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Area law enforcement official works to bridge the gap between police and minority communities
YOUNGSTOWN
As cities nationwide have erupted after simmering tensions between communities and their police departments boiled over, area law-enforcement officials are trying to make sure that doesn’t happen here in the Valley.
“As a result of some of the things that have been going on nationwide, we, like other departments, wanted to be ahead of the curve,” said Boardman Police Chief Jack Nichols.
The Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy “community diversity” session, led by retired Youngstown Detective Sgt. Delphine Baldwin-Casey, is training that’s required for new officers, but in which several area police chiefs, including Nichols, had their entire departments participate recently.
Many area law-enforcement agencies and community members also participated in a workshop Baldwin-Casey led several months ago that aimed to bridge the gap between the two through open dialogue.
Baldwin-Casey, of Campbell, is in a unique position to facilitate communication between police and minority communities.
“For me, oftentimes when I’m in training, I describe myself being the colors black and blue. I’m a black female, but for 31 years I wore the color blue. And I can see both sides,” she said.
“There’s frustration in the minority community that I can see, because ... I felt like I was taught racial profiling,” she said, recalling how when she was assigned to the West Side beat in 1978, her training officer told her to pull over black people driving down Mahoning Avenue “because black people don’t live on the West Side.”
“We had a big discussion about that [during training]. Was I being taught racial profiling, or was I being taught criminal profiling?” she said.
Baldwin-Casey and her family members have experienced racial profiling, she said. She recalled an incident in which her nephew was pulled over without cause.
“He said, ‘I wasn’t speeding. I didn’t violate any traffic. So I want to know why you pulled me over,’” she said. “The officer couldn’t give him an answer.”
She recalled another recent incident in which a relative was pulled over for driving with expired plates.
“That wasn’t the problem. The problem was, what was the probable cause for the stop? Because you couldn’t see from way over there that the license plate was expired,” she said.
Probable cause is a frequent point of tension between police and the minority community, she said.
“They’re asking a question about why they’re being stopped, and many times they’re not given a reason,” she said. “Why would you get upset about explaining why you stopped someone, if you stopped them for a good reason?”
On the other hand, she and other law-enforcement officials say members of the public often don’t have a good understanding of probable cause.
“You actually can have a situation where somebody absolutely did nothing but they get stopped,” said Nichols. He gives the example of a police officer investigating a bank robbery who stops someone who matches the description of the suspect.
“The officer approaches you, draws his gun because they’re talking about a bank robbery, and he actually handcuffs you while he completes his investigation,” he said. “In your mind, the cops stopped you for absolutely nothing at all,” but they had probable cause.
“I think that’s one of the things that people in the minority community need to be educated on, that we are trained to look at something that’s criminal,” Baldwin-Casey said.
Probable cause was a topic of discussion recently between Baldwin-Casey and Concerned Citizens of Campbell, a new group that is speaking out against police tactics that they say have gotten out of hand and are discriminatory to minorities.
“The one that irks me so bad is freedom from fear,” said organizer Ronnie Rupert. “I was born and raised here in this town ... and I’m afraid to go to the store and come back because something that might happen with the police.”
“Campbell needs to know – we’re tired,” he said.
“Just because you have probable cause, that doesn’t give you a right to misuse everybody you stop,” someone else at the meeting said.
The group, which says it is dedicated to strengthening the relationship between police the Campbell community, says it wants better communication, respect, accountability, freedom from fear and trust from the police.
Communication is key, Baldwin-Casey said.
“There’s things that we need to bring out because what’s going on across the country today. It saddens me, because I was a good cop. I am a good cop. And there are so many good cops,” she said. “So what’s going on across the country – that is not the majority of us. But what’s going on is so detrimental to police-community relationships.”
As for whether she thinks recent events in cities such as Ferguson, Mo., and Baltimore could happen here, she said: “I would never say it wouldn’t.”
It’s less likely to happen, however, if the community and police continue their dialogue, she said.
“Doing something is better than sitting back and doing nothing and thinking that the problem is going to go away,” she said.
“People need the police, and police need the people,” she said. “They have to stop being pitted against one another and come together and work for a common goal.”