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BEFORE THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICECIVIL RIGHTS DIVISIONFEDERAL COMPLIANCE AND COORDINATION SECTIONALMIGHTY LATIN KINGS AND QUEENS ) NATION, an unincorporated association, and )JORGE CORNELL, CARLOS COLEMAN, )
COMPLAINT UNDER TITLE VI OF
RANDOLPH KILFOIL, RUSSELL KILFOIL, )
THE CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1964
CHARLES MOORE, JUSTINE PARATORE, )RICHARD ROBINSON, LUIS ROSA, VANESSA )THORPE-DAVIS, FIDEL VALDEZ, and )SAMUEL VELASQUEZ ))Complainants, ))v. ))GREENSBORO POLICE DEPARTMENT and )and the CITY OF GREENSBORO ))Respondents. )The Complainants are an organization and several of its members who have beensubjected to arrests without probable cause, repeated harassment, loss of their jobs,imprisonment, physical assaults and damage to their reputation by officers of the GreensboroPolice Department on account of their race, ethnicity and national origin. Upon information and belief, the Greensboro Police Department (hereinafter “GPD”), administered by the City of Greensboro, is a recipient of federal financial assistance. (Ex. A). Therefore, the actions of theDepartment as detailed herein, are in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.Complainants seek remedies for the intentionally discriminatory acts by the respondents whichinclude targeting the Almighty Latin Kings and Queens Nation (hereinafter “ALKQN or LatinKings”) and its members for harassment without cause because of their race, ethnicity andnational origin. In addition, Complainants seek remedies for the policies and practices of theGPD that have a disparate impact on them on the basis of their race, ethnicity and nationalorigin; and thereby subjects Complainants to discrimination on the basis of their race, or nationalorigin.The GPD has systematically discriminated against and harassed ALKQN members sincethe group’s formation in 2005. There is evidence showing that the Greensboro PoliceDepartment’s anti-Latino bias causes it to intentionally target ALKQN members for deportation, bring baseless charges against them, and subject them to unlawful and discriminatory traffic
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stops, nonconsensual searches, and false arrests often involving the use of excessive force. GPDgang unit officers have visited ALKQN members’ places of work and residence without aninvestigatory purpose and spoken to members’ job supervisors and landlords, causing membersto lose their jobs and homes. As long as this problem goes unresolved, ALKQN members willcontinue to become more isolated from the broader community and will continue to suffer severeeconomic losses as they are forced to pay inordinately high bond amounts and attorneys’ feesdefending themselves against meritless criminal charges.Greensboro Police Department’s “top-down enforcement strategy,” by which it purportedly aims to disrupt criminal gang organizations, has disproportionately and adverselyaffected those Greensboro Latinos who have committed no crime by joining ALKQN. Therecord of complaints submitted to the Complaint Review Committee over the past five years,along with other evidence, indicates that similarly situated white and African-American membersof other Greensboro gangs have not been adversely impacted as ALKQN members have. One of the most glaringly obvious ways in which ALKQN has been adversely impacted is seen byexamining its members’ felony conviction rate. From late 2005 through early 2010, GreensboroALKQN members were convicted of
less than eleven percent of all felony charges. JordanGreen,
Charges of Corruption Put GPD Under Scrutiny
, Yes!Weekly, May 26, 2010, at 15. Incomparison, an analysis of the statistics available from the North Carolina Administrative Officeof the Courts indicates that the conviction rate for all felony charges filed in Guilford County (of which Greensboro is a part) is 65.4 percent.
Id.
This shockingly low conviction rate is explained by the fact that GPD’s gang unit officers constantly follow and harass ALKQN members seekingany pretext to make an arrest, and do not hesitate to bring meritless charges against the members,whether they be misdemeanor or felony crimes.
