Regards,

TZ

Thanks! I have been pleasantly surprised by how much traffic and attention this story has generated, but maybe that’s just because I’m already so familiar with the use and abuse of our disorderly conduct statute.

It is actually standard police procedure, at least here in the Commonwealth, for officers to collect as much basic information as possible (including race) regarding witnesses, suspects, and any other parties of interest on the scene in a situation like this. This is mostly just as a memory aid for the convenience of law enforcement, both as they continue to investigate a crime and if/when a case goes to trial. This kind of information can also prove helpful to the preparing a defense in many cases, especially if the defendant’s race/identity is somewhat ambiguous or if the identity of the defendant rests, as so often happens, solely upon the eyewitness testimony of someone of a different race. (It has been generally proven that cross-racial identification of specific individuals is far more difficult for people who were raised in homogeneous communities.) Objectively speaking, race is a convenient and readily-available personal identifying characteristic, which is why it appears on the standard arrest report form used in summarizing the Gates incident (as well as less controversial places such as birth certificates, medical records, etc.) along with gender and age.

As I said in the post, I have been trying to stay out of this conversation as it pertains to race, as I am simply not in a position to intelligently contribute much in this direction. However, I will add that I am personally aware through my clients that there is reason to believe that racial profiling and bias *can* be a real problem here in Massachusetts. Based on my knowledge of how and where these problems occur in the Commonwealth, I believe that they are far more likely to arise in smaller, less diverse communities (Google “Jason Vassell” to see a recent extreme example) than a major, highly diverse municipality like Cambridge. This is not to say it’s impossible, of course, but only that it wasn’t my first instinct here.

Yes, thanks for the great post.
I found a link to it on the Turley blog, provided by poster Dredd.

I noted in the Gatesgate “incident report” that both Gates and the woman who called the police to the scene were identified racially.
http://www.amnation.com/vfr/Police%20report%20on%20Gates%20arrest.PDF

As I wrote on the Turley blog this may be standard police procedure but I have yet to get an answer to two simple questions I posed there.

Perhaps you can enlighten me, a non-lawyer:
1) What is the justification for law enforcement officers identifying suspects
and witnesses by race?
2) How can any department that does so claim race neutrality subsequently?

I cited your blog on Professor Turley’s blog. And I had written a similar post on my blog before reading your blog.

Again, great post.