"They Say Where There’s Smoke, There's Fire; but Sometimes it's a Self-Induced Fire": Understanding Claims of Unequal Treatment Among Mexican-American Officers in the Los Angeles Police Department

Authors

Roberto Gallardo, University of North Texas at Dallas

Abstract

"Serving as an ethnographic case study and utilizing qualitative interviews, this study focuses on Mexican-American police officers and their perceptions of claims of unequal treatment based on race/ethnicity from other officers. The study finds that officers ideologically stand firmly against racism and discrimination. When non-overt claims of unequal treatment based on race/ethnicity are encountered, officers develop negative perceptions of claiming officers. Officers revert to individualized, merit-based, and other colorblind justifications to interpret and dismiss the claims. It is argued that given the lack of the overt nature of most claims today, facilitated by the most common occupational context in which the topic of race is encountered (with the community), this provides the foundation for interpreting claims of unequal treatment based on race/ethnicity among other officers."

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Gallardo, Roberto (2024) ""They Say Where There’s Smoke, There's Fire; but Sometimes it's a Self-Induced Fire": Understanding Claims of Unequal Treatment Among Mexican-American Officers in the Los Angeles Police Department," Qualitative Criminology (QC): Vol. 13: No. 2, Article 3.
Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/qc/vol13/iss2/3