PSP Traffic Stop Data Analysis Reflects Impartial, Evidence-Based Policing | State Police | Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

Harrisburg, PA – As part of the Shapiro Administration’s commitment to transparency and fair policing, the Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) today announced the release of an independent analysis of data collected from all trooper-initiated traffic stops conducted in 2025. The report was conducted by a research team based at the University of Cincinnati and led by Dr. Robin Engel, Senior Research Scientist at The Ohio State University’s John Glenn College of Public Affairs and one of the nation’s leading policing researchers. The report represents the latest findings from PSP’s traffic stop data collection initiative, which is designed to strengthen public trust, enhance trooper and motorist safety, and inform policy and training.
— Read on www.pa.gov/agencies/psp/newsroom/psp-traffic-stop-data-analysis-reflects-impartial–evidence-base

Get a .PDF of the report HERE

Contact Cards in Cincinnati – A Review of Racial Bias in Police Stops, 2009–2025

The analysis shows that in 2025:

● Cincinnati Police officers stopped Black people 3.4x more often than White people.

● Black pedestrians were stopped 5.4x more often than White pedestrians.

● Black people were stopped in vehicles 3.2x more often than White people.

The Cincinnati Police Department’s data shows that each step in the process – from where and when police stopped people, to who got stopped, searched, subjected to use of force, and arrested – was racially biased against Black people.

Cincinnati Police Department data from 2009–2025 shows:

● Once stopped by Cincinnati Police officers, Black people are:

2.1x more likely to be searched than White people.

1.9x more likely to have force used against them than White people.

1.8x more likely to be arrested than White people.

● In majority White neighborhoods, Black pedestrians are stopped by Cincinnati Police 4.5x more often than White people, and Black motorists experience discretionary traffic stops 5.5x more often than White motorists.

● The more White the neighborhood, the more likely it is for a Black person to be stopped there. Crime rates do not explain this trend.

Get a PDF of the report HERE

Check out a local news report on the reaction of government and the police union. HERE

Have Racial Disparities in Law Enforcement Stops Narrowed? – Public Policy Institute of California

California’s Racial and Identity Profiling Act (RIPA) requires detailed reporting on all pedestrian and traffic stops. Recent RIPA data from the state’s largest law enforcement agencies points to a reduction in the overall number of stops—but we do not see a substantial narrowing of racial/ethnic disparities in intrusive experiences during stops.
— Read on www.ppic.org/publication/have-racial-disparities-in-law-enforcement-stops-narrowed/

Vantage Point: History of Police Oppression of Africans in America (with Ronald Hampton), Part I

Part I — From slave patrols to modern policing, this Vantage Point conversation with Ronald Hampton examines the history of police oppression of Africans in America and the ongoing struggle for justice, accountability, and transformational change in public safety.

NOTE: Part 2 is also available on the website below.

— Read on HERE

Police Brass Agrees to Suspend Officers for Violating Rights of Black Driver During Downtown Traffic Stop | Chicago News | WTTW

The Civilian Office of Police Accountability determined that three tactical team officers assigned to patrol the Near North (18th) Police District improperly searched Limorris Bell and his car on Sept. 1, 2024.
— Read on news.wttw.com/2025/12/16/police-brass-agrees-suspend-officers-violating-rights-black-driver-during-downtown

Police stops and naïve denominators | Crime Science

A comparison of the racial composition of police stops to the entire population of a city or jurisdiction is frequently cited as evidence of racial bias in proactive policework. This article argues that using base population is naïve to the realities of the distribution of crime and policing. Using the example of Philadelphia, PA (USA), the impact of different benchmarks to estimate racial disparity in stop data is demonstrated. The range of alterative benchmarks include the spatial distribution of calls for service, the locations of violent crimes, and the demographic composition of suspects in crime as reported by the public. The article concludes by arguing that if cities ask police departments to prioritize certain problems and places, benchmarks to which police are held accountable should better reflect those priorities.
— Read on link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40163-025-00252-y

RFK Human Rights Submits Evidence to UN Special Rapporteur of Disproportionate, Deadly Policing in the U.S. – Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights

Today, Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights (“RFK Human Rights”), submitted a detailed report to the Special Rapporteur, an independent expert appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council, highlighting emerging trends and patterns in U.S. law enforcement’s use of lethal force.
— Read on rfkhumanrights.org/press/rfk-human-rights-submits-evidence-to-un-special-rapporteur-of-disproportionate-deadly-policing-in-the-u-s/

