Troubling New Evidence of Racial Profiling Culture at SDPD

The San Diego ACLU is deeply troubled by a recent report on KGTV in which several active duty police officers exposed several of their fellow officers in the Southeastern Division for complaining that a developing mural in the stationhouse had "too many black faces." The officers who are reportedly uncomfortable with the faces of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, City Councilmember Myrtle Cole, and their own Captain Tony McElroy, are among the officers charged with protecting and serving San Diego's southeastern neighborhood, which has the highest density of African American residents in the city.

The San Diego ACLU is concerned by how such biases could influence these officers in their day to day interactions in the community. One officer who was troubled by the comments said, “If they feel this way about a mural, how are they going to treat the public?”

This disturbing report is one more reason that the San Diego Police Department is in desperate need of a thorough audit that investigates the department’s incidences of racial profiling.