Race in Law Enforcement
In an attempt to provide general descriptions that may facilitate the job of law enforcement officers seeking to apprehend suspects, the United States FBI employs the term "race" to summarize the general appearance (skin color, hair texture, eye shape, and other such easily noticed characteristics) of individuals whom they are attempting to apprehend. From the perspective of law enforcement officers, a description needs to capture the features that stand out most clearly in the perception within the given society.
Thus, in the UK, Scotland Yard use a classification based on the ethnic composition of British society: W1 (White British), W2 (White Irish), W9 (Other White); M1 (White and black Caribbean), M2 (White and black African), M3 (White and Asian), M9 (Any other mixed background); A1 (Asian-Indian), A2 (Asian-Pakistani), A3 (Asian-Bangladeshi), A9 (Any other Asian background); B1 (Black Caribbean), B2 (Black African), B3 (Any other black background); O1 (Chinese), O9 (Any other).
In many countries, the state is legally banned from maintaining data based on race, which often makes the police issue wanted notices to the public that include labels like "light skin complexion", etc.
In the United States, the practice of racial profiling has been ruled to be both unconstitutional and also to constitute a violation of civil rights. There also an ongoing debate on the relationship between race and crime regarding the disproportional representation of certain minorities in all stages of the criminal justice system.
Studies in racial taxonomy based on DNA cluster analysis (See Lewontin's Fallacy) has led law enforcement to pursue suspects based on their racial classification as derived from their DNA evidence left at the crime scene. DNA analysis has been successful in helping police determine the race of both victims and perpetrators. This classification is called "biogeographical ancestry"
Read more about this topic: Social Interpretations Of Race
Famous quotes containing the words race in, race and/or law:
“In nothing was slavery so savage and relentless as in its attempted destruction of the family instincts of the Negro race in America. Individuals, not families; shelters, not homes; herding, not marriages, were the cardinal sins in that system of horrors.”
—Fannie Barrier Williams (1855–1944)
“A race horse needs only a touch of the whip; a clever person needs only a hint.”
—Chinese proverb.
“These, having not the law, are a law unto themselves.”
—Bible: New Testament St. Paul, in Romans, 2:14.