Chapter 4 policing

  • First, many historical accounts of police usually focus on cities such as Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Charleston

  • Second, most sown officers are employed at the local level in cities and counties

  • Third, the issue of race and policing continues to be a critical one in the nation’s urban areas

Policing Data

  • A citizen’s introduction to the administration of justice often begins with contact with a police officer

  • Although minorities have always been less likely to view the police as favorably as Whites do

  • During the 1960s, when the National Opinion Research Center conducted a national survey for the President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice

  • Researchers found that 67% of the general public responded that the police did an excellent or good job, and 77% answered the police did a pretty good to very good job of protecting people in their neighborhoods

  • Non-whites, primarily Blacks, gave a rating of very good half as often as Whites and a not-so-good rating twice as often

  • According to the National Crime Survey, while 54% of white victims of crime evaluated their local police as good, only 25% of Blacks and 19.2% of Hispanic victims did

  • Between 2002 and 2011, the majority of Whites continued to have the most confidence in the police

  • The confidence of blacks increased in 2011 to 43%, although it was still much lower than in 2005, when it was at its highest level in the decade

  • More recent polling has also found wide racial gaps in the views on police performance

  • Many factors have contributed to this reduction in confidence in the police: aggressive tactics, shadow immigration enforcement, homeland security and terrorism reduction initiatives, recurring incidents of use of deadly force or brutality, and racial profiling continue to frame confidence in the police. 

  • Police have historically enforced laws that are today widely regarded as violations of the human rights of racial and ethnic minorities

  • The historically oppressive relationship between police and African Americans is lost in contemporary discussion

  • Agencies can now issue crime alters and use Reverse 911 calls to inform residents of emergencies

  • Sherman (2002) described a criminal paradox characterized by improvements in fairness and effectiveness 

  • Three domains that affect public trust

    • The conduct and practices of the criminal justice system

    • The changing values and expectations of the culture the system serves

    • The images of the system presented in electronic media

  • Therrosit era of police

    • Began after 9/11, terrorist attacks have resulted in less community involvement, increased federalism, loss of civil liberties, greater reliance on private security, militarization, and a propensity toward errors of justice

  • The 2001 USA PATRIOT ACT

    • Used to counter-terrorism, although some viewed it as infringing on the rights of citizens

Overview of Policing in America

  • There are more than 18,000 federal, local, and state agencies, which vary in size and are bureaucratic and quasi-military in structure

  • There are Native American (tribal) police agencies, special police agencies with limited jurisdiction, and private police

  • In municipal agencies, the police role consists primarily of maintaining the social order, preventing and controlling crime, and enforcing the law

  • After 9/11, the increased emphasis on homeland security changed the role of local law enforcement to include more excellent surveillance capabilities, enhanced punishments for crimes related to terrorism, and improved relationships and communication between federal and local law enforcement

  • The majority of police officers are white males, even in many locales where minorities are a large percentage of the population

  • Between 1990 and 2000, minority representation in large police agencies increased from 29.8% in 1990 to 38.1%

  • Hispanic representation increased from 9.2% to 14.1%, followed by Black representation from 18.4% to 20.1%

  • Minority officers outnumbered White officers in some agencies, although the ratio of minority police officers to minority group members in large cities had increased only slightly from 0.59 in 1990 to 0.63 in 2000

  • There were 63 minority officers for every 100 minority citizens

  • The ratio of blacks increased to 0.74, for Latinos to 0.56, and for other minorities to 0.37

  • 63% of local police departments only employ between 2 and 24 sworn officers

  • Between 2006 and 2010, there were more than 2,766,630 sworn male and female police; 64.6% were White, 18.7% were Black, and 12% were Latino

  • The Bureau of Labor Statistics indicates that of the 704,00 police and sheriffs working in 2017, 2.4% were Asian, 13.9% were Black, 10.9% were Latino, and 13.6% were women

  • Women represented 12.5%, with Blacks at 14.1%, also posting double-digit representation

  • Hispanics held 7.1% of these front-line supervisory positions, and Asians a paltry 0.9%

  • The U.S. attorney General is the chief law enforcement officer in the country

  • The U.S. Department of Justice is the lead agency for enforcing the law, preventing and controlling crime, and ensuring fair and impartial administration of justice

  • Homeland Security Act created the Department of Homeland Security to provide a more integrated approach to security in the US

    • It became the largest employer of federal law enforcement officers and created the Transportation Security Administration

  • DOJ AND DOT were the largest employers of federal officers with arrest and firearm authority

