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Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department
The Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice opened its
investigation of the Ferguson Police Department (“FPD”) on September 4, 2014. This
investigation was initiated under the pattern-or-practice provision of the Violent Crime Control
and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, 42 U.S.C. § 14141, the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe
Streets Act of 1968, 42 U.S.C. § 3789d (“Safe Streets Act”), and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act
of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d (“Title VI”). This investigation has revealed a pattern or practice of
unlawful conduct within the Ferguson Police Department that violates the First, Fourth, and
Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, and federal statutory law.
Over the course of the investigation, we interviewed City officials, including City
Manager John Shaw, Mayor James Knowles, Chief of Police Thomas Jackson, Municipal Judge
Ronald Brockmeyer, the Municipal Court Clerk, Ferguson’s Finance Director, half of FPD’s
sworn officers, and others. We spent, collectively, approximately 100 person-days onsite in
Ferguson. We participated in ride-alongs with on-duty officers, reviewed over 35,000 pages of
police records as well as thousands of emails and other electronic materials provided by the
police department. Enlisting the assistance of statistical experts, we analyzed FPD’s data on
stops, searches, citations, and arrests, as well as data collected by the municipal court. We
observed four separate sessions of Ferguson Municipal Court, interviewing dozens of people
charged with local offenses, and we reviewed third-party studies regarding municipal court
practices in Ferguson and St. Louis County more broadly. As in all of our investigations, we
sought to engage the local community, conducting hundreds of in-person and telephone
interviews of individuals who reside in Ferguson or who have had interactions with the police
department. We contacted ten neighborhood associations and met with each group that
responded to us, as well as several other community groups and advocacy organizations.
Throughout the investigation, we relied on two police chiefs who accompanied us to Ferguson
and who themselves interviewed City and police officials, spoke with community members, and
reviewed FPD policies and incident reports.
We thank the City officials and the rank-and-file officers who have cooperated with this
investigation and provided us with insights into the operation of the police department, including
the municipal court. Notwithstanding our findings about Ferguson’s approach to law
enforcement and the policing culture it creates, we found many Ferguson police officers and
other City employees to be dedicated public servants striving each day to perform their duties
lawfully and with respect for all members of the Ferguson community. The importance of their
often-selfless work cannot be overstated.
We are also grateful to the many members of the Ferguson community who have met
with us to share their experiences. It became clear during our many conversations with Ferguson
residents from throughout the City that many residents, black and white, genuinely embrace
Ferguson’s diversity and want to reemerge from the events of recent months a truly inclusive,
united community. This Report is intended to strengthen those efforts by recognizing the harms
caused by Ferguson’s law enforcement practices so that those harms can be better understood
and overcome.2
Ferguson’s law enforcement practices are shaped by the City’s focus on revenue rather
than by public safety needs. This emphasis on revenue has compromised the institutional
character of Ferguson’s police department, contributing to a pattern of unconstitutional policing,
and has also shaped its municipal court, leading to procedures that raise due process concerns
and inflict unnecessary harm on members of the Ferguson community. Further, Ferguson’s
police and municipal court practices both reflect and exacerbate existing racial bias, including
racial stereotypes. Ferguson’s own data establish clear racial disparities that adversely impact
African Americans. The evidence shows that discriminatory intent is part of the reason for these
disparities. Over time, Ferguson’s police and municipal court practices have sown deep mistrust
between parts of the community and the police department, undermining law enforcement
legitimacy among African Americans in particular.
Focus on Generating Revenue
The City budgets for sizeable increases in municipal fines and fees each year, exhorts
police and court staff to deliver those revenue increases, and closely monitors whether those
increases are achieved. City officials routinely urge Chief Jackson to generate more revenue
through enforcement. In March 2010, for instance, the City Finance Director wrote to Chief
Jackson that “unless ticket writing ramps up significantly before the end of the year, it will be
hard to significantly raise collections next year. . . . Given that we are looking at a substantial
sales tax shortfall, it’s not an insignificant issue.” Similarly, in March 2013, the Finance
Director wrote to the City Manager: “Court fees are anticipated to rise about 7.5%. I did ask the
Chief if he thought the PD could deliver 10% increase. He indicated they could try.” The
importance of focusing on revenue generation is communicated to FPD officers. Ferguson
police officers from all ranks told us that revenue generation is stressed heavily within the police
department, and that the message comes from City leadership. The evidence we reviewed
supports this perception.
Police Practices
The City’s emphasis on revenue generation has a profound effect on FPD’s approach to
law enforcement. Patrol assignments and schedules are geared toward aggressive enforcement
of Ferguson’s municipal code, with insufficient thought given to whether enforcement strategies
promote public safety or unnecessarily undermine community trust and cooperation. Officer
evaluations and promotions depend to an inordinate degree on “productivity,” meaning the
number of citations issued. Partly as a consequence of City and FPD priorities, many officers
appear to see some residents, especially those who live in Ferguson’s predominantly AfricanAmerican
neighborhoods, less as constituents to be protected than as potential offenders and
sources of revenue.
