During his arrest, Northwestern PhD student thought of other black men and women ‘who had been shot and killed in their cars’

Pioneer Press Newspapers (Chicago, IL)

Jan. 24--More than three years after then-Northwestern University doctoral student Lawrence Crosby was accused of stealing what turned out to be his own car, the 28-year-old said he's moving forward with repairing his reputation and teaching others about the consequences of implicit racial bias.

A $1.25 million settlement between Crosby, the city of Evanston and four individual police officers is scheduled for approval by the Evanston City Council Jan. 28. Attorneys for Crosby confirmed the settlement amount. Evanston City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz confirmed a settlement had been reached, but declined to provide the amount

"I didn't know about implicit bias either until I'd gone through this," Crosby said Tuesday by phone. "I would like to bring attention to the issue of implicit bias and how it can influence people's decision making, in particular important decisions. Especially with someone whose life hangs in the balance."

Crosby's situation began in October 2015 when a white woman called police and told them she was watching a black man steal a car. She followed him in her own car, telling dispatchers of Crosby's location. It turned out that Crosby was making a repair to his own car before he drove away.

An engineering doctoral candidate at Northwestern University, Crosby was driving from his apartment to the science building on campus when police arrested him, according to his attorney, Timothy Touhy.

In her 911 call to police, the woman acknowledges that she may have made a mistake by calling the police on Crosby and, if that was the case, asked officers to apologize for her.

Crosby said that call changed his life.

"Getting stopped by the police for what was very clear to me wasn't a normal traffic stop because there were at least four or five police cars, that told me there was something more serious," Crosby said. "I thought of all these other incidents I heard of in the media, black men and women who had been shot and killed in their cars."

In the moment, Crosby said he wondered if he might be next.

He got out of his car with his hands up, which can be see on dash-cam video of the incident. Officers approached Crosby with guns drawn. Police ordered Crosby to get down and when he did not quickly comply, a group of officers rushed him and brought him to the ground. Crosby said that officers hit and kneed him.

A video of the arrest was released Jan. 11, 2017, by Evanston police includes dashboard camera recordings from both an Evanston police car and a camera that Crosby had installed on his own dashboard. Crosby said he had the camera to help determine liability in case of an accident for insurance purposes.

At the time, an Evanston Police Department spokesman said the use of force by police was justified as officers were responding to what they thought was an auto theft. The spokesman said officers delivered knee strikes and open-handed strikes to major muscle groups, as trained. He said Crosby later told officers the reason he hadn't immediately complied with their instructions was that he had been trying to move to the front of his car so that any ensuing interaction would be captured on his dashboard camera.

Crosby was arrested and charged with disobeying officers and resisting arrest, according to a police report, after officers learned the car belonged to him. A judge later dismissed the charges, according to Crosby's attorney.

Crosby's civil lawsuit, filed Oct. 11, 2016, in Cook County Circuit Court, cited false arrest and excessive force, and asked the city of Evanston and the arresting police officers to pay at least $50,000 for "compensatory and punitive damages, fees, costs and such other relief."

Crosby said he realizes police officers have a difficult and stressful job. More than the traffic stop, though, he was bothered by the city's decision to press charges against him after officers realized that he owned the car and they'd made a mistake in pulling him over.

"Instead of apologizing when they had an opportunity to do that, when they ascertained that I was the owner of the vehicle, even that would have ended the rest of the night," Crosby said. "It would have been somewhat traumatic still, but the actions they took after that were the most egregious to me. They knew that I owned the car, they made a mistake, and they decided to persist in prosecuting these crimes that they knew I didn't commit."

If Crosby could talk to the woman who first reported him stealing a car, he said he would ask why she followed him in her car if she thought he was a dangerous criminal.

"That just doesn't fit with the rest of it. It just doesn't make sense to me," Crosby said.

He also wondered why she didn't try to talk to him or get more information about the situation before calling police. Crosby said the woman was honking her horn at him and at first he thought there was something wrong with his car.

"I don't know. It's hard for me to give advice," Crosby said. "On one hand, if she really did think she saw an auto theft in progress, it should be in her right to report that. On the other hand, if she is unsure, you would think that she would not, that the doubt should be relayed.

"At the end of the day I guess she was cognizant that she at least was potentially engaging, she was cognizant that she was potentially influenced by implicit bias. Which is an ironic twist in this whole story," he said.

Experts describe implicit bias as attitudes or stereotypes that unconsciously influence an individual's actions or understanding of a person or situation.

Crosby said he's working now to mend his reputation, as he finds himself often defending his actions and explaining what happened following the case's national media spotlight. He's moved out of Evanston and declined to say what his future career plans will be.

Meanwhile, Crosby said, one of his first steps in addressing implicit bias is hosting a forum on the topic this spring for students and faculty at Stanford University where he earned his undergraduate degree.

"The goal at the end of the day is to have a conversation," Crosby said.

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