Racially motivated emergency call

Racially motivated emergency calls are fraudulent emergency calls motivated by racism. According to Alivia Zubron at the University of Northern Iowa, the consequences of emergency calls to police are often overlooked; additionally, risk-averse callers may be motivated by the sense of control that emergency calls bring to a situation. As a result, racists may attempt to rationalize emergency calls against targets based on perceived factors other than race. A study by Jameesha Rock at Florida Atlantic University found that police officers who respond to racially motivated emergency calls tend to mediate the dispute by affirming that the crime did not happen.

United States
In the United States, African Americans are more likely to be perceived as violent or criminally suspicious because of their race. As a result, white people have been known to call 9-1-1 on black people.

In April 2018, an employee at a Starbucks location in Philadelphia called police on two black customers who hadn't ordered anything because they were waiting for a business meeting. After they were arrested for trespassing, it was determined that there was no evidence that a crime was taking place. After the incident sparked protests and garnered international attention, Starbucks temporarily closed over 8,000 U.S. locations to provide racial bias training to its employees. Various incidents in 2019 garnered national coverage and went viral on social media under hashtags such as #BBQBecky.

In May 2020 in New York City, Amy Cooper, a white woman, called police on black birdwatcher Christian Cooper (who is unrelated) after he asked her to put her dog on a leash. Amy was criminally charged after it was determined that Christian had not assaulted her, as claimed.

In June 2019, the state of Oregon passed a bill that would allow victims of discrimatory 911 calls to sue the caller for up to $250. In the wake of the Amy Cooper incident, the state of New York made racially motivated 911 callers liable for injunctive relief and damages caused by their call. In September 2020, New Jersey made it a crime to make discriminatory 911 calls. In October 2020, San Francisco unanimously passed the CAREN Act, an ordinance that bans false 911 calls motivated by racism or other forms of discrimination. California state senator Rob Bonta simultaneously introduced similar legislation at the state level to make racist 911 calls a hate crime.