Group to investigate profiling convenes

A subcommittee of the Public Safety Advisory Board remains tight-lipped following its first meeting on Friday to review the Oct. 11 arrest of Spruce College House Associate Faculty Master Rui DaSilva.

The arrest has raised questions of racial profiling.

As of now, confirmed members of the subcommittee include Board Chairman and Social Work Professor Dennis Culhane, Chairman of Emergency Medicine William Baxt and Executive Director for the Office of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Programs Jeanne Arnold.

Culhane said that on Friday, the subcommittee "met and we laid out a schedule for our meetings and a process" for the review. He added that the group "agreed to keep our proceedings confidential until we release our report."

Baxt also affirmed that he would "absolutely say nothing... about the committee."

The committee was formed with Culhane as chairman in order to investigate the University Police's actions in the Oct. 11 arrest.

DaSilva was pepper-sprayed and then arrested by a UPPD officer after being stopped while wheeling bicycles down Spruce Street with the intention of donating them for use by Quadrangle residents. Since the incident, some have suggested that it was an instance of racial profiling by the UPPD.

After the Faculty Senate Executive Committee requested an independent review of the events on Oct. 23, University President Judith Rodin announced that she was also interested in creating a group to explore the issue.

Culhane said that the committee decided together that not disclosing information about the decisions of the subcommittee "was the best way to proceed."

Last week, Culhane said he hoped the subcommittee would be able to conduct an analysis and complete a report regarding the situation within three to four months.

Ann Farnsworth-Alvear, who is DaSilva's wife as well as director of Latin American and Latino Studies and faculty master of Spruce College House, said that she was not involved in the committee's investigation.

"I don't know anything about it," Farnsworth-Alvear said of the decisions and proceedings of the subcommittee.

She added that she did not "actually have any comments about it."

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