InvestigateWest (https://www.invw.org/category/investigative-reports/)
InvestigateWest’s mission is to do in-depth, investigative reports on important topics in the West, especially the Pacific Northwest, with a focus on the environment, health and social justice.
Americans – along with Europeans – account for 2/3 of world imports of seafood. Here we describe America’s battleplan for keeping seafood legal in the U.S. and helping American consumers avoid being a driver of the $23 billion annual market for illegal seafood.
Black riders face stiffest transit penalty: A study of fare enforcement on TriMet found no disparities last year. But that study didn’t take into account data that show police assigned exclusively to TriMet charge black transit riders with interfering with public transit – a misdemeanor on par with drunk driving – at rates at least 6.4 times those of white riders.
The Driver: Roberto Santana-Park, with his wife Lorraine and their daughter Reina. When Roberto drove without his license, this “mere conversation” with police ended in a trip to the hospital and charges of drunk driving and assaulting an officer.
Latino drivers are charged for driving-related crimes at rates higher than their white counterparts. This visualization demonstrates the disparities.
Jaime Miranda saw business cut in half at M&M Marketplace, his Latino-themed bazaar in Hillsboro, after a 2008 state law required applicants to prove they are in the country legally to get a license. One Woodburn grocery owner, Ezequiel Escobedo, who runs a Woodburn grocery, launched a delivery service for Latino clients who don’t have a license in response to the law.
Latino residents in Oregon are charged with failing to carry a license at rates more than eight times the rate of whites, the probability of which is “so much smaller than being struck by lightning,” said criminologist Mark G. Harmon. Their real crime? Some say it’s “driving while brown.”
The former Latina liaison for the Springfield police says new leadership in the department has pushed back against her efforts to address concerns about profiling of Latina residents.
The Lobbyist: Jim Ludwick, founder of Oregonians for Immigration Reform, has dedicated his retirement to making Oregon a less welcoming place for undocumented immigrants. https://soundcloud.com/investigatewest/ludwick-unequal-justice
Gov. Kate Brown has continually shown support for granting driving privileges regardless of immigration status. But as the state’s top elected leader, she was forced to defend a law discriminating against drivers based on immigration status.
In early Sept. 2001, Bob Terry was helping chart a path to citizenship for immigrant workers in the nursery business. Then 9-11 happened. And Jim Ludwick. Driving in Oregon would never be the same.
Hillsboro and Corvallis were the first police departments to collect stop data in Oregon – and they did so on their own. Their former chiefs talk about how they came to collect stop data in the early part of the century.
