WHITE DRUG DEFENDANT CLAIMS SHE'S THE VICTIM OF RACIAL PROFILING

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- A white woman stopped in a black neighborhood where
police officers found a syringe and spoon inside her purse says her guilty
plea should be thrown out because she was the victim of racial profiling.

Karen Vingle, 39, pleaded guilty recently to drug charges and was sentenced
to two years in prison. Her attorney wants an appeals court to dismiss the
case on grounds that she was unfairly stopped and searched by police
because of her race.

Typically, racial profiling involves complaints that officers stop
minorities, usually searching for drugs, simply on the basis of their race
and where they are at the time.

Vingle was arrested on Sept. 23, 1999, after cruising in her new Mustang
into a mostly black area of New Orleans known as Pigeon Town. Police said
they have arrested several white man and women cruising the neighborhood in
search of illegal drugs.

Criminal District Judge Leon Cannizzaro ruled the arrest was proper. Vingle
pleaded guilty on the condition she could challenge his decision to the 4th
Circuit Court of Appeal. Her appeal says her constitutional rights were
violated when police approached her as a white woman in the "wrong place."

"If we're going to apply the Constitution equally to all races, anybody who
is targeted because of their race has been violated," said Vingle's
attorney, Bernard Bagert Jr.

The district attorney's office has not responded yet to the appeal, but
prosecutors said during the trial that race was not the sole factor in
arresting her.

After Vingle was stopped, she was asked for her driver's license. Police
said that while she searched through her purse, officers spotted a syringe
and spoon that tested for traces of heroin and cocaine, along with half a
Valium.

Vingle pleaded guilty Dec. 14 to attempted possession of heroin, possession
cocaine and possession of diazepam. She served about two months in prison
before she was released on appeal bond.

Court records show she failed three drug tests late last year and didn't
show up at hearings in February and March, when her $5,000 cash bond was
forfeited.

Bagert said the appeals court will have to address whether race can help
form the basis of a reasonable police stop.