The GPD’s history of racially discriminatory employment practices, athough not directlyrelated to the racially discriminatory harassment of ALKQN, stems from the same “cowboy”subculture that exists among certain white officers within the department. As Greensboro’sReverend Nelson Johnson put it: “There is a group of white police officers who see themselvesas cowboys and above the law. These officers are even beyond the Sheriff’s control. Unless anduntil a thorough investigation of this police department is done, the most appropriate remedieswill not be clear.” We urge the Department of Justice to investigate the Greensboro PoliceDepartment’s discriminatory treatment of the Complainants and to work with the GreensboroPolice Department to eradicate these discriminatory practices.
I. Background: Race Relations in the City of Greensboro
On November 3, 1979, a group of Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi members descended uponan anti-KKK rally, shooting five marchers dead. The Greensboro Police Department did not provide officers for the march as was its normal practice for any type of protest. An all-white jury acquitted the accused murderers, but in 1985 a judgment of $350,000 was entered againstthe city of Greensboro—including five police officers—for having violated the marchers’ civilrights. Despite opposition from the Greensboro City Council, in 2005 Greensboro residents
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formed a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate what had caused the massacre.The Commission found that the Greensboro Police Department had been aware of the attackers’ plans and aware that there existed a high probability of violence, and nonetheless failed to assignofficers to the event.In the 1990s large numbers of Latinos began arriving in Greensboro and other parts of North Carolina for the first time. Greensboro’s Latino population jumped up four percent between 2002 and 2003, and by 2003 there were nearly 27,000 Latinos residing in the city. Themajority of Greensboro’s Latinos are undocumented immigrants from Mexico. North Carolina currently has more 287 (g) jurisdictions than any other state. In 2006Mecklenburg County became the first county in North Carolina to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) adopting the 287(g) program.Although 287 (g) was originally touted as a way of apprehending “dangerous criminal aliens,” in practice 287(g) in North Carolina has provided the mechanism by which racist law enforcementofficers can target Hispanic drivers for arrest and deportation without fear of reprisal.In July of 2009, Guilford County became yet another North Carolina county to adopt the287 (g) program, but only after a heated community debate. Hundreds of Guilford Countyresidents attended a community meeting in March of 2009 to express their concerns regardingthe county’s planned implementation of the program. At this meeting, a citizen asked GuilfordCounty Sheriff BJ Barnes how he had been able, during the course of a traffic stop, to identifythe driver as Latino. The Sheriff famously responded: “I could tell because of the kind of musiche had going.” Kathleen Jordan,
Sheriff B.J. Barnes Engaged in Heated Exchange Over 287 (g) Policy
, Beloved Community Center’s News & View, Apr. 2, 2009.In 2006, former Greensboro Police Officer and Latino A.J. Blake—who would, in 2007, become the only officer of color assigned to the gang unit—filed a complaint against whitesergeant Hafekaneyer for describing Latinos as wet-backs and for saying that Latinos all lookedlike illegal aliens. Blake later filed a complaint against white officer Ashley Brown for sayingthat since everyone from Honduras is a gang member, Blake, who is Honduran, must also be agang member. Press Release, Officer A.J. Blake,
Public Statement by Greensboro Police Officer A.J. Blake
(June 2, 2009) (on file in the Beloved Community Center’s “News & View”archives).In 2006, a group of non-white police officers filed a complaint against the city of Greensboro with the United States Equal Opportunity Employment Commission allegingemployment discrimination. On January 9, 2009, forty-four African-American officers sued thecity of Greensboro for employment discrimination
.
Police Officers File Discrimination Lawsuit
, News & Record, Jan. 9, 2009. Shortly after suit was filed, the GPD leadership promotedAfrican-American officer and plaintiff Tim Bellamy to the rank of police chief. Following his promotion, Bellamy quickly dropped out of the suit. The lawsuit is still pending.The Greensboro Police Department is currently in the process of declaring unfit for duty,and firing, a number of African-American officers involved in the pending employmentdiscrimination lawsuit. Specifically, the GPD is currently attempting to fire Captain Cherry who
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