SHERIFF SETTLES CLAIM OVER RACIAL PROFILING IN CAMPUS RAID

Department agrees to revise training and notify community college
trustees after incident at L.A. Trade-Tech.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, settling a claim over
detentions of minority students during a narcotics search at Los
Angeles Trade-Technical College, has agreed to revise its anti-bias
training and ensure that its supervisors prevent racial profiling.

The Sheriff's Department, which patrols Los Angeles Community
College District campuses, reached the settlement with the American
Civil Liberties Union of Southern California to resolve a claim
alleging the department stopped and searched dozens of
African American students based on their race. The
incident occurred Oct. 17 on the campus south of downtown Los Angeles.

Attorneys for the ACLU said that under the settlement, the Sheriff's
Department will implement changes, including examining current
anti-racial bias procedures and revising its policy to state that
department officials within their power "guarantee racial profiling
and bias-policing are not practiced."

"Our Constitution and laws protect the community against law
enforcement harassment based on skin color, and this settlement is
one step toward ensuring that the Sheriff's Department never allows
that to happen again," said Catherine Lhamon, racial justice
director at the local ACLU chapter.

The suit stems from an incident in which 14 deputies went to the
campus allegedly looking for drug dealers and detained 33 black
students. A Latino student who attempted to take pictures of the
raid was also detained. Two people were arrested.

An investigation by the college district, which oversees the trade
school, concluded that the student roundup constituted racial
profiling: using racial or ethnic characteristics to determine
whether a person is likely to have committed a crime.

Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore, however, said the department's
internal investigation and the county Office of Independent Review
found that the department did not commit racial profiling, but that
the operation could have been better planned and conceived.

Whitmore said the department had been asked to respond to drug
dealing on the campus.

Whitmore said that in addition to anti-bias training, the department
will now make sure college officials are part of any policing event
on a campus.

In the wake of the incident, Sheriff Lee Baca said that deputies who
conducted the undercover sting operation, without the knowledge of
campus officials, said they believed they were observing a narcotics
sale in progress.

Hoping to keep the suspect in sight, deputies detained all the
students surrounding the activity, Baca said.

The Sheriff's Department is now required to notify the college
district's eight trustees before launching an investigation of
alleged illegal activity on campuses, he said. Any such operation
would require approval from the district's chancellor.

Michael Gennaco, head of the review office, said his investigation
found that the raid was not a case of racial profiling but inept planning.