  • In 2008, there were approximately 120,000 federal full-time police personnel authorized to arrest and carry firearms

  • The DUS, US Customs and Border Protection, the FBI, and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement employ most federal law enforcement officers

  • Most federal officers are White males, and about one-third belong to a racial or ethnic minority group

  • Racial/ethnic minorities are in the majority among police officers in some major cities across the country, and they have also risen to the top of the policing profession as chiefs in the largest police departments in the United States

  • There is also the underlying belief that racial/ethnic minority police officers are more in touch with communities that look like them and will be received between and also produce better results

Historical Overview of Race and Policing

  • Facts about policing minorities and some White immigrants in earlier centuries are often omitted from criminal justice and law enforcement textbooks

  • American policing is a product of its English heritage

  • During the Colonia era, there were no formal police departments

  • The colonists initially made policing the responsibility of every citizen and later utilized the sheriff, constable, and watch system

  • There were regional differences in policing

    • In Boston and New Amsterdam, NY, night watches were established, whereas in the South, slave patrols were more common

  • Unlike the British police, American police agencies were decentralized, locally controlled, and influenced by politics

  • White immigrants dominated police forces in some cities in the North, and slave patrollers in the South were usually poorer Whites

  • The first African American police were free men of color who served in police organizations in New Orleans between 1805 and 1830

    • For the most part, they were responsible for slaves

  • Social tensions among immigrants, blacks, and native whites often resulted in conflicts and crime

  • Outside the urban areas, especially on the frontier, policing was characterized as a  vigilante in nature

  • Paid police forces emerged in the 1800s

  • Social disorder and crime continued to be challenged. This circumstance led to the formation of private police, such as the Pinkerton Agency, and the reorganization of public police

  • There are two essential reform efforts

    • First, the late 1800s attempted to reduce political control of the police

    • The next occurred during the early 20th century and focused on developing more professional police forces

      • These reforms are essential because some police were abusing their powers and restoring unsavory practices such as corruption and third-degree

  • During the 1960s, police were closely scrutinized following a great deal of civil unrest and several US Supreme Court decisions, including Mapp v. Ohio, Escobedo v. Illinois, and Miranda v. Arizona

  • Policing has changed dramatically due to the convergence of several previously mentioned factors, including the hiring of minorities and women, technological developments, community policing, and the research revolution

  • There are three eras in the history of policing often cited in many law enforcement textbooks

    • The political (18402 to early 1900s)

    • Reform (1930s to 1960s)

    • Community Problem-solving eras (1970s to present)

  • While significant changes were occurring in policing during our Nation’s history, members of minority groups benefited less than others from these changes

Policing Native Americans

  • Indian Country must be viewed temporally because federal and tribal laws have changed over time

  • Federal act of May 19, 1796, set the boundary between Indian Country and the United States; by 1799, the boundary was changed to give federal courts jurisdiction over U.S. citizens who committed crimes against Indians

  • An Act of March 13, 1817, further extended federal law to prevent white desperados from escaping federal and state law

  • Indian country or territory was defined as a country within which Indian laws  and customs and federal laws relating to Indians are generally applicable 

  • Following the Civil War, the US minimized the political autonomy of tribal leaders and encouraged government representatives to deal with individual Indians and families

  • Congress established the US-Indian police

    • By 1881, it composed of 40 agencies, 162 officers, and 653 privates

  • The US was becoming rapidly developed and settled by whites, which precipitated the demand for the acquisition of Indian land and resources

  • There were chiefs of Indian police on reservations who often mediated between white man’s law and Indian custom

  • The general allotment or Dawes Act permitted land to be allotted to individual Indians, making them landowners and farmers

  • The Dawes Act was extended to the five civilized tribes in Indian territory by the Curtis Act of 1898

  • The FBI's first major homicide investigation involved Native Americans

  • Beginning in the late 1800s, the reservations began yielding barrels of oil

  • By early 19902, the Osage were highly wealthy, considering that in 1923 alone, the Osage Tribe received $27 million

  • The Osage would receive more money from oil than all the old west gold rushes combined had yielded

  • After experiencing multiple murders in the early 1920s and no justice from the Bureau of Indian Affaird=s police, the Osage asked for assistance from the Department of justice, and the FBI infiltrated the ibe and uncovered some of the criminals

  • The FBI had local officers make the arrests since special agents of the FBI did not have the power of arrest or the authority to carry firearms at the time

