In January 1999 Irvin Landrum Jr., a young African American male, was shot and killed by Claremont police officers after a routine traffic stop. According to the Los Angeles Times (August 5, 1999), “one of the officers involved told investigators that Landrum had removed a gun from his waistband and fired. But a subsequent sheriff’s investigation showed that the gun Landrum allegedly pulled bore no fingerprints and had not been fired. The other officer declined to speak to sheriff’s detectives upon advice from his attorney.” Further investigation revealed that the gun allegedly used by Landrum was last registered to the former Ontario police chief. (Los Angeles Times, November 30, 1999).

In early October the Intercollegiate Department of Asian American Studies at the Claremont Colleges drafted a statement expressing our concerns about the Irvin Landrum case. While there were a range of views on the issue, we all thought it would be best if the department took a moderate position in our statement. We then distributed our statement to our colleagues confident that we would get broad faculty support for our statement. The Chicano Studies Department and the Intercollegiate Department of Black Studies immediately supported our statement. But the majority of our white colleagues have been strangely silent on this issue.

Every Wednesday protesters have been rallying in front of Claremont City Hall to have these police officers temporarily taken off patrol duty while there is a complete investigation of the killing. The protesters are mostly people of color. In light of the case, Reverend Jesse Jackson came to speak at a rally for social justice in Claremont. The enormous crowd of several hundred people was again predominantly people of color. Why does the Landrum case raise the apprehension of African Americans, Chicano Americans and Asian Americans, but not white Americans?

Four years ago our nation, black and white, was gripped by the O.J. Simpson case. National polls at the time showed that three-quarters of white Americans believed Simpson was guilty, while three-quarters of African Americans believed Simpson was innocent. There has been a remarkable cleavage in American society along color lines, and the Simpson case and the Landrum case make these divisions all the more poignant. Polls have long pointed to a persistent and pervasive chasm between the races when it comes to the police, the courts, and the American criminal justice system in general. White Americans and people of color see a very different reality here. Why is that? How do you explain these racial differences?

The wide gulf between white American’s views and the people of color’s views of the police and the courts is best explained by the radically disparate histories and personal experiences of these two groups. White Americans are overwhelmingly trusting of the police and the criminal justice system. As a group, white Americans have had far more positive encounters with the nation’s legal system. Historically they have faced white judges and white juries. Generally they have encountered respectful police officers. And typically they have had the resources to hire better attorneys. Consequently, white Americans tend to be more trusting of the criminal justice system, and tend to take the statements and the evidence of the authorities at face value. White Americans are also more trusting of the media, and believe that they are being given unbiased information.

On the other hand, people of color have a long history of being victimized by the police and the justice system, and consequently question the fairness and impartiality of both institutions. For example, the evidence clearly shows that African Americans have been subjected to systematic discrimination in the courts for generations. Only since uniform sentencing guidelines were implemented in 1987 have these disparities diminished. Furthermore, this historical racial bias is reinforced by the daily experiences of people of color. We are followed by store security guards and pulled over by police for “driving while black”. People of color can generally tell you stories about how they, or their cousin, or their friends, were hassled or arrested by the police for no reason other than the color of their skin. Because of our history and our experiences, people of color tend to harbor a deep distrust of the criminal justice system.

People of color experience a different kind of America than white Americans. For example, white Americans were genuinely shocked when they saw the videotaped beating of Rodney King. People of color were shocked that whites Americans were shocked. Our worlds are very different. White Americans need to listen, hear and internalize the experience people of color have had with the American criminal justice system. Only then will white Americans understand why people of color are concerned about the Landrum case.

We long to have things in common, and to believe that we live in the same world. And for the most part we live in very similar worlds. But when it comes to the criminal justice system, the United States remains deeply divided because white Americans and people of color actually live in very different worlds and face very different realities. The Simpson case and the Landrum case expose these racial differences in our society. We are surprised by each other’s reactions, and it increases our suspicions and decreases our faith in each other. We need to understand these differences, present and past, before we can truly learn to trust each other and live together in harmony.