What is the CAREN Act? It could help deter racially-biased 911 calls in San Francisco
A San Francisco lawmaker introduced the “CAREN Act,” an ordinance that aims to deter racially-motivated 911 calls.
San Francisco Supervisor Shamann Walton introduced the Caution Against Racially Exploitative Non-Emergencies, or CAREN Act, on Tuesday. It’s a reference to “Karen,” a slang term that has been used to describe women accused of racism, often when calling police on Black people, Forbes reported.
The bill would change the San Francisco Police Code to make it illegal to file a report motivated by race, religion, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, according to the publication.
“Racist 911 calls are unacceptable that’s why I’m introducing the CAREN Act at today’s SF Board of Supervisors meeting,” Walton tweeted.
The bill would “protect the rights of communities of color who are often targeted and victims of fraudulent emergency calls,” Walton said in a statement, according to The San Francisco Chronicle. “The CAREN Act will make it unlawful for an individual to contact law enforcement solely to discriminate on the basis of a person’s race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, gender, sexual orientation, or gender identity.”
Another California lawmaker, Assemblymember Rob Bonta, introduced a separate bill that would designate a false emergency report based on someone’s race, gender or religion as a hate crime.
The legislation comes in the wake of publicized incidents in which police have been called on Black people.
Amy Cooper, a white woman who called the police on a Black man in Central Park in New York on Memorial Day, was charged for falsely reporting an incident, Manhattan’s district attorney said on Monday.
The viral incident was caught on video and showed Christian Cooper, a Black man, telling Amy Cooper to put her dog on a leash while in a section of the park requiring pets to be leashed. Christian Cooper, who is not related to the woman, posted the video on Facebook and wrote that Amy Cooper’s dog was “tearing through the plantings.”
In the video, Amy Cooper told Christian Cooper: “I’m calling the cops” and “I’m gonna tell them there’s an African-American man threatening my life.”
“Please tell them whatever you like,” Christian Cooper said.
In another example, a white couple accused James Juanillo, a person of color, of vandalizing private property after he wrote “Black Lives Matter” outside his home in Pacific Heights, California, McClatchy News reported. The woman in the video said she knew who lived in the home, despite it belonging to Juanillo.
