Police union questions criminologist's
impartiality
By Tamsin McMahon
Local News - Friday, October 22, 2004 @ 07:00
Kingston’s police officers have been told to get in line with everyone else
who wants a peek at the results of the police department’s recently completed
program to collect information on the race of everyone they stop.
The Kingston Police Association, which represents more than 200 uniformed
officers, tabled a letter at yesterday’s police services board meeting asking
for access to the raw numbers from the year-long data collection pilot project
that wrapped up Oct. 1.
The union said it had concerns about University of Toronto criminologist Scott
Wortley, who was picked to crunch the numbers, and wanted to do its own,
independent analysis.
In his Oct. 14 letter, association president Sean Bambrick said he didn’t feel
Wortley could be unbiased, since the department consulted him when it was first
setting up the data collection project last year.
“I have also learned that Mr. Wortley said that police do practice racial
profiling in a Toronto Star series on the same topic,” Bambrick wrote. “I
am, of course, not suggesting any overt partiality on behalf of Mr. Wortley, but
for obvious reasons this creates concerns for the Association.”
Wortley was not quoted in the Toronto Star’s 2002 series Race and Crime, which
examined whether Toronto police engaged in racial profiling.
The union hadn’t yet picked the person they want to crunch the numbers, but
Bambrick said it might look to the Police Association of Ontario for advice.
Officers had voted against the project when it was started last year.
They worried that having to fill out a detailed sheet, called a contact card, on
the race and ethnicity of everyone they stop would cause officers to
second-guess themselves.
The police department already has a complaints process to deal with allegations
of racial profiling, the union contended.
In his letter to the board, Bambrick said officers are thrilled to see the end
of a project that has had a negative impact on police in the community.
“Many of my members believe this program has attacked our credibility and
integrity, creating a poor perception of our professionalism to the public and
other police agencies,” he wrote.
The board responded by saying the association would have to wait until the
police department publicly releases its own analysis of the data in late
February or early March.
Mayor Harvey Rosen, a board member, said he was worried that if the union got
the raw data early, it could come out with its own take on the numbers before
the department had a chance to weigh in.
“It could be a difficult issue to deal with,” he said.
“It’s our process, we should have control over it.”