Is the Use of Ethnic or Racial Profiling by Law Enforcement Personnel Constitutional?

Introduction

Law enforcement personnel frequently profile certain kinds of people who are more expected to carry out offenses. Many of these suspect individuals are profiled, for the reason that, of actions observed by police forces. Even though, this kind of profiling is not always taken as just act, law enforcement officials think it essential to recognize possible criminal action before it take places and causes damage to others. One of the most debated concerns in police force is the profiling of people based exclusively on the racial or nationalized basis of the individual.

Examples of profiling by police forces are exemplified in lawful decisions and information gathered by lawmaking bodies, suggestive of that minorities are unreasonably the focus of usual traffic stops and other safety-allied exercises. The matter has occasionally involved legislature attention, predominantly with regard to presented and projected lawmaking protections, which take account of the planned 'End Racial Profiling Act' of 2011 in the 112th Legislative Body (Feder, 2012, pp.5). Courts have considered the legitimate consequences of the performance as an “irrational search and arrest” in the 4th Amendment and, in recent times, as a contradiction of the 14th Amendment's equal fortification assurance. Centralized decrees grant a stay of execution to people who assert that their constitutional rights are dishonored by racial profiling by police forces and guiding principles. This paper will offer both sides of argument of the case that has been considered by U.S. Supreme Court in the last ten years.

Discussion

Key Facts of the Case

In the year 1998, shooting deaths of three young people by troopers in a traffic stop on the New Jersey Turnpike sparkled a nationwide debate on the matter of alleged "racial profiling" by police officials. Opponents of profiling assert that the act is racially prejudiced, as Law Enforcement Personnel lean to stop and scrutinize minorities more frequently than majorities.

Case of United States v Brignoni Ponce dealt with the matter of racial discrimination as a feature giving rise to rational doubt of illegal activity. In this case, the police officials supported the feature to give explanation for stopping car of the Mexican residents. Neither this feature nor the police officer's idea that the inhabitants were illegitimate aliens satisfied the legal decisions for an investigatory purpose. The Court approved that any person from Mexico is an unfamiliar person and requires to prove his Mexican appearance as a related feature. Independently, that feature did not maintain rational doubt needed for a stop. The Court projected a multifactor scrutiny: “Police Officials may think about the features of the region; customary patterns of traffic on the particular highway, and previous practice with an unknown in the same state.” Moreover, unpredictable performance and ambiguous actions by individuals under the surveillance of the law enforcement personnel, in addition with the features of the car, may support the doubt needed for an investigatory purpose.

Opponents of racial profiling lean on the 4th Amendment of the United States Constitution to confront the ...