  • Public Law 280 transferred federal responsibility for criminal and civil jurisdiction, including law enforcement duties, to six states: Alaska, California, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oregon, and Wisconsin, and made it optional for all other states to assert jurisdiction

  • It was the belief that states and sheriffs were now responsible for law enforcement

  • On reservations where state laws apply, police activities are administered in the same manner as elsewhere. On reservations where state laws do not apply, tribal laws or Department of the Interior regulations are administered by personnel employed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, by personnel employed by the tribe, or by a combination of both

  • By 1976, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and/or tribes maintained law enforcement services on 126 reservations assigned to 61 Indian agencies

  • Ribes have assumed responsibility and control of policing on many reservations

  • The typical department is small and, therefore,e provides considerably less police protection than other urban and rural agencies

  • the Navajo and Seminole police departments are the most significant tribal agencies, but most tribal agencies have fewer than 50 full-time sworn personnel

  • The relocation program of the Bureau of Indian Affairs transplanted Native Americans to cities in the early 1950s

Policing African Americans

  • By the early 18th century, most of the early colonies regulated the movement and activities of free and enslaved negroes by enacting special codes to control them totally

  • During the Antebellum period, slaves were unprotected from crimes by slave owners, including murder, rape, assault, and battery

  • Patrollers or slave patrols, the first distinctively American police system, existed in every southern colony

    • Duties included checking passes of slaves leaving plantations, routinely searching slave quarters for stolen property, and administering whippings

    • Slave revolts were of increasing concern and, along with slavery, mandated a brutal policing mechanism to both protect Whites and dehumanize blacks

  • During the 1800s, in the North and South, both before and after emancipation, free blacks were treated like slaves

  • Their movements were regulated: they were prohibited from entering several states and had to be employed to remain in states; in Virginia, an emancipated slave had to leave the state within 12 months or forfeit freedom

  • African Americans were excluded from policing in most cities until the 1800s.

  • Back police did serve in Washington, DC, as early as 1861

  • The first wave of Black police officers in the US appeared during the reconstruction

  • North and South employed blacks, including Chicago, Philadelphia, Columbia and Charleston, South Carolina, and several cities in Mississippi and Texas

  • By the 1890s, most blacks had been eliminated from police agencies in the south

  • The under protection of Blacks by police was a problem in both the North and South during the race riots in the 19th and early 20th centuries

  • Police did not protect blacks from these attacks on their persons and property, and sometimes, they even participated in these events.

  • Police officers played a pivotal role in race riots in East St. Louis, Chicago, Tulsa, Detriot, and Washinton DC

  • In the 20th century federal troops were sometimes called in to assist in restoring order

  • There were approximately 50 black police by 1940

  • Although Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Caroline, the states with the largest black populations, had no black policemen

  • Blacks made substantial grains in law enforcement after the 196os, although it would take numerous court battles to integrate police departments, and the problems of under protection and police violence persisted into this century

Policing Asian Americans

  • In 1876, there were 151,000 Chinese in the United States, and 116,000 were in the state of California

  • Like others, many Chinese immigrated to California in search of gold, although they were known to serve as cooks, laundrymen, and servants

  • Around 1880, el Paso, Texas, became a point of entry for Chinese laborers from Mexico after the United States made entry for Chinese workers illegal

  • Often referred to as coolies, the Chinese were involved in laying tracks for the Southerner pacific railroad or remained in el paso after completing railroad tracks that originated in the west

  • British and American traders had encouraged opium addiction in China in the early 19th century to address a trade imbalance

  • Opium smoking was common among Chinese immigrants and confined to them between 1850 and 1870

  • Opium and opium dens gained popularity with the underworld of gamblers, prostitutes, and other criminals

  • In 1883, several dens were operating in El Paso were frequently by members of both the lower and upper classes

  • Eventually, they were targeted by the police and other governmental officials because of concerns that whites were mixing with Chinese, viewed by some as polluting

  • In the 1870s and 1880s, federal, municipal, and state governments passed laws that penalized opium smoking

  • Dens patronized by whites were the most likely to be raided

  • After the anti-opium smoking legislation, imports decreased, and this decrease coincided with a reduction in the size of the Chinese population that was also related to more restrictive immigration policies

  • 20th century, asian Americans were more likely to remain in cultural enclaves and less likely to be involved in crime in their communities

Policing Latinos

  • American capitalists who colonized the southwest during the 1850s and 1860s created a cheap labor force and perpetuated an atmosphere of violence against Chicano immigrants

