NCJ Number
215234
Journal
British Journal of Criminology Volume: 46 Issue: 4 Dated: July 2006 Pages: 613-640
Date Published
July 2006
Length
28 pages
Annotation
Drawing upon a broader qualitative study of violence in the lives of African-American youths from a distressed urban community, this study examined the experiences and perceptions of police harassment and misconduct for 40 of these youths.
Abstract
Two findings of this study are consistent with the findings of other research on minorities and the police in the United States. First, the African-American youths reported more dissatisfaction with and mistrust of the police than other groups. Second, Blacks disproportionately reported "getting hassled" by the police, and they disproportionately experienced a range of additional adverse police actions. More than half of the youth in the study sample had no history of serious offending, but they still reported negative experiences with the police. Those youth who had committed various offenses in the past but had stopped their criminal behavior still believed they would be perceived as criminal by even those police who were aware of their changed behavior. The youth's complaints were not focused on policing itself in their neighborhoods, as many recognized the importance of constructive police actions; however, they complained about aggressive and discourteous treatment during routine encounters. When the police were believed to have exercised their authority fairly and treated suspects respectfully, the youth were less likely to attribute a racially biased motive to police stops. This study obtained data from a survey of and indepth interviews with 40 Black adolescent boys (ages 13-19) living in St. Louis, MO. Interviews began in spring 1999 and ended in the spring of 2000. 1 table and 74 references