If I am stopped by police, can I be sure it is not because of my race?

Racial profiling leads to unfair and unnecessary criminalisation, with detrimental health and socio-economic impacts.¹ Racial profiling by police reinforces stereotypes and can further stigmatise targeted communities, leaving them feeling alienated and unsafe.

In a 2017-2019 study on the criminalisation of young people from the South Sudanese community in Victoria, participants described experiences of harassment, intimidation and surveillance by police, and noted a stark difference in their treatment vis-à-vis white communities.² Similar experiences were reported in the case of Haile-Michael v Konstantinidis (2013), in which the Federal Court established that the complainants, both East African-born, had been subjected to discriminatory policing through repeated and unjustified street stops.³ The case called on an expert witness who confirmed that young African Australians were 2.5 times more likely to be stopped by police in certain suburbs of Melbourne.⁴

There is explicit evidence demonstrating that First Nations people are routinely subject to racial profiling by police. In one example, documents released to The Guardian by Western Australia Police under Freedom of Information laws revealed significant disparities between police-initiated and automated camera law enforcement.⁵ The 2019 data revealed that Aboriginal drivers were far more likely to be given penalties by police, despite cameras revealing infringement levels between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal drivers to be almost exactly the same.⁶ Gaps in on-the-spot fines varied across different offence types, but in some cases, Aboriginal drivers were found to have 19.2 times more penalties than non-Aboriginal drivers. The same data showed that traffic enforcement involving Aboriginal drivers was leading to cycles of unpaid fines and further police attention.⁷

Racial profiling can also influence decisions made by others in positions of authority that lead to interactions with police. In 2020, a coronial inquest into the death of Yorta Yorta woman, Tanya Day, who died in police custody in 2017, found the train conductor’s unconscious bias regarding Ms Day’s Aboriginality directly influenced his decision to request police attendance to the train station.⁸ The inquest found that Ms Day was the first sleeping passenger ever removed from the train by that conductor.⁹

First Nations people in Australia are the most incarcerated people in the world, representing just 3% of the Australian population, but 29% of the prison population.¹⁰ Experiences of colonisation, dispossession, housing instability and trauma compound the likelihood that a person will encounter the criminal justice system. Research also shows that many Indigenous people are placed in custody for trivial offences and are less likely to be granted bail than non-Indigenous people.¹¹ In reality, racial profiling by police is just one example of discrimination within and around the justice system.

In 1991, the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (RCIADIC) made numerous recommendations designed to prevent the over-incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.¹² Since then, more than 500 First Nations people have died in police custody¹³ and most of the key recommendations made by RCIADIC remain unimplemented.¹⁴

Communities are providing tangible solutions to many of these issues. Organisations like Deadly Connections provide holistic, culturally responsive interventions that disrupt disadvantage and break the cycles of over-incarceration.¹⁵ Across the country, women and girls who engaged with the Wiyi Yani U Thangani project expressed their willingness to volunteer their efforts, expertise and community connections to ensure a better relationship between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and police.¹⁶

By reflecting on the impact of racism, and taking a stand against it, we can build a fair and equal society – for all.

Racism.

It stops with me.