  • Latino migrant workers in the southwest received the harshest treatment

  • As early as 1823, the Texas Rangers engaged in questionable practices ranging from threats to torture, flogging, castration, and lawless executions

  • The high number of lynchings and killings of Mexicans by Anglo mobs continued without punishment from 1848 to 1916

  • The number of brutal incidents in Cali and Texas prompted the Mexican ambassador to protest the mistreatment of Mexicans in 1912, formally

  • The police in Chicago and Gary, Indiana, were more likely to arrest Mexican Americans than poles for drunkenness

  • White sailors stated that they were attacked by a group of Mexicans, which marked the beginning of what is referred to as the zoot suit riots or sailor riots

    • The sailors retaliate by going to East Los Angeles and attacking Mexican Americans, especially those wearing zoot suits

    • The riots continued until June 7, when the navy finally put an end to the wanton attacks by declaring Los Angeles off-limits to military personnel

  • Recent legislation and activism by stakeholders and activism by stakeholders has heightened awareness of the ongoing scrutiny of browns by federal, state, and local police

  • The representation of Latinos in local police agencies increased from 4.5% in 1987 to 10.3% in 22007 and was estimated to be 12% in 2013

Policing white immigrants

  • During the 1800s, immigration increased considerably as waves of Germans, Irish, and the new immigrants 

  • They were viewed less favorably than those who had arrived before 1850

  • Incoming migrants from eastern and central Europe brought many negative social characteristics often attributable to their race, refer to nationality and culture

  • Progressive-era reformers saw immigration as a threat to democracy, social order, and American identity

  • It was easier for foreign-born whites to blend into American society gradually

  • Many white immigrants were able to secure jobs as police officers

  • The police often assisted white immigrants in their transition to life in a new country

  • The Boston police provided firewood and other necessities to Irish immigrants

  • One function of the Boston police department was to distribute free soup in station houses, especially during accommodate overnight lodgers

  • The tension between upper and middle-class native-born and foreign-born whites often resulted in more aggressive policing that emphasized law enforcement more than service

  • Policing of white immigrants depended on whether the police were controlled by political machines friendly to either immigrants or progressive-era reformers seeking to restrict the immorality of immigrants

  • Because policemen were recruited from the lower and lower middle classes, they had little to no inclination to impose the morality of the upper middle and upper classes on the ethnic ghettos

  • White immigrants were less the focus of police interest than violent crimes perpetrated by American-born white males

  • Most persons who have been arrested have been white

  • Policing minorities has gradually improved as a result of the civil rights movement, federal legislation, affirmation action policies, human rights advocates, community policing, minority political empowerment, minority ascendancy in police organizations, policing research, and increased media focusing on police behaviors

  • Despite improved police-community relations, there are several contemporary issues regarding race and policing that continue to impact citizen confidence in the police negatively 

Police Deviance

  • Police deviance: police officer activities that are inconsistent with the officer’s official authority, organizational authority, values, and standards of ethical conduct

  • Use of force, corruption, perjury, having sex, sleeping, or drinking while on duty, discrimination, and failure to enforce the law are examples of police deviance

    • Known to exist since the 1800s

  • President Herber Hoover established the Wickersham Commission to investigate the shortcomings of the administration of justice the third degree, a mostly secret and illegal practice, was a common form of police deviance

  • Another egregious incident of police deviance occurred in 1999 in Tuli,a Texas, when 46 people, the majority of whom were black, were arrested by Officer Tom Coleman and charged with being cocaine dealers

  • In 2001, more than a dozen police departments, including Cincinnati, New York City, Detroit, New Orleans, and Tulsa, were under investigation by the DOJ Office of Civil Rights to determine whether they engaged in patterns and/or practices of two types of police deviance, discrimination, and brutality

  • The OCR was investigating 17 police departments across the county

  • The OCR also has investigated several agencies including the police departments of Albuquerque, Cleveland, Puerto Rico, Portland, Seattle, and Ferguson

  • How discrimination manifests itself in police behavior is referred to as reasonable racism

  • Most courts have authorized police to use race in making decisions to question, stop, or detain persons so long as doing so is reasonably related to efficient law enforcement and not deployed for purposes of racial harassment

  • Reasonable racial discrimination continues to be viewed as a practical aspect of good law enforcement

Police use of deadly force

  • Recent societal emphasis on the number of deadly force shootings involving black males

    • National police crisis of 2014 to 2016

  • There were daily reports of the killing of young Black men, which were often caught on video which fanned the flames of national outrage and protest

