The following is an opinion contribution and reflects the author’s views alone.
Recently the editorial board of the Daily Princetonian published an opinion article signed by the entire editorial board advocating for the severing of ties with local municipal law enforcement including the Princeton Police Department (PPD) and to cease utilizing sworn police officers within the Princeton University Department of Public Safety (DPS). As a Princeton graduate (GS ‘17) and a law enforcement professional with 17 years of service, I can not let the board’s myopic view taint what is an opportune time for police reform.
There is no doubt that police in this country need reform. Bad cops should be fired (or in an ideal world, they would never be hired). Police should not be the answer to all societal problems. Military style weapons and tactics should not be used on a routine basis. No knock warrants should not be used, except in the rarest of circumstances (such as the arrest by the NYPD of two individuals who were planning an imminent bombing of the New York City Subway in Brooklyn on July 30, 1997), among many other reforms. However, cutting ties with police departments and getting rid of another should not be part of the University’s goals.
To help support their claim that the PPD is “not immune from systematic racism,” the editors cite two statics from PPD’s 2018 Annual Report – the percentage of traffic stops in which African Americans are the drivers (15.4%) and the percentage of use of force incidents that involve an African American suspect (52%). The editors then compare these percentages to the percentage of Princeton’s African Americans population (6%). This is done to show that PPD stops African Americans and uses force against them disproportionately. However, because police don’t only interact with township residents and Princeton is a highly transient town, this comparison is skewed.
According to PPD, only 28% of traffic stops result in summonses being issued and 72% result in warnings. A better question may be does any one race receive a summons instead of a warning at a higher rate than any other? Another comparison that would be more appropriate is are African Americans stopped at a rate disproportionate to Princeton’s daytime population demographics? Although I don’t know the answer to either of these questions, my suspicions tell me the answers do not point to any “systematic racism.”
The editors go on to show that PPD’s use of force statistics support their claim. In 2018, PPD responded to 41,534 calls for service, resulting in 21 use of force incidents (0.0005%). 11 out of those 21 incidents involved an African American (52%). Again, instead of comparing the use of force incidents to population, how about they are compared to the number of suspects resisting arrest? Is PPD using force for similar incidents disproportionately on any specific race? Considering that there was only one excessive force complaint in 2018 and it was exonerated, I’m not sure that the editors will find the proof that they are looking for (as an aside there were two differential treatment complaints that were also exonerated). PPD ought to be commended for their extremely low use of force rate.
One interesting fact that I did notice is that the racial makeup of the PPD is disproportionate to Princeton’s demography. African Americans make up 14% of the department, despite being 6% of the population. Hispanics are similarly overrepresented, making up 18% of the department and only 8% of the population. And not only is PPD more diverse than the population of the municipality it serves, it is also more diverse then the University student population.
The editors then turn their attention to the University’s DPS, claiming that they operate with a “punitive, brute-force approach.” In order to prove their point, the editors discuss a 2008 incident where DPS “’stepped up’ its patrols in order to address drug use on campus….[which] mostly involved ‘trace amounts’ of marijuana.” Putting aside the fact that this incident is over a decade old and that the intervening 12 years are a better indicator of DPS’ service, the “stepped up” patrols were not intended to address drug use on campus as the editors claim. Rather, they were part of an overall student-faculty-alumni group strategy involving education and counseling in addition to enforcement in order to address high risk drinking on campus.
Turning to more current times, the editors discuss the University’s choice to dispatch DPS to deal with the COVID-19 public health emergency. Although I was not on campus during the pandemic, I can only imagine this was the University’s approach after students ignored all other attempts to get them to comply with University and state orders. It appears that the University only threatened “arrest and expulsion” after students failed to obey orders to disperse after multiple warnings. The Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students was quoted as saying that it was “dishearten[ing] to see that so many students…failing to heed these protective measures and engaging in disruptive behavior” and that these disruptions constitute a threat “to your own health and the health of those around you.” Maybe it’s just me, but I’m finding it hard to see a “punitive, brute force approach” from these two examples.
Unfortunately, a university campus is not immune to crime. Just up Route 1 at Rutgers University’s suburban Livingston Campus in Piscataway, a former student stabbed another student and a faculty member back in 2016. And in 2018 on our own campus, there were 13 reported rapes, 16 burglaries, 17 motor vehicle thefts and 1 arson. There is a need in society (and on college campuses) for police. Instead of cutting ties with PPD and eliminating sworn police officers from DPS, now is the time to sit down together and push through reforms which the editors may be surprised to learn are wanted and needed not only by the citizens, but also by those men and women whose lives depend on the citizens they serve.
Ari L. Maas GS ’17 is a law enforcement professional with 17 years of experience. He has a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Rutgers University and a J.D. from New York Law School, and is a licensed attorney in both New York and New Jersey. In 2017, he earned a Masters of Public Policy degree from the Woodrow Wilson School.
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