The Justice Department on Wednesday released a scathing 102-page report revealing systemic racial discrimination against African-Americans at the hands of the Ferguson Police Department and city officials.
After an extensive federal civil rights probe, the Justice Department found what it described as “unlawful bias against and stereotypes about African-Americans,” resulting in repeated violations of the First and Fourth Amendments and excessive uses of force.
Here are the report’s most shocking revelations:
1. Unlawful arrest has long-term consequences
Summer of 2012. A 32-year-old African-American was cooling off in his car after a basketball game in a public park.
What comes next is a series of civil rights violations described in the Justice Department report that resulted in the man losing his job as a federal contractor.
A Ferguson police officer demands the man’s Social Security number and identification before accusing him of being a pedophile and ordering the man out of his car.
When the officer asked to search the man’s car, the 32-year-old refused, invoking his constitutional right.
The response? The officer arrested the man at gunpoint, slapped him with eight charges, including for not wearing a seat belt, despite the fact that he was sitting in a parked car. The officer also cited him for “making a false declaration” because he gave his name as ‘Mike’ instead of ‘Michael.’
“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,” the report says.
2. People? More like, “sources of revenue”
The Justice Department also revealed that driving the uneven hand of the law in Ferguson was “the city’s emphasis on revenue generation.”
City officials repeatedly pushed the Ferguson police department to increase city revenue through ticketing, resulting in disproportionate targeting of African-Americans.
“Many officers appear to see some residents, especially those who live in Ferguson’s predominantly African-American neighborhoods, less as constituents to be protected than as potential offenders and sources of revenue,” the probe concluded.
African-Americans were disproportionately targeted by those practices, ticketed and cited for minor violations at a higher rate than white residents.
And African-Americans were almost exclusively on the receiving end of some violations: They accounted for 95% of “manner of walking in roadway” charges and 94% of “failure to comply” charges, for example.
3. Didn’t pay that parking ticket? Here’s your arrest warrant
The Justice Department probe revealed racial discrimination by the police department, but also by the municipal court.
The city court issued more than 9,000 arrest warrants stemming from minor violations like parking and traffic tickets.
The city wasn’t just focused on revenue through tickets, but the fines associated with late payment of fines and additional arrest fees, according to the report.
The investigators spoke with one woman who is still dealing with the repercussions of a 2007 parking violation.
More than seven years later, she’s now been arrested twice because of the parking violation and has already paid $550 in fees stemming from the parking violation.
She still owes $541 … on a ticket that originally amounted to a $151 fine.
“The woman, who experienced financial difficulties and periods of homelessness over several years, was charged with seven Failure to Appear offenses for missing court dates or fine payments on her parking tickets between 2007 and 2010,” the report says.
4. Shocking stats
African-Americans accounted for 90% of officers’ use of force.
African-Americans weren’t just more likely to be stopped, but more likely to be cited and arrested regardless of the reason for the stop. And they were more likely to receive multiple citations during a single incident.
Less than 8% of Ferguson police officers are African-American.
