Nearly half of classic car festival arrests involved minorities

Sunday, Aug. 22, 1999 | 4:03 a.m.

The analysis, published Sunday, adds fuel to a debate over how police handle security problems that have become a hallmark of the annual event.

Of the 245 arrests made during the Aug. 4-7 event, 49 percent were Hispanic, black, Asian or American Indian, the analysis of arrest records shows. Up to 200,000 visitors attended the car show.

About 12.6 percent of Reno residents were minorities, according to the 1990 U.S. Census. Local civil rights leaders said the analysis shows that a disproportionate number of minorities were arrested.

Reno police defended their performance, saying the high proportion of minorities thrown in jail stemmed from the high percentage of minorities attending the car show.

Civil rights leaders met with Reno police last week to discuss the arrests. They also requested that officers be given more racial sensitivity training. At the time, neither side knew the number of minority arrests.

"Were they (police) doing it because they felt if they get the blacks and Hispanics out it would make it safer? Were they being targeted?" asked Jesse Gutierrez, executive director of Nevada Hispanic Services.

"This is not an anti-cop issue, it is a civil rights issue," said Lonnie Feemster, president of the local NAACP.

Eight people, two of them minorities, have filed internal affairs complaints against officers in incidents at this year's car show.

Tracking the number of minority arrests is not a good way to improve racial relations, said Deputy Chief Jim Johns.

"I'm focusing on equal treatment and trying to do better," he said. "Who the crowd is made up of is not important to us. They continue to make race the issue when crowd misbehavior is the issue."

Police imposed a variety of tough measures after crowds last year turned over cars, threw rocks and bottles and smashed barricades. Police in riot gear used police dogs and tear gas to break up the disturbances.

Police arrested 519 people at the event last year. Eleven people filed internal affairs complaints.