The Frame Game

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Complaints about law enforcement aren't confined to sensational police shootings. Day in and day out, minority communities around the country feel unfairly burdened by America's tough new policing strategies. In an illegal tactic called racial profiling, blacks and Latinos charge, New Jersey police pull over a disproportionate number of minority drivers, then look for a crime or violation to charge them with. A study found that the troopers are five times as likely to target blacks as they are whites. Governor Christine Todd Whitman fired the state-police superintendent this month for defending his officers by saying minorities are more involved than whites in drug trafficking.

When crime rates are high--or when there is a horrific crime, like the Nicarico murder--the pressure on law enforcement is immense. But get-tough policies can mean getting tough on innocent people--even sending them to death row. With crime rates falling, Americans don't want to go soft on crime, but their sense of fairness is being sorely tested. Communities are beginning to ask how prosecutors and police can be effective while still respecting citizens' rights. Now it's time for law-enforcement officials to start taking the question seriously too. "The criminal-justice system works," says Jed Stone, who represented Rolando Cruz in an early trial, "only if the ordinary citizen believes in the integrity of the system."