  • The 2015 Washington Post figures identified more than double the number of police killings of citizens reported in the FBI data

  • Only California had more than a hundred police killings

  • There was the sense that police were under attack by the public

  • Ferguson effect: came in two forms,

    • First, there was the belief that following the furor surrounding the killing of Michael Brown, the police were being targeted for random retaliatory shootings

  • Ferguson effect is tied to the belief that because of the scrutiny of police officers following the Ferguson incident, police officers are engaging in de-policing or restricting their police activities to protest their profession being overly scrutinized

  • Belief perspective I point to differential law enforcement and the possible effects of prejudice and discrimination

  • Belief Perspective II posits that minorities are involved in crimes that increase their likelihood of victimization by the police

  • The OCR findings in the investigation of the Ferguson police department as well as other agencies, lend some support to Belif Perspective I. 

  • The National Organization of black law enforcement executives offers some support for the belief perspective as well

  • The use of excessive force, brutality, and shootings of unarmed minority suspects and undercover officers are symptoms and manifestations of biased policing

  • Tennesse v. Garner ruled that shooting feeling felons was unconstitutional

  • The issue of reasonable force by police officers in Graham v. Conner concluded that the perspective of a reasonable officer, as well as the facts and circumstances, must be considered

  • Goldkamps’s belief perspective II has some support as well

  • The Death in custody reporting aof 2000 mandates that all states collect and report data on arrest-related deaths

  • An examination of police officers feloniously killed in the line of duty can be considered as a support for belief perspective II as well

  • Oponetnsof Goldkamp’s perspective II argie that many victims of police use of excessive force are not engaged in violent criminal acts when they are beaten or killed by police

  • In 2008, an estimated 776,000 people about 1.9% of the 40 million U.S. residents who had contact with police that year—reported use of force or threat of force

  • Blacks and younger persons were more likely to have had contact with police that resulted in the use of force

Police Bias

  • Implicit bias or hidden bias has received considerable attention as researchers attempt to understand what role it plays in criminal justice and how it can be both prevented and controlled

  • Both historical and cultural influences shape implicit bias

  • Biased-based policing is a term used to describe how some officer's decisions are based upon stereotypes and negative attitudes about certain people–in this case, racial and ethnic minorities

  • During the political era, the police were responsible for specific ethnic groups with political power in their neighborhoods

  • Not only did the police have the authority to arrest, coerce confessions, and recommend charges, but they frequently aided and abetted mob attacks against blacks

  • Especially during the Jim Crow era of racial violence

  • Police misconduct and inconsistent enforcement procedures were still issues

  • During the 1960s, the FBI’s counter-intelligence program was an example of how police bias can manifest in police tactics and operations

  • Executive Order 13684 established the president’s task force on 21st-century policing;

  • The task force identified best practices and made recommendations to the president on building public trust and improving collaboration between local police and the communities they serve

    • Recommendations: increasing the diversity of the policing profession

    • The use of body-worn cameras was also heavily discussed as a way to increase accountability

Racial Profiling

  • Racial profiling refers to any action that results in the heightened racial scrutiny of minorities–justified or not

    • Recognizes that racial discrimination experienced by consumers, travelers, those crossing borders, as well as those subject to searches by police and other governmental officials

  • Driving while black/brown was the most visible form of racial profiling

  • Beliefs about those who might commit crimes (predictive), rather than those who committed them (descriptive) it was less formal (based on empirical support) and more informal on empirical support and personal experiences

  • Wilkins v. Maryland State Police

    • Highlighting the overrepresentation of African Americans in stops by Maryland state police

  • State v. Soto with demonstrating that, at least in New Jersey, criminal profiling had become racial profiling

  • Whren v. United States, the US Supreme Court granted officers the power to stop persons suspected of drug crimes under the pretext of probable cause for a traffic violation


Veil of Darkness Thesis

  • Veil of Darkness thesis argues that police officers cant engage in racial profiling if they cannot see the race of the driver

  • If stops of blacks during the day are high and they remain so at night, it could be an indication that Blacks simply are engaging in more traffic violations and the department is not engaging in profiling 

  • If however, stops of blacks fall during the evening, this could be an indication that profiling is taking place

  • More than 7,000 stops from Oakland, California, and found little evidence of racial profiling

  • Ritter and Bael (2009) analyzed data on more than 53,000 stops in Minneapolis, and they found statistical differences in the number of stops made by Blacks and Latinos during the day and evening, supporting the presence of racial profiling

