By Tonya Alanez and Danny McDonald
Boston Globe
February 8, 2022

Despite no findings of police bias, a new state report revealing stark racial disparities in outcomes of traffic stops in Massachusetts is further documentation of inequities in the justice system, community leaders and experts said.

Released Monday, the report analyzed 11 months of traffic stops in 2020 and determined Black and Latino drivers were more likely than white drivers to be subjected to searches during stops and had a higher chance of receiving a criminal citation or being arrested.

However, the 400-plus-page document said there was no evidence of racial disparity when it came to the drivers police chose to pull over.

… Jeffrey Butts, the director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College, said Tuesday that the results of the study are “not surprising.” “When we talk about racial and ethnic bias in the justice system it’s always a little increment of bias at every stage . . . [it] ends up being a huge problem at the end,” he said.

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