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Justice Dept. finds pattern of racial bias by Ferguson police (w/video)

 
A Justice Department investigation opened after the killing of Michael Brown has found patterns of racial bias in the Ferguson Police Department, the city’s Municipal Court and its jail.
A Justice Department investigation opened after the killing of Michael Brown has found patterns of racial bias in the Ferguson Police Department, the city’s Municipal Court and its jail.
Published March 4, 2015

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department will issue findings today that accuse the Police Department in Ferguson, Mo., of racial bias and routinely violating the constitutional rights of black residents by stopping drivers without reasonable suspicion, making arrests without probable cause and using excessive force, officials said.

Federal officials opened their civil rights investigation into the Ferguson Police Department after the uproar in the St. Louis suburb and across the country over the fatal shooting in August of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, by Darren Wilson, a white Ferguson police officer. A grand jury in St. Louis declined to indict Wilson in November.

Federal officials will not bring civil rights charges against Wilson, but they see their broad civil rights investigation into the troubled Police Department as the way to force significant changes in Ferguson policing.

Outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder said last fall that the need for "wholesale change" in the department was "pretty clear." In remarks two weeks ago, he said he was "confident that people will be satisfied with the results that we announce."

In hundreds of interviews and in a broad review of more than 35,000 pages of Ferguson police records and other documents, Justice Department officials found that although African-Americans make up 67 percent of the population in Ferguson, they accounted for 93 percent of all arrests between 2012 and 2014.

"If the report of the Department of Justice findings are accurate, then it will confirm what Michael Brown's family has believed all along, and that is that the tragic killing of their unarmed teenage son was part of a systemic pattern of policing of African-American citizens in Ferguson," said Benjamin Crump, the attorney for Brown's family.

The findings come as Justice Department officials negotiate a settlement with the Police Department to change its practices. If they are unable to reach an agreement, the Justice Department could bring a lawsuit, as it has done against law enforcement agencies in other jurisdictions in recent years. A U.S. official said that Ferguson officials have been cooperating.

As part of its findings, the Justice Department concluded that African-Americans accounted for 85 percent of all people stopped by Ferguson police officers and 90 percent of all citations issued.

The Justice Department also plans to release evidence this week of racial bias found in emails written by Ferguson police and municipal court officials. A November 2008 email, for instance, stated that President Barack Obama could not be president for very long because "what black man holds a steady job for four years."

The Justice Department did not identify who wrote this and other racist emails and to whom they were sent. Officials at the department spoke to the Washington Post on the condition of anonymity to discuss the review before today's release.

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The review concludes that racial bias and a focus on generating revenue over public safety routinely violate the Constitution and federal law.