Blacks and Hispanics were more likely than white drivers to be searched by state, county and city law officers after a traffic stop, and in many cases those searches were unnecessary, an investigation by The Frederick News-Post found.
Prompted by a 1993 racial profiling lawsuit against Maryland State Police, a 2001 state law requires law enforcement agencies to keep and submit records each year on all discretionary traffic stops.
The requirement is set to end Dec. 31. A bill introduced earlier this month in the Maryland senate, SB 1027, would extend the requirement through Dec. 31, 2009.
The 11-member Judicial Proceedings Committee of the Maryland General Assembly unanimously voted Friday to send the bill to the senate. The bill is expected to be voted on this week.
Through a Public Information Act request, The News-Post obtained databases of 2002-2005 traffic stops by the Frederick Police Department, Frederick County Sheriff's Office and Maryland State Police totaling more than 115,000 records.
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Searching for answers
Experts say racial disparity among stops warrants investigation
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'I have had one bad experience after another'
Some residents question the validity of the reasons they were stopped by law enforcement personnel on Frederick County roads in the past year. They suspect profiling based on their physical appearance was an unspoken component of their traffic stop experiences.
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What you had to say
The Frederick News-Post ran an online request for three weeks, asking readers to let us know about their traffic stop experiences. Here is a brief look at some of their responses:
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What is required by law?
Anytime a motorist is stopped by a police officer in Frederick County, he will be issued one of three items Ñ an order to repair missing or malfunctioning equipment on his vehicle, a warning or a citation.
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Police perspective
Suggestions that racial profiling is a problem in law enforcement are demoralizing and frustrating for police personnel like Frederick Police Department Officer Ray Wharton and Maryland State Police Trooper C.A. Mattingly.
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Building trust
Racial profiling complaints came in by the dozens each month to the Frederick County branch of the NAACP in the 1970s and 1980s. These days, branch president Guy Djoken fields about five complaints a month.
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Related Elements
Key Findings
A News-Post investigation uncovered the following regarding traffic stops made by Maryland State Police, Frederick County Sheriff's Office and the Frederick Police Department:
- Blacks were more likely than white drivers to be searched after a traffic stop, among all police agencies. Hispanics were more likely than whites to be searched during traffic stops by state troopers and sheriff’s deputies.
- Disparity among discretionary search “hit” rates — police seizing drugs or other property after the search — suggests blacks and Hispanics were more likely than whites to be searched unnecessarily by city officers and sheriff’s deputies.
- Among all agencies and races, no more than 3 percent of drivers were subjected to a discretionary search and the majority of these searches failed to result in police seizing drugs or other property.
- Blacks consistently made up higher proportions of police stops than expected based on blacks representation among city residents and licensed county drivers.
Among stops by state and city police, whites made up lower proportions of traffic stops than expected.
- Hispanics stopped by state troopers were more likely than whites or blacks to receive a traffic citation and less likely to be given a warning.
- Data showed inconsistent record keeping of stops of Hispanic drivers. While state and city police marked Hispanic drivers separately from other races and ethnicities, sheriff’s deputies nearly always characterized Hispanics as “white” or “other.”
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