Transoceanic Profiling: ongoing racism in Germany and the United States

Police brutality, particularly in altercations involving immigrants or people of color , has been on the rise in recent years. With immigration rising in both the U.S. and Germany, it appears that diversity comes with a cost.
(Photo courtesy of cagle.com)

Last week an unnamed German citizen, 26, won a landmark discrimination case in the Higher Administrative Court for Rhineland-Palatinate.

Here is the catch: he is black. 

Both a German citizen and a student at a university in Kassel, the man has been taken aside at least 10 times by federal police. On this occasion, he was traveling to visit family in Offenbach. The police took him aside, thinking he was another undocumented illegal.

However, when the police harassed him to hand over his travel documents, he finally decided to stand up to them. Other train passengers spoke out against the officers, but nevertheless, the officers continued to harass the student. Eventually, he was taken to the police station where he was finger printed and placed into a holding cell. They questioned whether or not he could speak English and had documents.

Eventually, he was released once he showed his driver's license. His reason for resistance? Due to his past experiences being taken aside, he found that police need to give at least one reason for questioning passersby. In his case, the police failed to do that.

Though the student did not seek monetary damages, he characterized the experience as "the worst day of [his] life."

In California, this experience is common amongst Latino immigrants, legal and illegal alike. Thus, racial profiling has become especially prominent, particularly in border states. Racial profiling is defined as taking a person's race or ethnicity into account when deciding whether to engage in enforcement.

In 2008, the ACLU of Southern California released a report, which analyzed Los Angeles Police Department pulling over pedestrians and determined that African Americans and Latinos were "over-stopped and over-frisked" by law enforcement, much like the officers in Germany.

According to this ACLU study, blacks and Latinos were 76 and 16 percent more likely to be pulled over and searched than whites. Twenty nine and 32 percent of blacks and Latinos were more likely to be arrested as a result of these searches.

What other trends have there been in regards to racial profiling in the U.S. and abroad? Are there any patterns you have notice?

Racial Profiling: Germany vs. Arizona

In a recent ruling courts ruled against racial profiling based on skin color. After an incident where 26-year-old student refused when asked to show his identification on a train due to his dark skin color and was subsequently held at a police station, the student brought the case to court, suing for discrimination.  After a lower court deemed the police action acceptable a higher court overturned the ruling, saying that this action had gone against Germany's anti discrimination law. This case could set a precedent against racial profiling by the police.
   As a US citizen and resident of Arizona this case reminded me of SB1070, Arizona's recent illegal immigration law. This law, while it does not openly accept racial profiling, does promote it by allowing officers to demand immigration papers if there is reasonable suspicion that they are dealing with an illegal immigrant. The term reasonable suspicion basically allows the officer to decide who could or could not be illegal. In the case of Arizona, most illegal immigrants come across the nearby border with Mexico, thus making it extremely easy to suspect anyone of hispanic heritage of being illegal. In any case, I was glad to see that Germany has made it clear that requesting identification purely based on one's looks is not acceptable. I hope that Arizona can learn from this example and eventually follow suit.