Problems with dog sniffs
An excellent expose by the Tribune shows that alerts by police drug-sniffing dogs in suburban Illinois are usually wrong, and that the hit rates for car searches resulting from the use of dogs are nearly twice as high for whites than for Hispanics (“Drug dogs often wrong; Police canines can fall short, but observers cite residue and poor training as factors,” Page 1, Jan. 6).
These numbers do not tell the full story. Dog sniffs are menacing, especially for minority motorists, in light of historical abuses committed with police dogs. Dog sniffs also are humiliating, taking place in full view of passing motorists, friends and strangers alike, many of whom probably conclude that the people subjected to dog sniffs must be guilty of something. Full car searches based on false dog alerts are even more frightening and embarrassing.
The same state database used by the Tribune shows a similar racial disparity in so-called consent searches, which occur when police lack legal cause to search a car but nonetheless request permission to search. In 2009, Illinois State Police troopers were 3.2 times more likely to consent search Hispanic motorists compared to white motorists, yet the resulting hit rate for whites was 2.7 times higher than for Hispanics. The data are similar for other years and departments.
These data demonstrate the need to reform dog sniffs and consent searches during routine traffic stops. Dog sniffs should be banned absent individualized reasonable suspicion that a car contains illegal drugs.
In 2005, legislation to mandate this standard was sponsored by almost all members of the Illinois House Black Caucus. This standard should be constitutionally mandated. Without this objective standard, too many police officers use hunches to decide which cars to sniff, and those hunches too often rest on unconscious or even conscious bias. The inevitable result of this unbridled discretion is the stark racial disparity found by the Tribune.
Requests for consent, like canine sniffs, are based on hunches instead of objective evidence, leading predictably to racial disparity. Roadside search requests are inherently coercive, which is why more than 95 percent of motorists of all races give so-called consent to Illinois State Police troopers. Thus, individualized suspicion is not a meaningful fix, and consent searches of cars should be banned.
The state’s dog-sniff and consent-search data also show the need for other reforms.
First, a state statute calls for a task force to study such data, and to recommend improvements in police policies. Unfortunately, this task force has never met. The governor immediately should convene it.
In turn, the task force should promptly recommend individualized suspicion for canine sniffs and a ban on consent searches.
Second, the Tribune could not have performed its study without data collected under the Illinois Traffic Stop Statistical Study Act of 2003, a police accountability law championed by then-State Sen. Barack Obama. Unfortunately, that statute will expire in 2015. The Legislature now should make this critical statute permanent.
Third, the Legislature should create a statewide system for training, certifying and monitoring drug-sniffing police dogs.
A regulatory agency should track the hit rates of car searches based on each dog’s alerts.
The study act should be amended to ensure that the public has access to these data.
Dogs with poor hit rates or racially disparate hit rates should be retrained or retired.
— Harvey Grossman, legal director, ACLU of Illinois, Chicago
Let all run
I think the reason that the vast majority of folks who wanted to keep Rahm Emanuel off the mayoral ballot felt that way was due to an intense dislike of someone who is known to be a polarizing public figure; it was not because of any sacred notions about what constitutes a “qualified” candidate.
As long as you are a citizen of the U.S. and not a convicted felon, go ahead and have at it.
If Emanuel had never lived in Chicago and wanted to run for mayor, why should anybody care? If he were not connected to the city and its people, he wouldn’t stand a chance of winning.
Just look at what happened when Republicans imported Alan Keyes from out of state to run for the U.S. Senate against Barack Obama in 2004.
Keyes was a clueless egotist and could not have cared less about what really mattered to the voters of Illinois.
It was legal for him to run as an obvious outsider, but all he succeeded in doing was to waste his time.
Just let the people decide!
— Nick Sloane, Evanston
Ineffective change
As I watch his TV commercials, I get the impression that Rahm Emanuel is intending to bring to Chicago that same change and hope that Barack Obama brought to Washington. Does anyone need any other reasons to vote for one of the other candidates?
— Lee J. Regner, Park Ridge
Not a charity
I am a middle-income senior with a respectable pension. I can quite well afford to pay the same taxes as working people, and pay full fare on the CTA, and see no reason why I should not. (All the same, I will take advantage of those breaks as long as they are offered.)
Not only should free or half-price rides on CTA and other RTA agencies be given only to those actually in need, the cost should come entirely out of the welfare budget.
That is, welfare agencies should pay RTA the full price for all passes, and then give them to deserving clients.
Why should we expect RTA to be a charity?
— George W. Price, Chicago
Free rides
I am a 79-year-old senior citizen who worked until I was 72.
I never collected unemployment, workers’ compensation or disability.
I never got free breakfast or lunch in school.
The only thing I got free was the room and board I got while I was in the Army for two years (1952-53).
Maybe veterans should receive free rides for seniors on the CTA.
— Ervin E. Huber, Chicago
Cost increases
The Tribune calls for ending free rides for seniors (Editorial, Jan. 24).
We retirees have just been hit with a huge state tax increase and can ill-afford another hit, which is adding what will amount to another tax.
— Gary Greenberg, Chicago
