beer meeting was broadcasted even in Japan. I wished to hear Dr. Gates talk as I assume that he would be a good speaker given his great success as a scholar. Hope that Dr. Gates makes even further contribution to the field of study as well as reaching out the general public in the next years to come in his career. I tend to admire scholars in their late 50s and 60s. That's the time for social scientists to really get mature and accomplished. It is in a way unfortunate that he has become so world-famous for this incident more than for his work. Given that his expertise is not mathematics, physics, biology, or classical literature, but very closely related to the issue at stake, I hope that he would address the topic in his field of academic expertise in profound, meaningful ways.

Dr. Gates has said that he is going to put together a TV documentary on racial profiling for NPR, I believe.

Ptichka said:

Joe, Cambridge is not an integrated town. It has its Indian neighborhoods, its black neighborhoods, and it has its affluent - read predominantly white - neighborhoods. Heterosexuals and homosexuals are, indeed, integrated in those affluent parts.

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If they are poor immigrants they would be in the most affordable location for that neighborhood. Is that the reasons all Asian Indians are separated from all Black neighborhoods? Have you ever been to Kingston, Jamaica? Have you ever seen the higher caste Indian (it still exists if not legal) integrated with the slumdogs? Much of so called unintegrated neighborhoods are based on money. If you have it, then you can choose where to live. I toured quite a bit in St. Petersburg and to me it seemed like it is all monolithic Russians, but the differences in the neighborhoods of the haves and the have nots is not quite the same.

But we are talking about Racial Profiling. Did that white cop actually know he was targeting a black man before he went to the scene of the emergency call? Were there any white people there that he should have questioned first? I do not believe we have been made aware of the scenario surrounding this dumb case. Who were the people who originated that emergency call?

Doris - If Gates does a documentary on racial profiling, do you think he will include Kingston, Jamaica? If we assume Gates believes all white Americans are racial profilers, and that seems to be his goal, it's hard to believe that it will not be a more than a one-side conclusion. He will not consider racial profiling in the Carribbean.

I've never heard of Gates before, but apparently he is big in his field which I know nothing about. If so well known, I can understand his resentment in just being stopped for questioning, and his indignant behaviour following makes sense. But then was the cop indoctrinated in his studies that no one is above the law? Should the cop had recognized him for his brilliance? Should the cop have only stopped caucasions and asian like? Should a cop accept any excuse a suspect gives him anywhere?

btw. What else happened to the original emergency?

Joe, The original caller saw 2 guys with suitcases force open a door with their shoulders. She said in the original call, one of the guys was Hispanic and didn't see the other very well, and both were rather large. Dr. Gates is short, frail, and black. No wonder the cop looked odd when he saw him in the house. The cop had to be thinking there are one, maybe 2 other guys here. Home invasion would be a possibility, I would think.

However, actually it was Dr. Gates and the Moroccan driver of his limo. The limo driver was gone by the time Sgt. Crowley showed up.

The caller was a lady (Lucia Whalen) who works in the area and saw what was going on at her lunch break outside. An elderly lady prevailed upon her to call it in to 911 as there had been a lot of burglaries in the area recently. Sgt. Crowley described talking to her at the scene and wrote in his police report that she said 2 black guys with backpacks. She says she never talked to Sgt. Crowley.

Post beer summit, Dr. Gates sent flowers and a note to Lucia Whalen:

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/re..._flowers_of_gratitude/srvc=home&position=also

Meanwhile, Dr. Gates put out the following press notice (in same article above)

“Sergeant Crowley and I, through an accident of time and place, have been cast together, inextricably, as characters - as metaphors, really - in a thousand narratives about race over which he and I have absolutely no control,” Gates wrote late Thursday on theroot.com, the Web site of which he is editor in chief. “It is incumbent upon. . . (us) . . .to utilize the great opportunity that fate has given us to foster greater sympathy among the American public for the daily perils of policing on the one hand, and for the genuine fears of racial profiling on the other hand.”

Gates added he thanks God that he lives “in a country in which police officers put their lives at risk to protect us every day, and, more than ever, I’ve come to understand and appreciate their daily sacrifices on our behalf.”

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I wonder whether Sgt. Crowley will be part of Dr. Gates' racial profiling show?

dorispulaski said:

Joe, The original caller saw 2 guys with suitcases force open a door with their shoulders. She said in the original call, one of the guys was Hispanic and didn't see the other very well, and both were rather large. Dr. Gates is short, frail, and black. No wonder the cop looked odd when he saw him in the house. The cop had to be thinking there are one, maybe 2 other guys here. Home invasion would be a possibility, I would think.

However, actually it was Dr. Gates and the Moroccan driver of his limo. The limo driver was gone by the time Sgt. Crowley showed up.

