The history of the world has proven a statement again and again: any government, democracy, or a monarchy despite of their stringent laws can never eliminate crimes within their boundaries. However they have not stepped behind in setting up authorities for operating or controlling these practices. Police authorities owing to their limited resources have been sluggish in operations. One such practice of the use of race or ethnicity as grounds for suspecting someone of having committed an offence naming racial profiling is rarely found in the system claims Jack McDevitt, who directs the Institute on Race and Justice at Northeastern University.
“Police departments can tell incredible amounts of information about where they make arrests, who they arrest, where they get 911 calls from, but very few police departments collect information on who they conduct traffic stops on”, exclaimed McDevitt, who was asked to conduct the study by the Criminal Justice. Jack along with his coadjutor Amy Farell initiated research to find whether there are disparities in the racial breakdown of motorist and pedestrian stops in Douglas County, and if so, what’s causing them and whether it is systemic.
Jack and Amy termed these types of researches as imperative owing to their potential results assisting the authorities in easing their hectic procedures. He expressed “These kinds of efforts by police departments are hugely important and send messages that the police want to get it right, they want to increase trust between the police and their communities”.
Harminder Singh