Opinion: Jude Landsman: How can we expect change if institutions are not held accountable?
The Boulder Police Department and the Boulder County District Attorney’s office have an accountability problem.
The Daily Camera, reporting on Chief Greg Testa’s retirement, mentions that Testa’s tenure, while having many positive achievements, will also be remembered for two high profile incidents of alleged discrimination regarding incidents with Zayd Atkinson (picking up trash in his yard) and the arrest of Sammie Lawrence (legally filming an officer with known excessive force charges). The reporter, John Spina, writes, “The stop data report, prompted by both of these incidents” — the stop data report actually came out before those two incidents — “showed that black people are twice as likely as white people to be stopped at an officer’s discretion, and once stopped, they are twice as likely to be arrested.” Thank you Boulder Daily Camera for stating this again, clearly, and in print.
Click here to read this article in its entirety at www.dailycamera.com