While ostensibly trying to help people of color in the legal system, the Washington State Supreme Court has issued a ruling that could actually put communities of color at risk. Further, the decision could create even more tension and division between these communities and the police officers who are sworn to serve and protect them.
In the case of State v. Sum, the Supreme Court found that “implicit, institutional, and unconscious biases, in addition to purposeful discrimination, have resulted in disproportionate police contacts, investigative seizures, and uses of force against Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC) in Washington.” The court held that it is “a matter of independent state law that race and ethnicity are relevant to the question of whether a person was seized by law enforcement.”
While it is true that the demographics of those arrested by the police in Washington state are often disproportionate with the demographics of the population, the Court had no factual basis for finding that the cause of this racial disproportionality was due to “institutional biases” by law enforcement agencies and “purposeful discrimination” by police officers.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the population of Washington State is 78.5% white and 4.4% Black or African American. Data from the FBI’s National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) shows that 78.5% of arrested suspects in Washington State are white while 13.7% of arrests involve Black suspects. This means that Black residents are more than three times as likely to be arrested as white residents.
This is where the Court’s analysis ends, and the nine justices used this data to find that the racial disparities with the population are the result of biased policing against BIPOC communities.
If the court had gone further with its analysis and used a valid scientific methodology for calculating racial disparities, the justices could have identified the root causes of these disparities. This analysis would have led to a very different decision by the court. Racial disparities in the legal system can be reduced only by investing in underserved communities thereby reducing and preventing criminal behavior and keeping people out of the system in the first place.
The FBI’s NIBRS system also provides data on the race of crime victims and reported crime suspects. In Washington state reported victims of violent crimes were 75.4% white and 16.8% Black. This means that Black residents are four times more likely to be the victim of a violent crime than white residents. Victims of violent crimes who reported these incidents to police identified the suspects’ race as white 61.0% of the time and as Black 32.6% of the time. This means that law enforcement agencies in Washington are more than seven times as likely to receive a report of a violent crime involving a Black suspect than a white suspect.
Why are Black residents in Washington state much more likely than white residents to report being the victim of a violent crime and why are Black residents more frequently reported as violent crime suspects?
According to the Washington State Department of Health, systemic and institutional racism have shaped the communities where we live: “Race is a central consideration for the healthy communities’ movement. Race has shaped our regions, creating places that offer profoundly unequal opportunities to their residents. In many ways, race remains our deepest divide. Effective strategies to build healthy, vibrant, sustainable communities must address both race and place, openly and authentically.”
Racism and discrimination have had significant impacts throughout our society and have produced profound racial disparities. A 2020 study from King County found that:
• Black adults are more than 2.9 times likely to be living in poverty or near poverty compared to white adults. • Black adults are more than 4 times as likely to run out of food without money to purchase than white adults. • Black adults are evicted 5.5 times more often than white adults. • Black adults represent 28% of homeless households receiving services in the homeless response system — more than quadruple their percentage of the King County population. • Black adults are more than 2 times less likely to have insurance compared to white adults. • The rate at which Black people have confirmed cases of COVID-19 is 3 times greater than that of white people, and the rate of COVID-19 hospitalization is double that of white people. • The median income for Black households is $48,075, which is about half the median income of white households ($94,533). • In Seattle, Black household median net worth is $23,000, which is only 5% of white household median net worth ($456,000).
No one should be surprised that racial disparities exist in the legal system just as they do in virtually every other area of our society.
If law enforcement officers engage in biased or discriminatory behavior, they should be held accountable and there are legal and administrative mechanisms for doing so. However, the law enforcement profession should not be held responsible for racial disparities that exist in policing data that are not the result of biased behavior by police officers. We cannot reduce racial disparities in the legal system simply by issuing court decisions requiring officers to be unbiased. In order to reduce racial disparities in stops, arrests, searches and uses of force, we must address the root causes of criminal behavior. Governments need to invest in BIPOC communities and reverse the injustices of the past. Regulations and laws should be adopted or changed to ensure equal opportunities for all.
The police are simply dealing with the downstream effects of hundreds of years of systemic and institutional racism in our society. The police cannot reduce these racial disparities on their own. Rather than teaming up mental health professionals with police officers, governments should invest in a better mental health care system that provides treatment on demand. Rather than sending out social workers with police officers to deal with homeless encampments, local governments should provide affordable housing for all their residents. Racial disparities will not be reduced by drafting new police policies or by implementing implicit-bias training programs or by imposing more consent decrees on law enforcement agencies. In fact, there is some evidence that implementing policing reforms may actually increase racial disparities.
The State v. Sum decision does not address the problems the nine justices claim to be concerned about. Instead, their opinion will further divide the police from the communities they are sworn to serve and protect and will increase tensions with BIPOC residents.
The Court has made it much easier for BIPOC individuals to accuse the police of bias and this will cause police officers to distance themselves from BIPOC communities. Unfortunately, this decision by the state Supreme Court will only increase racial disparities in the legal system as officers become less proactive and focus more of their time on violent felonies where racial disparities are the highest.
If significant investments are made in BIPOC and underserved communities, criminal behavior will be reduced, fewer people will enter the legal system, and racial disparities will be eliminated. Then we can look seriously at reducing funding for law enforcement agencies because some of their services will no longer be needed.
The opinions expressed in reader comments are those of the author only and do not reflect the opinions of The Seattle Times.