A white Cincinnati police officer with a historical past of aggressive behaviour has been punished after being caught on her physique digicam calling a Black teen a racial slur.
Officer Rose Valentino was pulling into her police precinct on the east facet of the town in April 2022, when a gaggle of automobiles lining up on the close by Western Hills University High School blocked her approach.
Police physique digicam footage, obtained by WCPO, exhibits the 14-year veteran officer turning into more and more agitated and turning on her sirens. A Black teenager then walks by and allegedly raises his center finger at Ms Valentino, sending her right into a rage.
“F****** n******. I f****** hate them,” she can be heard saying in the footage.
Officer Valentino, who trains rookie Cincinnati police officers, has had her policing powers suspended while the disciplinary process takes place, according to city officials
“Officer Valentino won’t be on metropolis streets in uniform, sporting a badge, or carrying a firearm,” interim city manager John Curp said in a statement.
The Cincinnati police union said Ms Valentino told WCPO “anyone” who uses such language is “wrong,” but that the officer is entitled to a fair disciplinary hearing under the union contract.
The incident horrified city officials.
“I was appalled to see Officer Valentino display such hateful, angry, and racist language. Our law enforcement represents all of this city, and Black Cincinnatians deserve to feel safe knowing they will be treated with mutual respect,” Mayor Aftab Pureval mentioned in an announcement on Monday.
“A fair and complete process needs to play out, but someone demonstrating this behavior has no place in a world-class organization like CPD.”
The officer admitted to using the slur in reference to the teen, according to an internal investigation, blaming the mental pressures of the job and even popular music for influencing her racist choice of language.
Ms Valentino told investigators she had been “desensitized to racially offensive language by music and hearing people talk on the street” and “frequent exposure had allowed the slur to slip into her vernacular.”
The officer, who joined the drive in 2008, has a documented historical past of aggressive behaviour.
In 2018, she was one in all three officers named in a lawsuit, after pulling out a gun and handcuffing a Black realtor exhibiting a Black consumer a house, which had mistakenly been reported as a break-in. The metropolis later settled the swimsuit for over $100,000.
Two years later, Officer Valentino pleaded responsible to punching two members of the family and utilizing her umbrella to break a automotive whereas off-duty, and was referred for anger administration therapy.
The CPD has a historical past of officers utilizing racist language, and bringing down disproportionate policing and violence towards communities of color.
Two CPD officers are presently suing the town, after they have been each disciplined for utilizing the n-word whereas on obligation.
The Cincinnati police have killed 12 folks since 2013, 75 per cent of whom have been Black, in a metropolis with a Black inhabitants of simply over 40 per cent, in line with knowledge evaluation from the Mapping Police Violence undertaking. There are almost an identical disparities with regards to arrests, in line with Police Scorecard.
