Police stop and search innocent (white) people to balance race figures, terror watchdog says

[Liberal_in_LA]

On talk radio and on the internet, these folks say "what's the big deal" about innocent people of color being stopped and searched by the police but when the shoes on the other foot...
:nopity: :nopity: :nopity: :nopity:
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Police stop and search innocent people to balance race figures, terror watchdog says

White people are being unjustifiably stopped and searched to provide racial balance in police statistics, the antiterrorism watchdog said yesterday.

Lord Carlile of Berriew, QC, described the searches in his annual report on the operation of counterterrorism legislation as “almost certainly” illegal. He said that he knew of cases where people were stopped by officers even though they did not fit any known terrorist profile.

He accused the police of wasting time and money by carrying out “self-evidently unmerited searches”, which were also an invasion of civil liberties. The searches, for example, of blonde women who fit no terrorist profile came against a backdrop of complaints from rights groups that the number of black and Muslim people being stopped and searched by police was disproportionate.

Lord Carlile said that police were stopping white people unjustifiably so that official figures would make it look as if they were not singling out black and Asian people under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000. “No police officer has admitted that to me, but I believe that is the case,” he told The Times.

Under Section 44, police can stop and search anyone in a designated area without suspicion that an offence has occurred. Last year the number of white people searched rose from 29,900 to 73,000, blacks from 3,600 to 15,200 and Asians from 5,500 to 20,700. Although whites made up the biggest number, in terms of population, blacks and Asians were more likely to be stopped.

Lord Carlile wrote in his report: “I have evidence of cases where the person stopped is so obviously far from any known terrorism profile that, realistically, there is not the slightest possibility of him/her being a terrorist, and no other feature to justify the stop.

“In one situation the basis of the stops was numerical only, which is almost certainly unlawful and in no way an intelligent use of the procedure.”

One example was a white middle-aged professional woman who was at a railway station in northern England when she was stopped and searched by a British Transport Police officer.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6521199.ece


'If 50 blonde women are stopped who fall nowhere near any intelligence-led terrorism profile, it's a gross invasion of the civil liberties of those 50 blonde women.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1193816/Police-search-whites-just-balance-books-watchdog-claims.html

[vadawg]

1. lol kinda funny, but i can so see it happening

though the keeping of figures on stops based on race can point out officers with issues you are going to find officers trying to balance the figures so as to not get labeled or have to do sensitivity training etc. Though i imagine there are some neighbourhoods were they would have to work hard to get a balance.

[Liberal_in_LA]

3. Doesn't matter what the criminal activity is, cops will stop non whites more. Drugs are an example.

Stats show that whites participate just as much if not more. Yet cops refrain from yanking whites out of the car for searches.

[vadawg]

4. not arguing that, but as an example my patrol area is very shy of whites

and the job i do means i interact mainly with young black and hispanic males, if you were to look at the figures of my stops it would look like i was the most unfortunate guy ever never to run across any white dudes, but for me its pretty common to not stop any white people for days at a time, just a fact of the neighbourhoods.

[BlooInBloo]

2. I wonder if these two were "unjustifiably" stopped?