    • Syracuse, New York, the researchers did not find support for the presence of racial profiling

    • Racial profiling was not prevalent in jurisdictions where there was heavy sentiment to the contrary

Stop and Frisk

  • Type of racial profiling, referred to as either stop question and frisk, when police stop pedestrians as they go to and from work or school and raise the subway

  • Commonly referred to as walking while Blacks, these stops occur daily and are viewed as necessary by police and intrusive and unwarranted by citizens

  • Street stops don’t occur as often as traffic stops, but when they do, fewer pedestrians 71%, report that police behave properly compared to drivers 88% involved in traffic stops

  • Terry v. Ohio granted police officers the right to stop and detain a person when there is reasonable suspicion that a crime is either in progress or about to occur

  • The majority of persons stopped were blacks and Hispanics, who were stopped nine times more often than whites

    • Walking and shopping while black

    • Bucyling while black

    • Profiling in airports

  • Fredrickson and Siljander argued that racial profiling does not exist because race is just one of several factors considered in the process of police profiling

  • Rather, they posited that criminal profiling may sometimes be racially biased and discriminatory

  • Ferguson police officers routinely violate the Fourth Amendment in stopping people without reasonable suspicion, arresting them without probable cause, and using unreasonable force against them

  • BJS conducts the Police Public Contact Survey, and its data are often used in racial profiling research

  • According to the 2011 PPCS, traffic stops continue to occur more often than street stops, more than 80% of drivers involved in traffic stops believed the police acted properly regardless of race and ethnicity

Traffic Safety Stops vs. Investigatory Stops

  • In traffic safety stops, officers target especially egregious violators, leaving the rest of us to mosey on at merely 3 or 4 miles per hour over the speed limit

  • Investigatory stops, officers target people who look suspicious 

  • Criminalblackman is what often triggers investigatory stops and contributes not only to the racial disparities in police stops but also to the negative views minorities, especially African Americans, hold of the police

  • Investigatory stops are counterproductive to the core crime-fighting mission of policing

  • There are three suggestions

    • First, they argue that citizens should not be stopped in their cars or on the streets unless there is clear evidence of criminal behavior

    • Second, this requirement should be strictly enforced through departmental oversight and the prohibition of pretextual stops except when there is a serious public safety issue

    • Finally, the authors believe that searchers should be prohibited unless probable cause is present\

Consent searches

  • Research interest in consent searches following traffic stop has increased

  • This interest is due at least in part to the use of this type of search in the War on Drugs

  • Racial profiling is a complex, nuanced phenomenon,n and that race is more symbolic than predictive of stopped drivers' attitudes toward police

Immigration and Policing

  • President Donald trump

  • Among his first acts in office was to sign an executive order that banned the accepting of all refugees temporarily and prohibited the entrance of people from seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen

  • Executive Order 13769, protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry into the United States, is commonly referred to as the Muslin ban, 

  • Executive Order 13767 calls for the construction of a physical wall along the southern border

  • American employers have long courted Mexican immigrants

  • Mexicans and Latinos appear to have transitioned from migrant workers to criminal illegal immigrants: lockdown through legislation

  • Three agencies within the Department of Homeland Security are responsible for the enforcement of immigration laws: the US Customs and Border Protection, the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Services, and the US Citizenship and immigration services

  • DHS ICE implemented Secure Communities: a comprehensive plan to Identify and Remove Criminal Aliens

  • An effort to improve public safety that included technological advances and cooperation with local and state law enforcement agencies

  • A multifaceted and multiagency effort that required stakeholders in federal agencies as well as tribal LEAs to work with ICE and other LEASs to apprehend and remove criminal alien

  • Some states enacted legislation requiring state and local law enforcement officers to act as federal immigration agents

  • Arizona enacted SB 1070, a controversial immigration law that requires police to enforce federal laws and to check immigration status upon reasonable suspicion that someone is an illegal immigrant.

  • SB 1070 was copiedwith  by other states as well

  • Shadow immigration enforcement refers to the distorted exercise of regular policing powers by a state or local officer who has no immigration enforcement authority for purposes of increasing immigration enforcement that involves the disproportionate targeting of vulnerable foreign populations for hyper enforcement

  • The US Supreme Court ruled in Arizona v. United States that some provisions of SB 1070 did interfere with the power of the federal government to enforce immigration laws, including being in the state without legal papers, seeking employment in the state, and arresting a person without a warrant