Study alleges police disproportionately pull over and search

coalition for social justice is claiming. they point to for social justice is claiming. they point to statistics such as those – at the cambridge police department – where the average search rate was higher for black people than white. 47 abc’s julian sadur reports on the findings – and asked police why the statistics show this trend. we’re not out there pulling people over because of race, it is prohibited in our department track chief dan dvorak of the cambridge police department says a study published by the southern coalition for social justice doesn’t show the full picture. he says statistics can say anything you want them to say – but to understand them – you have to understand how police operate. numbers published by the coalition show that on average cambridge officers search blacks five percent more than whites. the coalition says the numbers speak for themselves. 34 what we found is that there are some departments that disproportionately stop drivers and search them at disproportionate rates based on the color of their skin 44 track dvorak says yes – the numbers are disproportionate – but that’s because the statistics are indicative of where his officers are making stops – not because his officers are searching people based on the color of their skin. 100348 “that’s indicative of just the jurisdiction that your police are in?” 100350 it is, it’s just where we’re working at the time 100353 100325 we see crime happening so we direct our officers into a certain area and it could be racially disparate from the public 100333 track dvorak – isn’t alone in his belief. wicomico county sheriff mike lewis agrees the numbers don’t paint a clear picture. in 2016 – statistics show his department pulled over and searched more whites than blacks – the reasoning – he says that is just who happened to be getting pulled over in the area that they were in. his example – delmarva bike week this past summer – an event that he claims attracts mostly white males. during that time his deputies are assigned to that detail – and conduct a high volume of traffic stops for various reasons and therefore have more whites stopped and searched than blacks. in the end – the southern coalition for social justice says their hope is that departmentswill use the statistics to help develop better practices. julian sadur – 47 abc the southern coaltion for social justice said this marks the first time such information is available to marylanders we have a link to the statistics on our website – 47 abc dot com.