RACIAL DISPARITIES SEEN IN S.D. POLICE DATA
Study of pedestrian stops, traffic stops, use of force shows higher rates among people of color
Another study of San Diego police data has found that people of color — especially Black people — are stopped, searched and subjected to force at higher rates than their White counterparts, even after accounting for factors like poverty and crime rates.
“The data is very clear. We have work to do,” Mayor Todd Gloria said Thursday while discussing the findings during a news conference outside the San Diego Police Department headquarters. “We’ve known for some time about the racial disparities that exist in policing,” he said. “No matter the reasons behind them, these disparities can stir up pain for members of our San Diego city community. We as a city will own this and will work to be better.”
The report, released Thursday, adds to a growing list of studies that have brought into focus long-standing, pervasive racial disparities within the county’s second-largest law enforcement agency.
Community members calling for reform often reference these kinds of studies alongside their own experiences with police. And although police leaders said after the report’s release that they plan to make changes to the department’s policy on consent searches — a shift activists have long advocated for — some community members have criticized city and police officials for shying away from policy initiatives that could more directly address racial disparities.
Bishop Cornelius Bowser, a police reform advocate, said the city and the Police Department have had ample opportunities in the wake of similar studies published in recent years to implement substantive policy changes that would improve the way officers interact with communities of color, particularly during traffic stops.
“We need more than just rhetoric,” Bowser said. “We need more than just the same old song.”
Police Chief David Nisleit vowed to take a close look at the findings and engage in conversations with the public about how to best move forward. Next week, the department and the
Center for Policing Equity will host two events to share some of the report’s key findings and solicit input from the public.
“From the beginning, we anticipated the findings would likely show disparities and bring up pain felt by some of our (communities of color),” Nisleit said. “These disparities do not necessarily mean discrimination, but they do allow us to take a much deeper look into why they exist and how we can address them through procedural, operational and strategic decision-making.”
The Police Department commissioned the study from the Center for Policing Equity, a nonprofit that uses data to help police agencies identify and eliminate bias, in 2019. The report looked at four years of data from 2016 into 2020 including pedestrian stops, traffic stops and use of force.
Many of the findings mirror those presented in similar studies, including a San Diego Union-Tribune analysis of nearly 500,000 police and deputy stops published earlier this year.
According to the latest report, Black people, who account for about 6 percent of the city’s population, made up nearly 23 percent of all pedestrian stops.
During pedestrian stops, Latinos and Asians were searched more often than Whites. According the report, Asian people were less likely to be found with contraband than White people who were searched.
During traffic stops, Blacks and Latinos were more than twice as likely to be searched than Whites. Latino people, however, were less likely to found with contraband than White people who were searched, the report said.
The study also broke down pedestrian stops made by every San Diego police officer. According to the analysis, not one patrol officer stopped Black people at rates that were lower than the proportion of Black residents in an officer’s patrol area. However, 17 percent of the department’s patrol officers stopped White individuals at rates that were lower than the proportion of White residents in those their patrol areas. More than 60 percent of patrol officers stopped Latino individuals at rates that were lower than the proportion of Latino residents in their patrol areas.
Bowser said he believes these findings were a reflection of the systemic racism many feel is at the core of police disparities.
“That’s why we have to change the policies on how our communities are policed,” he said.
Researchers also employed a statistical technique called a regression analysis, which investigates to what extent factors other than an individual’s race — like neighborhood characteristics, poverty and crime rates — contribute to a person’s likelihood of being stopped.
Even after accounting for these factors, Black pedestrians were stopped 4.2 times as often and were nearly 5 times more likely to be subjected to force when compared to White people, the report said.
“When racial disparities are present even when the influence of these neighborhood-level factors is removed from the equation, it suggests officer behavior, or department policy or practices, are likely to be playing a role,” the report read.
Regarding use of force, Latino people were also more likely to suffer force than White people. Nearly half of all children between the ages of 3 and 14 who were subjected to force were Latino.
Although department officials have acknowledged in the past that officer bias likely contributes, in part, to policing disparities, law enforcement leaders have said factors outside officers’ control — situations like homelessness, mental illness and criminal activity — are more responsible for racial discrepancies.
Previous studies have shown, for example, that a large number of police stops are made in San Diego’s East Village community, where many homeless people live. Although Black people account for 6 percent of the city’s population, they make up 21 percent of the county’s unsheltered homeless population and 30 percent of the county’s sheltered homeless population, according to the latest homeless count by the San Diego Regional Task Force on the Homeless.
Over the last several years, the San Diego Police Department has implemented some reforms, including a long-sought ban on the carotid restraint, or sleeper hold.
The department also codified stand-alone de-escalation and duty-to-intervene policies, adopted new policies setting limits on officers’ actions during protests and reconfigured its gangsuppression team, in part to reduce the impact of saturation patrols, which f lood certain neighborhoods with officers.
Other changes are in the works.
A set of proposed policy initiatives would require officers to notify individuals they stop of their right to refuse a search and require officers to get consent to a search in writing or on bodyworn camera video.
“I believe it’s a positive change,” Nisleit said in an interview, adding that the policy revision would not take away a tool for officers. “I’m looking at trying to do anything that we can to build trust but also try to reduce disparities.”
The chief also announced a new unit that will track and analyze use-of-force instances in the hopes of learning from individual cases and finding ways to improve training for officers.
But for many advocates, true reform centers on reducing the presence of police in communities across the county and reimagining how public safety is maintained.
In 2016, after a San Diego State University study found officers were more likely to search minorities, even though White people were found with illegal items more often, several San Diego community organizations came together to form the Coalition of Police Accountability and Transparency.
Last summer, the coalition published a road map to reform called Police Accountability Now.
One key change proposed by the coalition would require officers to have probable cause to stop, search or detain anyone — a more stringent legal standard than the “reasonable suspicion” model officers use today.
Another major policy shift would be to decriminalize or deprioritize low-level offenses like disturbing the peace, encroachment and petty theft —offenses that disproportionately affect the poor and mentally ill.
Francine Maxwell, president of the San Diego NAACP Branch, said she was pleased that the Police Department will discuss the report’s findings with the public. However, she questioned whether the discussion would lead to bold action.
“How much talking can somebody do without implementation?” she asked. “There’s not a true sense of urgency.”
The first virtual community forum to discuss the report will be held at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, and another will be held for youth at 5:30 p.m. on June 30. Community members can RSVP at sandiego.gov/CPEreport. The findings will also be presented to the City Council on June 29.