This culture within FPD influences officer activities in all areas of policing, beyond just
ticketing. Officers expect and demand compliance even when they lack legal authority. They
are inclined to interpret the exercise of free-speech rights as unlawful disobedience, innocent
movements as physical threats, indications of mental or physical illness as belligerence. Police
supervisors and leadership do too little to ensure that officers act in accordance with law and
policy, and rarely respond meaningfully to civilian complaints of officer misconduct. The result
is a pattern of stops without reasonable suspicion and arrests without probable cause in violation
of the Fourth Amendment; infringement on free expression, as well as retaliation for protected 3
expression, in violation of the First Amendment; and excessive force in violation of the Fourth
Amendment.
Even relatively routine misconduct by Ferguson police officers can have significant
consequences for the people whose rights are violated. For example, in the summer of 2012, a
32-year-old African-American man sat in his car cooling off after playing basketball in a
Ferguson public park. An officer pulled up behind the man’s car, blocking him in, and
demanded the man’s Social Security number and identification. Without any cause, the officer
accused the man of being a pedophile, referring to the presence of children in the park, and
ordered the man out of his car for a pat-down, although the officer had no reason to believe the
man was armed. The officer also asked to search the man’s car. The man objected, citing his
constitutional rights. In response, the officer arrested the man, reportedly at gunpoint, charging
him with eight violations of Ferguson’s municipal code. One charge, Making a False
Declaration, was for initially providing the short form of his first name (e.g., “Mike” instead of
“Michael”), and an address which, although legitimate, was different from the one on his driver’s
license. Another charge was for not wearing a seat belt, even though he was seated in a parked
car. The officer also charged the man both with having an expired operator’s license, and with
having no operator’s license in his possession. The man told us that, because of these charges,
he lost his job as a contractor with the federal government that he had held for years.
Municipal Court Practices
Ferguson has allowed its focus on revenue generation to fundamentally compromise the
role of Ferguson’s municipal court. The municipal court does not act as a neutral arbiter of the
law or a check on unlawful police conduct. Instead, the court primarily uses its judicial authority
as the means to compel the payment of fines and fees that advance the City’s financial interests.
This has led to court practices that violate the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process and equal
protection requirements. The court’s practices also impose unnecessary harm, overwhelmingly
on African-American individuals, and run counter to public safety.
Most strikingly, the court issues municipal arrest warrants not on the basis of public
safety needs, but rather as a routine response to missed court appearances and required fine
payments. In 2013 alone, the court issued over 9,000 warrants on cases stemming in large part
from minor violations such as parking infractions, traffic tickets, or housing code violations. Jail
time would be considered far too harsh a penalty for the great majority of these code violations,
yet Ferguson’s municipal court routinely issues warrants for people to be arrested and
incarcerated for failing to timely pay related fines and fees. Under state law, a failure to appear
in municipal court on a traffic charge involving a moving violation also results in a license
suspension. Ferguson has made this penalty even more onerous by only allowing the suspension
to be lifted after payment of an owed fine is made in full. Further, until recently, Ferguson also
added charges, fines, and fees for each missed appearance and payment. Many pending cases
still include such charges that were imposed before the court recently eliminated them, making it
as difficult as before for people to resolve these cases.
The court imposes these severe penalties for missed appearances and payments even as
several of the court’s practices create unnecessary barriers to resolving a municipal violation.
The court often fails to provide clear and accurate information regarding a person’s charges or
court obligations. And the court’s fine assessment procedures do not adequately provide for a
defendant to seek a fine reduction on account of financial incapacity or to seek alternatives to 4
payment such as community service. City and court officials have adhered to these court
practices despite acknowledging their needlessly harmful consequences. In August 2013, for
example, one City Councilmember wrote to the City Manager, the Mayor, and other City
officials lamenting the lack of a community service option and noted the benefits of such a
program, including that it would “keep those people that simply don’t have the money to pay
their fines from constantly being arrested and going to jail, only to be released and do it all over
again.”
Together, these court practices exacerbate the harm of Ferguson’s unconstitutional police
practices. They impose a particular hardship upon Ferguson’s most vulnerable residents,
especially upon those living in or near poverty. Minor offenses can generate crippling debts,
result in jail time because of an inability to pay, and result in the loss of a driver’s license,
employment, or housing.
We spoke, for example, with an African-American woman who has a still-pending case
stemming from 2007, when, on a single occasion, she parked her car illegally. She received two
citations and a 550 to the court for
the events stemming from this single instance of illegal parking. Court records show that she
twice attempted to make partial payments of 50, but the court returned those payments,
refusing to accept anything less than payment in full. One of those payments was later accepted,
but only after the court’s letter rejecting payment by money order was returned as undeliverable.
This woman is now making regular payments on the fine. As of December 2014, over seven
years later, despite initially owing a 550, she still owed $541.
