Owusu-Bempah’s lecture provided his interpretation of data gathered in his latest research titled “Black Men and Urban Policing, Toronto Style” on Thursday.
“The study was to determine whether blacks do have more contact with the justice system and police in Toronto and to better understand their perception of this,” Owusu-Bempah said.
Research included in-depth investigation of the black community, the young black male community, race and its effects in the police community and the ?“disproportionate minority contact” between police and those of color.
His data showed almost 25 percent of black men in Toronto were stopped three or more times, whereas 8 percent of white men were stopped and 6 percent Chinese men ethnicity in the past two years. Black women held an even higher percentage by comparison.
In a survey limited to only young black men, the data reported 36 percent of them were physically abused by the police, 29 percent were stopped and searched, nearly 17 percent felt verbally abused and almost 8 percent were falsely arrested, he said.
When studying the police community and race, Owusu-Bempah said he encountered several complications.
He said with the “subculture in the police community” it was difficult to research beyond the police’s distrust of outsiders and code of silence due to a fear of damaging their careers or reaping ?internal reprisals.
For this reason, he said he obtained approval from his research team to move ?forward with his studies without an approval from the institution.
“About one-fourth of my data came from just approaching (the police officers) who supervise construction in the streets,” ?Owusu-Bempah said.
He found in his studies that black communities are often “over-policed and ?under-protected.”
In one set of data, he found that black persons are more likely to be stopped in Toronto than in New York City.
“This really puts into perspective the way that blacks are viewed in our society, if we think about the general regard toward Canada and the U.S.,” Owusu-Bempah said.
Although the title of the lecture states his data reflects specifically Toronto, he connects the lecture and datasets to an international scale.
Before teaching at IU, Owusu-Bempah was born in Britain and completed his Ph.D. at the Centre of ?Criminology at the University of Toronto.
He made comparisons in his findings between Sweden, Britain, Canada and the United States.
Muna Adem, a future Ph.D student in sociology, said she was concerned about the United States’ lack of progress on the issue.
“We – I come from Sweden – don’t talk about (the disproportionate contact between police and minorities) at all, so how can the same issues be true in a country where there is so much ?discussion?”
Owusu-Bempah said that racism in social structures exists in all countries, so these situations will still occur regardless of free speech.
He said he feels there should be more positive images of successful black professors, doctors and politicians in circulation to counteract the negative images of young black men in pop culture and music being promoted today.
He said society needs to hold officials accountable for the inequality in policing between races, as well as the police officers themselves.
Furthermore, he said body camera footage should always be accessible for the public to have a firsthand insight of police-citizen ?interaction.
Acknowledging the “obvious status quo” and the perception of blacks in communities, as well as working together as a society, is the way to advance beyond these issues, Owusu-Bempah said.
This article has been revised to say 25 percent of Black men are stopped by police, which is more than white or Chinese men.