The caller was a lady (Lucia Whalen) who works in the area and saw what was going on at her lunch break outside. An elderly lady prevailed upon her to call it in to 911 as there had been a lot of burglaries in the area recently. Sgt. Crowley described talking to her at the scene and wrote in his police report that she said 2 black guys with backpacks. She says she never talked to Sgt. Crowley.

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Thanks very much, Doris, for the report.
So the cop didn't know about much about the story, if anything, before he got there, and the witness, Whalen or the elderly lady, said she(they) never talked to him. Did they give any reason for not talking to him? Yet he wrote up a scenario that it was 2 black men. (Moroccans, btw, can be black as some people in the USA are black).

How could the cop have written up his story if he had never talked to Whalen and the elderly lady? If there were no talks between them, then the cop is seriously wrong for making up a story, and racial profiling could be considered part of the story. Something must have prompted him if the two ladies were not giving information which they could have as eyewitnesses.

I know Gates was upset and I don't blame him, but Breaking and Entering is a serious offence.

I really don't know why Crowley said he talked to Whalen and she said he didn't. However, the report is oddly written enough that Crowley could have talked to a lady that wasn't Whalen, but said she was the one that called 911. (He says "later identified as Whalen) Protocol says he's supposed to talk to the 911 caller if she is still at the site.

Yes, a Moroccan can be very dark, but according to the 911 call, it was 2 rather big guys, one Hispanic. Nobody heard the guy was Moroccan until after the event.

Yes B&E is serious and it can be simple burglary for money or a home invasion of some sort. Either way, not good.

dorispulaski said:

I really don't know why Crowley said he talked to Whalen and she said he didn't. However, the report is oddly written enough that Crowley could have talked to a lady that wasn't Whalen, but said she was the one that called 911. (He says "later identified as Whalen) Protocol says he's supposed to talk to the 911 caller if she is still at the site.

Yes, a Moroccan can be very dark, but according to the 911 call, it was 2 rather big guys, one Hispanic. Nobody heard the guy was Moroccan until after the event.

Yes B&E is serious and it can be simple burglary for money or a home invasion of some sort. Either way, not good.

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Just doesn't make sense, if the two eyewitnesses did not say anything and Crowley went there as a B&E under orders then the whole scenario came about after the fact. I do not see a real scenario there. Too many missing pieces.

You have to forgive me for being persistent on this, I use to date a law student who would drive me up the wall with all her questions about anything - not necessarily about the law.

There was also a TV piece on profiling at the airports yesterday morning.. Some want to stop it; others fear Terrorists will slip by. Swarthy looking men, women and children are suspicious.

All scenarios come about as 'after the fact', at least if the fact is a 911 call.

When you call 911 in my town,here's what happens. Dispatcher one sends out an ambulance, a fire truck and a police truck immediately. Dispatcher 2 gets the facts from you.

She/he then conveys the info first to the equipment most likely to be of use. In this case, it would be the police.

So the cop was told 2 kind of large men, one Hispanic, forced open the door, one entered.

This is why the whole event from 911 call to arrest of Professor Gates took only 6 minutes.

If there's a heart attack or a B&E, time is of the essence.

dorispulaski said:

Meanwhile, Dr. Gates put out the following press notice (in same article above)
“Sergeant Crowley and I, through an accident of time and place, have been cast together, inextricably, as characters - as metaphors, really - in a thousand narratives about race over which he and I have absolutely no control,” Gates wrote late Thursday on theroot.com, the Web site of which he is editor in chief. “It is incumbent upon. . . (us) . . .to utilize the great opportunity that fate has given us to foster greater sympathy among the American public for the daily perils of policing on the one hand, and for the genuine fears of racial profiling on the other hand.”
I wonder whether Sgt. Crowley will be part of Dr. Gates' racial profiling show?

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I really enjoy reading the posts by dorispulaski, belzc, and Joesitz. Thanks!
To me the whole incident is just polices doing their job in respond to 911 call. I do think the professor over reacted either due to his past experience or his own opinions about racial profiling, and then things got out of control a bit. I do know that shouting at policeman and not cooperate usually will get you into trouble no matter what's your skin color. If the policeman didn't do anything after he saw the professor then it would be reverse- racial profiling. And let's not forget that The Media just loves to have something to print. I was really surprised at President's deep involvement into this. I don't think it's wise. \
Just my 2 cents.

According to Wilipedia,

A person who recklessly, knowingly, or intentionally:
(1) engages in fighting or in tumultuous conduct;
(2) makes unreasonable noise and continues to do so after being asked to stop; or
(3) disrupts a lawful assembly of persons;
commits disorderly conduct.

Apart from racial issues, I find the arrest of a suspect who resisted verbally showing a valid ID for disorderly conduct as an abuse of power. It was not a request of voluntary attendance, but arrest with handcuffs without warrent.

