In Florida, police are waging a war on black bicycle riders, investigators say

[Zaac]

In Florida, police are waging a war on black bicycle riders, investigators say


By Peter Holley April 18

For the past decade, Tampa police have enforced a “stop and frisk”-style policy that aggressively and disproportionately targets the city’s poor, black residents who ride bicycles, according to a Tampa Bay Times investigation.

Cyclists can be stopped and ticketed for having a missing tail light, baggy clothing, pedaling through a high-crime neighborhood or not having their hands on the handlebars, which is no longer illegal, according to the Tampa newspaper.

“It’s always the light, or to run your VIN number,” 31-year-old Anthony Gilbert told the Times. “‘Let’s have your ID. Just stand in front of my cruiser.’ Now you’re being humiliated. Your friend’s riding by. Your reverend might be riding by. Now, you’ve got to go to church. The pastor’s going to be like, ‘What happened, son?’ ”

Of the 10,000 bicycle tickets issued by Tampa police in the past dozen years, the newspaper found that black cyclists received 79 percent of those citations, despite making up less than a quarter of the city’s population.


In the past three years alone, the Times reported, police have issued 2,504 bike tickets, which is more than Jacksonville, Miami, St. Petersburg and Orlando combined.

Police have stopped some riders more than a dozen times, the newspaper reported, and, at least one individual has been ticketed three times in a single day.

“If it’s not racial profiling, what is it?” Joyce Hamilton Henry, director of advocacy for ACLU of Florida, told the Times.

Critics might call it “biking while black,” but police, the paper reported, have another name for it: proactive policing.

“Instead of waiting to respond to 911 calls, officers now look for ways to initiate contact with potential lawbreakers and head off crime before it happens,” the Times wrote.

“This is not a coincidence,” said Police Chief Jane Castor told the Times. “Many individuals receiving bike citations are involved in criminal activity.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...ar-on-black-bicycle-riders-investigators-say/

:tear:

 

[carpro]

yada yada yada Same o same o

More race baiting. Big deal.

 

[Doubting Thomas]

In other news, in major cities across America blacks are waging war against other blacks in gang-related killings. Sadly, this goes underreported since the the race hucksters can't generate the same kind of media circus that occurs if the one who kills the black person happens to be white.

Likewise black Christians are murdered by black Muslims in Africa, and crickets are heard in the mainstream media outlets. (I guess black lives matter only when they are killed by non-blacks :tear: )

 

[PreachTony]

Of the 10,000 bicycle tickets issued by Tampa police in the past dozen years, the newspaper found that black cyclists received 79 percent of those citations, despite making up less than a quarter of the city’s population.

:tear:

Yeah, but what percentage of the city's bicycle riders do blacks make up?

For example: If there are 1000 bike riders in the city, and of that number 800 are black, then the statistic holds, regardless of city population breakdown.

 

[just-want-peace]

Yeah, but what percentage of the city's bicycle riders do blacks make up?

For example: If there are 1000 bike riders in the city, and of that number 800 are black, then the statistic holds, regardless of city population breakdown.

Now here you go messin' up a fantastic premise (with a lot of promise) by wanting some facts!!
You ought to be ashamed.:tongue3:

 

[annsni]

Yeah, but what percentage of the city's bicycle riders do blacks make up?

For example: If there are 1000 bike riders in the city, and of that number 800 are black, then the statistic holds, regardless of city population breakdown.

I was just going to ask the same thing. In my area, Hispanics make up the largest portion of bike riders because many of them do not own cars. So I would expect tickets to bike riders in my area would reflect a higher portion of Hispanics ticketed than other racial/ethnic groups.

 

[carpro]

Yeah, but what percentage of the city's bicycle riders do blacks make up?



For example: If there are 1000 bike riders in the city, and of that number 800 are black, then the statistic holds, regardless of city population breakdown.

You're wasting your time. Zac is not interested in facts or the truth.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Zaac]

A Tampa Bay Times investigation concluded that Florida police are targeting people riding bikes in poor black neighborhoods for minor — and sometimes, imaginary — offenses, as an excuse to question what a department memo called "potential criminals." In practice, "potentials criminals" translates to "African Americans."

According to the Times, officers have figured out a way to use "an obscure subsections of a Florida statute that outlaws things most people have tried on a bike, like riding with no light or carrying a friend on the handlebars."

The resulting statistics are striking. Eight out of 10 bike riders stopped in Tampa from 2003 year to 2015 were black, meaning they received 79 percent of the bike tickets despite making up a quarter of the city's population. But the narratives that go along with these numbers are nearly unbelievable.

Here are some of the stories from the Times's report on the study, which analyzed over 10,000 bike tickets issued over a period of 12 years:

After a 56-year-old black man rode his bike through a stop sign while pulling a lawnmower, police handcuffed him while they confirmed that he had not stolen the lawnmower, but borrowed it from a friend.
Police confiscated the bike of a 54-year-old black man because he didn't have a receipt proving that it belonged to him.
A 63-year-old black man was stopped for not having lights on his bike, when he did actually have lights on his bike.
After a 33-year-old man ran a stop sign on a bike without a light, police officers punched, kicked, and choked him until he was unconscious. Later, the officers explained to a judge why they were suspicious that he may have had a weapon on him: "He was in a high-crime area," and "He had large clothing." ("Was he black, too?" the judge asked. She dismissed the criminal charges.)

"It's possible blacks in some areas use bicycles more than whites. But that's not what's driving the disparity," the paper concluded. "Police are targeting certain high-crime neighborhoods and nitpicking cyclists as a way to curb crime. They hope they will catch someone with a stolen bike or with drugs or that they will scare thieves away."

This isn't just speculation. A 2007 department memo uncovered by the Times outlining what officers called "Bicycle Blitzkrieg" made it plain that goal was "to aggressively enforce bicycle infractions ... where there has been increased criminal activity ... opening more avenues to make arrests."

Officers weren't stopping individuals because they were individually suspicious. They were stopping them because of where they lived — a factor that, of course, went hand in hand with their race. Bicycle infractions simply provided a cover.

That means that in Tampa, residents essentially lived under two different sets of laws, determined by their race and neighborhood, and that black people truly couldn't do something as simple as riding a bike in the same way that white people could. Apparently officers were fine with that.

http://www.vox.com/2015/4/20/8457289/tampa-police-bicycle-investigation