Harvard professor arrested

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., July 20 (UPI) -- A prominent black Harvard professor is facing disorderly conduct charges after his arrest while trying to get into his own home in Cambridge, Mass., police say.

Henry Louis Gates Jr., director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research, was arrested at midday Thursday by police officers investigating a possible break-in, The Boston Globe reported Monday.

The incident has raised the specter of racial profiling.

"He and I both raised the question of if he had been a white professor, whether this kind of thing would have happened to him, that they arrested him without any corroborating evidence," Harvard Medical School Professor S. Allen Counter said after talking with Gates.

A police report indicates Gates, who had inadvertently locked himself out of his house, was taken into custody after "exhibiting loud and tumultuous behavior," the newspaper said.

Gates's friends said he was already inside his home when officers arrived, handcuffed him and held him for several hours even though he showed them his driver's license and Harvard University identification card.

The newspaper said the nationally prominent 58-year-old academician did not return calls for comment, and police declined comment, saying the Middlesex County prosecutors were investigating.

Counter, who also is black, was stopped and threatened with arrest by university police in 2004 after being mistaken for a robbery suspect as he crossed Harvard Yard.

Gates is to be arraigned Aug. 26.