Salon.com > Sheila Burke

Tennessee police chief uses polygraph to screen for racist applicants

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 13:18:00 +0000

COOPERTOWN, Tenn. (AP) — A police chief hired to rebuild a tiny Tennessee department dismantled by scandal is using a lie-detector test to keep racists off his force.

Coopertown Police Chief Shane Sullivan took over the department in November, becoming the 11th chief in as many years. He was hired on the heels of a series of police scandals that for a few months left Coopertown with no police at all. Years before that, a mayor was voted out of office after the local prosecutor accused him of racism and running a notorious speed trap.

Law enforcement experts say Sullivan's polygraph approach is unusual, though some departments use the devices for other purposes during the application process. Others try to root out bias in other ways. One polygraph expert warned that lie detectors can't accurately predict racism for reasons that include people's inability to recognize their own racism.

Sullivan said he doubts racists will even apply for the force if they know about the tests.

"I think the polygraph will definitely keep these people from applying," the 39-year-old chief said.

And he believes the policy is working, because he says it's already discouraged some applicants. "I've told a couple of ones about the polygraph who have not called me back."

Tenn. court decision may finally end Fisk art case

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 23:56:42 +0000

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Fisk University may soon be able to generate cash from its 101-piece art collection donated by the late painter Georgia O'Keeffe.

On Monday, the Tennessee Supreme Court announced that it would let stand a ruling allowing the historically black university to complete a $30 million deal to sell a 50 percent stake in the collection to the Crystal Bridges Museum in Bentonville, Ark.

The decision may mean the legal battle that's lasted more than a decade is all but over.

Officials at the cash-strapped Nashville school have said Fisk might be forced to close if it didn't sell the stake in the Stieglitz Collection to the museum built by Wal-Mart heiress Alice Walton.

"We're feeling pretty happy here," Fisk President Hazel O'Leary said. "We felt we had the clarity that the law was in our favor."

She said only a few administrative details need to be worked out before the case is closed.

The state of Tennessee has fought to keep the collection in Nashville. State lawyers argued that allowing the deal would have a chilling effect on future donations here because Fisk is going against the stipulations O'Keeffe made when she donated the collection to the school in 1949.

Nashville flood death rises to 30

Thu, 06 May 2010 19:10:16 +0000

Amanda Fatheree had about an hour to flee the floodwaters from her west Nashville home Sunday with her husband, mother and three young children. What she saw when she returned a day later left her heartbroken.

Furniture she and her husband spent years paying off stood in their front yard, soaked and caked with mud from deadly flooding caused by record-busting rains that forced thousands to evacuate -- some by boat and canoe. Her children's toys, clothes, books and games were destroyed, along with two vehicles that were left behind.

"When I first got here, I just cried and cried. My whole life was gone," she said.

Officials in Tennessee on Thursday reported the state's 20th death from the storm. The deaths of at least 30 people in Tennessee, Mississippi and Kentucky were blamed on weekend flooding and tornadoes.

The new death was in Memphis, where police reported that Terrance Williams, 32, went missing Saturday after his car was disabled in rising floodwaters. Police found a body Wednesday but haven't yet released the identity.

Two other people were missing in Nashville, and searches are under way for two in Kentucky.