Alternatives advised to cut traffic stop bias

Mailed citations, automated cameras recommended to ease racial disparities

Racial disparities in whom California police officers stop and search are so glaring that a team of researchers argues that officers should be making fewer traffic stops overall to prevent bias.

New research from the Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan think tank, suggests that police departments across the state should explore alternative traffic enforcement methods, such as mailing drivers citations for nonmoving violations or using automated cameras to enforce traffic laws.

In a report released last week, institute researchers said those alternative enforcement methods “could improve officer and civilian safety, reduce racial disparities and enhance police efficiency without jeopardizing public safety.”

The findings could bolster the cause of progressive criminal justice advocates who’ve pushed for policies that ban or

limit pretextual stops — instances when an officer stops a driver for a minor traffic violation, like a broken taillight or tinted windows, and uses the stop as an excuse to investigate the driver for a more serious offense.

San Francisco is considering whether to adopt such a policy, and a few other California cities, including Los Angeles and Berkeley, have already reformed their policies.

The researchers said they made their recommendations after reviewing officer-reported data about the demographics of 3.4 million drivers who were stopped by the state’s 15 largest police agencies in 2019. The state’s most recent data available is for 2020, but researchers focused on 2019 because they said the pandemic made for a “highly unusual” year.

The data shows Black people were disproportionately — by far — the most likely to be stopped by officers; they accounted for 14% of traffic stops when they are 6% of the state population. Latino people accounted for 40% of stops when they are 39% of the population. White drivers made up 33% of stops when they are 35% of the population.

“Depending on the time of day, Black drivers are between two and almost four times as likely to be stopped relative to their share of the population,” the report states.

But researchers said the most compelling case for policies that reduce officer interaction with the public is what happens after a traffic stop is made.

Black drivers are much more likely to be searched, detained or handcuffed during a stop, particularly at night. But they are also less likely to be found with contraband, such as illegal guns, or other evidence of criminal activity.

About 1 in 4 Black drivers stopped by police departments between 4 p.m. and midnight was searched by police, compared with 1 in 10 for white people, the study found.

Despite being searched more often during those nighttime stops, Black drivers were found to have contraband in 19% of cases, compared with 25% for white drivers.

Magnus Lofstrom, the lead author of the report and the institute’s criminal justice policy director, said those stark findings suggest law enforcement could reduce racial disparities in stops through more indirect enforcement methods, particularly when it comes to citing drivers for minor infractions like equipment violations or expired registration.

For years, police departments have responded to complaints of racial profiling by expanding training to make officers more aware of implicit or unconscious biases. But Lofstrom, during a presentation about the report last week, doubted the value of bias training.

“The research support for its effectiveness is not very strong,” he said.

The direction the policy institute has suggested, with officers making fewer stops for minor traffic violations, could quickly become a reality in some parts of the state. A state board that compiles data on racial profiling is considering whether to recommend those practices in the future.

In its 2022 report, the board called on “policymakers and law enforcement and municipal leaders to consider ways to eliminate pretextual stops and therefore reduce any potential for harm stemming from such stops.”

California’s effort to collect “stop data” began in 2015, when then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed the landmark Racial and Identity Profiling Act.

The law requires police departments to report the demographic data of every person they stop, based on the officer’s perception of those characteristics. It was portrayed at the time as a means to root out profiling.

But many justice reform advocates say such data collection has done little to stop profiling from occurring, though it has put a spotlight on the issue.

The Chronicle, in an analysis published over the summer, found that racial disparities in police stops are only getting worse. The newspaper found that the gap between Black and white people stopped by police widened in 11 of the state’s 15 biggest law enforcement agencies from 2019 to 2020, when factoring in their relative population shares.

To confront the problem, the institute’s report suggests two new enforcement methods that could reduce officer-initiated stops for violations that don’t pose an immediate safety risk:

Mail warnings or citations to the registered owner of the vehicle, especially for nonmoving violations such as a busted taillight or tinted windows. In San Francisco, members of the Police Commission have proposed a similar policy to curtail pretextual stops, which would prevent officers from using any violations on a list of common minor infractions as the basis for a stop.

Deploy more automated red-light and speed cameras that can be used to cite drivers. Speed cameras currently aren’t legal in California, through redlight cameras are permitted and common in many cities.

“These strategies have the additional advantage of reducing discretion in enforcement decisions, which could also lead to decreases in racial inequities in policing,” the report states.

While progressive advocates largely back policies that seek to reduce pretextual stops, automated cameras are a more polarizing approach.

Adrienna Wong, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Southern California, said that such cameras could have the effect of “compounding inequity” if they are disproportionately deployed in low-income areas.

Meanwhile, many police officials question the extent to which data on police stops is indicative of a problem specific to policing. Some blame the racial differences on strategies that deploy more officers to lowerincome neighborhoods, often communities of color, that experience more crime.

San Leandro Police Chief Abdul Pridgen, who is Black and spoke at a Public Policy Institute of California panel on the report, said he doesn’t question the data that suggests profiling is rampant. But, he said, it’s a reflection of a broader bias against Black men, not just that of police.

“It’s really just a testament that they’re human beings and influenced by the society we live in,” Pridgen said of officers.

The report, however, suggests that racial bias in local law enforcement plays a role in influencing officers’ decisions about whether to stop Black and Latino drivers.

To isolate traffic stops from other factors, the researchers applied the “veil of darkness” technique, an analysis that measures whether people of color are less likely to be stopped during the night, when officers often cannot see faces as easily.

Researchers specifically looked at the period around daylight saving time, and whether Black people are more likely to be stopped at the same time of day when light conditions suddenly change.

They found that stops of Black and drivers decreased by about 2.5% in the evening or early morning, when conditions shifted from light to dark.

Jessica Christian/The Chronicle John Jones III takes a Lyft to work in Oakland in May. Jones said earlier this year that after being stopped by police several times, he refrains from driving at night or with other Black men.