2023 TRAFFIC STOP DATA ANALYSIS – Suffolk County PD

Traffic Stop Data Analysis
Stonewall Analytics, LLC 2
Executive Summary
This report analyzes nearly 160,000 traffic stops conducted in Suffolk County, New York, in
2023, with the goal of assessing whether racial or ethnic disparities exist in stop and search
practices. The study applies two key statistical tests: the Veil-of-Darkness test to evaluate racial bias in stop decisions and the Hit Rate test to examine search outcomes across different racial and ethnic groups. The data were obtained through the Suffolk County Police Department. The data were cleaned and standardized to ensure consistency across the reporting period of calendar year 2023.
The Veil-of-Darkness test compares traffic stops made during daylight and nighttime hours,
under the assumption that officers are less able to discern a driver’s race at night. Logistic
regression models were used to assess whether minority drivers were stopped more frequently
in daylight than at night, controlling for various factors such as officer command type. The
results showed no statistically significant relationship between daylight stops and the likelihood
of stopping minority drivers, as compared to White drivers. The odds ratios for minority drivers
remained close to 1.0, indicating that racial bias did not appear to be a significant factor in
initial stop decisions.
The second component of the analysis focused on traffic stops with searches using the Hit Rate test, which assesses whether searches yielded a positive result, which is defined as a search yielding illegal drugs, illegal weapons, or other contraband or evidence. Although the data revealed variation in hit rates across racial and ethnic groups, with White drivers having the highest positive result rate, statistical tests found no significant difference in hit rates between White drivers and Black or Hispanic drivers across geographic areas. While White drivers were more likely to have positive result searches, the difference was not statistically significant, suggesting that variations in search outcomes may be influenced by other factors rather than bias in policing practices.
Overall, the study found no evidence of racial bias in traffic stop decisions based on the Veil-of-Darkness test and no statistically significant differences in search hit rates between minority
and White drivers. However, the findings highlight the importance of ongoing monitoring and
refinement of data collection practices to ensure transparency and fairness in law enforcement
activities. Future research should explore additional variables that may contribute to disparities
in post-stop outcomes and continue evaluating traffic stop data over time to detect any
emerging patterns or policy impacts.

Get the report HERE

New Jersey State Police Traffic Stop Analysis 2018-21

Introduction

In November 2021, the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (NJ-OPIA) engaged the author of this study for the purpose of conducting an independent analysis of traffic stops made by the New Jersey State Police (NJ-SP). Based on the author’s extensive experience working

with state and local policymakers to develop early warning systems for identifying police disparities, the NJ OPIA requested that the analysis focus on the central question of whether there was disparate treatment on the part of NJ-SP towards racial and ethnic minorities.2 After cleaning and linking all of the raw data provided by the New Jersey Office of Law Enforcement Professional Standards (NJ-OLEPS), the analytical sample used in this analysis consisted of 6,177,109 traffic stops made by NJ-SP from 2009 to 2021. In the full analytical sample, 60.52 percent of traffic stops were made of White non-Hispanic motorists while 18.8 percent were Black/African-American and 13.44 percent were Hispanic/Latinx. The overall volume of minority motorists stopped by NJ-SP increased from 35.34 percent in 2009 to 46.28 percent in 2021

www.nj.gov/oag/newsreleases23/2023-0711_NJSP_Traffic_Stop_Analysis.pdf

The Skanner News – Police Stop More Black Drivers, While Speed Cameras Issue Unbiased Tickets − New Study From Chicago

Traffic stops by Chicago police have more than doubled over the past nine years in what the American Civil Liberties Union, a civil rights group, is calling the “new stop-and-frisk.”

Stop and frisk is when officers stop and search people based on “reasonable suspicion” that they are involved in criminal activity. The practice has been documented to disproportionately target Black and Latino people – not only in Chicago but also in New York and across the United States. In Chicago, it has declined sharply since a 2015 reform agreement between the ACLU and the Chicago Police Department.
— Read on www.theskanner.com/news/usa/36350-police-stop-more-black-drivers-while-speed-cameras-issue-unbiased-tickets-new-study-from-chicago