ADDRESS THE ISSUE OF RACIAL PROFILING

According to a police statement, Jamal Davis was stopped for driving
with a suspended driver's license. The Nov. 23 article, "Heroin found
before death," says the car was registered to a woman living in
Sanford. If the car was registered to someone else, the police could
not have known who was driving it at the time it was stopped. If the
police did not know the identity of the driver, how could they have
known that his driver's license was suspended?

They could not have known. Which begs the question, "Why, truthfully,
was Davis stopped?"

Perhaps Davis was stopped because it was almost 11 p.m. Perhaps
because the area he was stopped in hosts some less-than-desirable
elements. Perhaps because he was an African American. I submit that
it was a combination of the three. Racial profiling.

This traffic stop was nothing less than a fishing expedition. "Let's
pull him and see what we've got." This time police were lucky. Davis
was not squeaky clean. This fact, however, does not make it OK. The
issue of racial profiling in Fayetteville needs to be addressed.

When pulled over by an officer, most inquire as to the reason for the
stop. In Davis' case, the law could not have given him an answer --
at least not right away.

Sam Moore

Fayetteville