Racial Bias
Ferguson’s approach to law enforcement both reflects and reinforces racial bias,
including stereotyping. The harms of Ferguson’s police and court practices are borne
disproportionately by African Americans, and there is evidence that this is due in part to
intentional discrimination on the basis of race.
Ferguson’s law enforcement practices overwhelmingly impact African Americans. Data
collected by the Ferguson Police Department from 2012 to 2014 shows that African Americans
account for 85% of vehicle stops, 90% of citations, and 93% of arrests made by FPD officers,
despite comprising only 67% of Ferguson’s population. African Americans are more than twice
as likely as white drivers to be searched during vehicle stops even after controlling for non-race
based variables such as the reason the vehicle stop was initiated, but are found in possession of
contraband 26% less often than white drivers, suggesting officers are impermissibly considering
race as a factor when determining whether to search. African Americans are more likely to be
cited and arrested following a stop regardless of why the stop was initiated and are more likely to
receive multiple citations during a single incident. From 2012 to 2014, FPD issued four or more
citations to African Americans on 73 occasions, but issued four or more citations to non-African
Americans only twice. FPD appears to bring certain offenses almost exclusively against African
Americans. For example, from 2011 to 2013, African Americans accounted for 95% of Manner
of Walking in Roadway charges, and 94% of all Failure to Comply charges. Notably, with 5
respect to speeding charges brought by FPD, the evidence shows not only that African
Americans are represented at disproportionately high rates overall, but also that the disparate
impact of FPD’s enforcement practices on African Americans is 48% larger when citations are
issued not on the basis of radar or laser, but by some other method, such as the officer’s own
visual assessment.
These disparities are also present in FPD’s use of force. Nearly 90% of documented
force used by FPD officers was used against African Americans. In every canine bite incident
for which racial information is available, the person bitten was African American.
Municipal court practices likewise cause disproportionate harm to African Americans.
African Americans are 68% less likely than others to have their cases dismissed by the court, and
are more likely to have their cases last longer and result in more required court encounters.
African Americans are at least 50% more likely to have their cases lead to an arrest warrant, and
accounted for 92% of cases in which an arrest warrant was issued by the Ferguson Municipal
Court in 2013. Available data show that, of those actually arrested by FPD only because of an
outstanding municipal warrant, 96% are African American.
Our investigation indicates that this disproportionate burden on African Americans
ca
Approaching Environmental Health Disparities and Green Spaces: An Ecosystem Services Perspective
Health disparities occur when adverse health conditions are unequal across populations due in part to gaps in wealth. These disparities continue to plague global health. Decades of research suggests that the natural environment can play a key role in sustaining the health of the public. However, the influence of the natural environment on health disparities is not well-articulated. Green spaces provide ecosystem services that are vital to public health. This paper discusses the link between green spaces and some of the nation’s leading health issues such as obesity, cardiovascular health, heat-related illness, and psychological health. These associations are discussed in terms of key demographic variables—race, ethnicity, and income. The authors also identify research gaps and recommendations for future research
Lynching in America:Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror
In America, there is a legacy of racial inequality shaped by the enslavement of millions of black people. The era of slavery was followed by decades of terrorism and racial subordination most dramatically evidenced by lynching. The civil rights movement of the 1950s
and 1960s challenged the legality of many of the most racist practices and structures that sustained racial subordination but the movement was not followed by a continued commitment to truth and reconciliation. Consequently, this legacy of racial inequality has persisted, leaving us vulnerable to a range of problems that continue to reveal racial disparities and injustice. EJI believes it is essential that we begin to discuss our history of racial injustice more soberly and to understand the implications of our past in addressing the challenges of the present.
Lynching in America is the second in a series of reports that examines the trajectory of American history from slavery to mass incarceration. In 2013, EJI published Slavery in America, which documents the slavery era and its continuing legacy, and erected three public
markers in Montgomery, Alabama, to change the visual landscape of a city and state that has romanticized the mid-nineteenth century and ignored the devastation and horror created by racialized slavery and the slave trade
Disparities in Nursing Home Quality Selected Measures - United States 2011
While the health care quality improvement community has prioritized health disparities in acute care settings, such as hospital inpatient and ambulatory care, less attention was given to disparities in long-term care. This is despite the fact that a growing body of evidence documents pervasive racial, ethnic, and class disparities in long-term care in the United States.5-10 Furthermore, in the past decade, nursing homes have instituted various quality improvement programs and collaboratives, but it is unclear what effect they might have had on disparities. To determine what effect quality improvement efforts have had on disparities, we conducted analyses of the prevalence of selected nursing home clinical measures among long-stay nursing home residents
Proceedings: Driving Down Disparities Innovations in Health Care Delivery, Communications and Technology
The Disparities National Coordinating Center (DNCC) held a virtual conference on Tuesday, April 8, 2014 to inspire QIOs with innovations in technology, communications and care delivery that will be applicable to their future disparities work. Over 200 participants joined the conference to learn about new techniques in healthcare delivery; gain understanding of how technology, effective communication and policies can impact health disparities and explore innovative ways to apply these tools to their work