Harvard Police Chief Paul E. Johnson said this week that a flyer charging the department with racial harassment was misleading, and allowed his officers to directly address the charges.

"I felt the need to address the specific charges made by the Black Students association. There are glaring misstatements in the flyer--errors of fact," said Johnson, adding that the department is investigating the incidents internally.

In a flyer distributed to undergraduates last month, the Black Students Association (BSA) cited four cases in which Harvard officers allegedly mistreated students because of their race.

Black students and Harvard Police officers give similar accounts of recent cases of alleged police harassment but they disagree on whether these incidents constitute racial harassment.

BSA president Zaheer R. Ali '94 said his organization stands by the charges in the flyer. He said the flyer was based on signed, written statements from students involved.

The Crimson interviewed the students and officers involved in three of the four incidents described in the flyer. Police had no record of the fourth incident, in which police allegedly frisked a Latino student without cause, and the student involved could not be reached for comment.

Although students and police agree on many of the details of the incidents, the students criticized police conduct as racially motivated. Some called for mandatory sensitivity seminars for officers.

Police officers defended their conduct and said they are simply responding to all complaints, some of which may be prejudiced.

Students Stopped

Clinton E. Dye '93 said he was stopped by two officers while walking his bike form Currier to Leverett House on April 9.

Officer George F. Pierce asked the three students to show identification, and told them that he was not stopping them because they were Black but because he was responding to an earlier call, both Dye and Pierce said.

"He said he had gotten a call saying three suspicious Black men were stealing bicycles from the Quad," said Dye.

But Dye said, "It was obvious that we were only being stopped because we were Black--it was just an unpleasent situation."

Pierce, who is white, said the caller may have been a racist. But Pierce said he was following standard police procedure to respond to all calls when he stopped the students.

Dye acknowledged that the caller and not the officer may be responsible forharassment in this case.

Pierce said he was offended by the BSA flyer,which he interpreted as charging him as beingracist.