I guess things might be different in the US where citizens can own a gun and the policeman has to think of self-defense more seriously. But if this is something that you have to accept as things that often happen in the US, no wonder mistrust towards the police seems pervasive.

Because everyone knows that it was Dr. Gates and his limo driver who broke into his house, it has become obscured that the cop did not know this.

The cop received a 911 call that said 2 rather large men, one Hispanic, had broken down the door and one had entered the house. (The recording of the 911call & the dispatcher's relay of that call to the cop are available, so this is not speculation.) (There is a question of whether or not the cop talked to Ms. Whalen. She says not, so I am assuming not. But it doesn't change the case at all.)

So when the cop saw Dr. Gates, two things were clear: Gates is neither rather large nor Hispanic. Clearly either there was another person in the house, or the 911 caller had not given a correct description.

In any case, in all such home invasion / breaking and entering cases, the key thing is to keep to home owner (and the cops) safe, whether the home owner is being cooperative or not. Dr. Gates refused to answer when the cop asked whether anyone else was in the house, and he refused to come outside. This is, of course, Dr. Gates' right. However, it put the cop in a pickle.

To understand this case, you must picture it from the cop's perspective, which is that you must always assume the worst- i.e. at least one, maybe 2 criminals are in the house. And the cop was the closest cop, and was driving without a partner.

The cop settled for following Dr. Gates into the house to get the id (thus keeping him in sight and hoping to deter any possible person hiding from hurting Dr. Gates, if Gates proved to be the homeowner, which is what the cop said later he suspected), and eventually getting Dr. Gates on the porch. He also called several other cop cars as backup, to make sure if anyone was in the house, any criminals hiding would have no opportunity to escape. However, since he did not have permission to go in the house, he couldn't search it to verify that no one else was inside. His only option was to somehow stall for time and keep Dr. Gates from going back inside until the police were sure it was safe.

His method of doing this was the rough and ready one of arresting him and taking him to the police station. In an ideal world, the cop would have succeeded in not upsetting Dr. Gates in the first place, or in calming Dr. Gates down latter.

So This was not a great choice; however if you run this whole case through in your mind with 1 big blonde & one other big man breaking in and casting the professor as a short redhead, and the professor still uncooperative, it may make more sense to you. Assume the red headed professor is an aging hippie who had bad interactions with the police when he was young, for the purposes of the visualization.

Thanks for your information and providing another perspective.

dorispulaski said:

So This was not a great choice; however if you run this whole case through in your mind with 1 big blonde & one other big man breaking in and casting the professor as a short redhead, and the professor still uncooperative, it may make more sense to you. Assume the red headed professor is an aging hippie who had bad interactions with the police when he was young, for the purposes of the visualization.

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As I said, I find an arrest with handcuffs without warrent shockingly rough regardless of race/ethnicity. If ensuring the immediate security was the main issue, the police could have listened to the suspect after putting the handcuffs, but the suspect was sent to the police station. Is this something that you have to expect and accept as an occasionally conducted action by the police? Apart from race/ethnicity, I feel that this could be newsworthy if it happens in Japan.

Well, there are a plethora of true police shows on TV here. One is Street Crimes. In it, a white man in Florida broke into his girl friend's apartment to get some things for her. She was at the hospital and didn't have the key. The neighbor called 911. The police asked him to come out of the apartment, which he did. They questioned him and obtained his ID. He answered politely. They handcuffed him with his hands behind his back. They read him his Miranda rights.

Then they called the apartment manager and the hospital and verified that he had her OK to break in and get her stuff. They apologized and let him go.

In FL, they have a concealed carry law, so anybody with a permit could have a gun concealed on them. In FL, I'd use the cuffs too. I'm not sure what the gun laws are in MA, but pretty much everywhere you can get a carry permit of some sort for a handgun.

Thanks for further background info. I understand that the police always has to be aware of the worst case scenario.

BTW, I know mistrust toward the police is pretty pervasive among poor neighborhoods and/or minority communities. What are the typical images of the police in the US mainstream culture then? Are people scared, cautious, or obedient when interacting with them, so that they won't be perceived as uncooperative? Or are people not afraid of being assertive when needed, feeling safe and trustful that assertiveness with justifiable reasons would not lead to unexpected rough treatments?

I was familiar with the campus police in a US university and they were extremely friendly and approachable because the majority of the staff were fellow college students. The campus itself was pretty safe, too. But I guess the kind of relationship between students and the campus police may not be the standard outside the campus.

Not sure if it helps, but here's a poll from 2005:

http://harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=605

And one on racial attitudes to the police that's recent:

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/07/29/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5196554.shtml

dorispulaski said:

Not sure if it helps, but here's a poll from 2005:

http://harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=605

And one on racial attitudes to the police that's recent:

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/07/29/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5196554.shtml

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Wow, thank you! Very interesting data! I will take a closer look at it later, but wanted to thank you first.