ACLU FILES SUIT AGAINST MD

Police Group Says Blacks Targeted Along I-95

By Paul W. Valentine Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, June 5, 199
8; Page
B01

The American Civil Liberties Union yesterday escalated its five-year-
long
offensive against the Maryland State Police, announcing a broad new
class-action lawsuit claiming that African American motorists still a
re
being targeted for drug searches on Interstate 95.

State police immediately counterattacked with a news conference of th
eir
own, denying that there is either a policy or practice of race-based
drug
"profiling." They also offered statistics showing that, of the millio
ns of
motorists on I-95, only a minuscule number -- black or white -- are s
topped
and searched.

At the news conference, Maryland Attorney General J. Joseph Curran Jr
. threw
his support behind the troopers, as did all four state police employe
e
organizations, including the Coalition of Black Maryland State Troope
rs.

The ACLU class-action suit, filed in federal court in Baltimore on be
half of
all black drivers who have undergone state police searches in which n
othing
was found, includes claims by 11 black drivers. Five of those drivers
told
reporters at the news conference held by the ACLU that they were subj
ected
to a range of humiliating and verbally abusive treatment during roads
ide
searches by troopers and drug-sniffing dogs.

"I continue to feel the effects" of a January 1996 search, said Gary
D.
Rodwell, 42, head of a nonprofit organization in Philadelphia. He sai
d
troopers stopped him for speeding and told him that he "looked like a
drug
dealer. . . . It's a pretty frightening feeling, particularly after t
he sun
goes down."

Even on the way to yesterday's news conference, "I was on paranoid lo
okout,"
said James E. Alston, 38, of Burtonsville, a military claims clerk at
Fort
Myer.

ACLU attorneys said the Maryland searches are part of a larger nation
al
pattern of singling out African Americans, a phenomenon they called "
DWB,"
or "driving while black." Numerous legal actions have been filed agai
nst
other law enforcement agencies in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Florida a
nd
Indiana.

The Maryland class-action suit follows ACLU complaints against state
police
by two black families that have won settlements since 1993.

In one case, U.S. District Judge Catherine B. Blake ordered state pol
ice in
1995 to start tabulating a racial breakdown of traffic stops and sear
ches by
troopers patrolling a 45-mile stretch of I-95 from suburban Baltimore
to the
Delaware line -- a roadway police say is a major drug pipeline on the
East
Coast.

Based on the tabulations, Blake ruled in 1997 that troopers on I-95 w
ere
still engaging in a "pattern and practice" of racial discrimination.

Quarter-by-quarter figures show an uneven but gradual decline during
the
last three years in the proportion of motorists subjected to searches
who
were black, falling from 80 percent to 45 percent.

Police officials noted that the total number of searches also has dec
lined
during the period -- a factor state police Superintendent David B. Mi
tchell
attributed to lower trooper morale in the face of "constantly being c
alled
racist" and to drug dealers avoiding the Maryland I-95 corridor becau
se of
national publicity generated by ACLU litigation.

There is an additional reason, said Lt. Keven L. Gray, commander of t
he
troopers patrolling I-95: Many are newly assigned and "less experienc
ed at
spotting possible [drug] couriers." He said many of the older trooper
s,
weary of the accusations of racism, transferred to other assignments.
He
said that 33 percent of the 47 troopers assigned to the interstate ar
e
black, including himself.

Many troopers privately acknowledge that a disproportionately large
percentage of searches involve black motorists but attribute that to
the
fact that I-95 is used for ferrying drugs between cities with large m
inority
populations, such as Washington and Baltimore and other cities up and
down
the Eastern Seaboard, and the couriers are drawn from the communities
they
serve.

At the police news conference, Mitchell cited statistics that fewer t
han 1
percent of all motorists stopped for traffic violations are searched
or
arrested. And despite a somewhat higher proportion of blacks being st
opped,
he said, if blacks were truly being targeted, "I'd be having lawsuits
filed
ad nauseam at me. . . . If we're the 'good ol' boys,' some people mak
e us
out to be . . . they should look at the overall statistics."

Road Searches and Race

The ACLU has filed a federal class-action lawsuit in Baltimore allegi
ng
discrimination against African American drivers along Interstate 95 w
ho have
been stopped for drug searches by Maryland State Police.

Traffic Stops and Searches by Maryland State Police*

Whites Blacks

Traffic stops 32,727 14,048

Stops that resulted in searches 156 187

Searches that resulted in arrests 58 83

*On a 45-mile stretch on Interstate 95 between Baltimore County and t
he
Delaware line

SOURCE: Maryland State Police

A9 Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company

Checked-by: "R. Lake"