Report: SDPD Racial Profiling Study Revisions Raise Questions

Last December, the city Council heard the results of research to determine if bias played a factor in police traffic stops in San Diego. It was compiled by researchers and they found disparities existed in the pulley stops between whites and people of color but the overall tone of the report was that while some bias might exist, it was not a major problem in the San Diego Police Department. The draft version of the profiling study obtained from San Diego State tells a slightly different story. Joining me is Kelly Davis and her story was published in voice of San Diego. Welcome back. Thank you. What led you to search for the report in the first place? When report was first presented to the city Council Public Safety committee, members of the public got up and spoke and expressed concerns that the authors of the report, it might have been pressured by the city and the police department to tying -- tone down the findings and change some findings. I thought, I will put in a public request for all copies of the report and see if it checks out. How did you end up with a draft copy? The city denied my request and said they had no draft copies. They had a single draft copy but it had handwriting on it so they could not turn it over to me. Then, I went to San Diego State and put in a request. It took a while. They found draft copies that had been emailed back and forth between the researchers and the city. At some point, the city got word that I had put in the request and so they got back to me and said, we found copies of the report but we are not going to turn it over to you because doing so could cause a threat to public safety or further inflame police community relationships. What goes through the changes between the draft version of the racial profiling study and the final draft? About two dozen times, the word biased was replaced with disparities. For instance, let -- C. Acknowledge the existence of ethnic bias and it became disparities. I spoke to experts on this and they agreed they would have made the change as well. The thing that stood out to me the most is the final draft found that black drivers were more likely to be stopped than white drivers during the day. One police division, the North Eastern division, which includes largely white, upscale neighborhoods and the mayor -- that was the only division that researchers found that met the threshold for statistically significant findings. When I got the draft copy, revealed there were two other districts, South Eastern division and Northern division that were just on this cost of it being statistically significant for racial profiling. All of those findings it were -- they were removed by the final draft. They were removed by the researchers themselves. Why did they choose to do that? If they were 95% confident that the finding was true, they kept it in the report. If they were 95% confident that racial profiling was happening in this certain police division, that was in report. Initially, it was going to be if there were 90% confidence. They decided to keep it at 95%. The additional precincts, the confidence levels were in the range of 92% pick Yes. Did you talk to other researchers about this 95% standard that the SDSU researchers used? But the one I talked to said that that was totally acceptable and that's what she uses. Another I spoke with said, there is some debate in this area. You know, when you are looking for evidence of bias, you would be more flexible and open it up a bit more. You might want to keep a closer eye on this Police Department if it is starting to creep close to the line of the statistical significance. There was a recommendation with -- which the researcher slept out. They suggested the department should consider moving away from minor traffic stops entirely. Tell us about that and why that recommendation got eliminated. This was interesting. They found 25% of the traffic stops were for equipment violations like tail lights are broken or license plates lights are burned out. Researchers suggested, stop doing those stops. Write down the plates number and set up a mechanism with the courts or whoever to issue a fix-it ticket. That recommendation was removed on the study because researchers told me, the lead researcher said, they realized there was no chance of this being implemented. They left it in for the sake of leaving it in? Do they remove it to foster goodwill and maybe get other recommendations to be taken seriously? They went that route. Remove it and hopefully it fosters goodwill. When you look at the final report, even with the changes between the draft report and the final report, that report found the police do treat people differently than whites. Is there an indication that that report, the final report, even watered down has made an impact? There are no changes as a result of this study. That is not to say there haven't been changes. That Police Department did introduce new training anti-bias training and emotional intelligence prior to the report being released. This report did recommend specific types of training models. You know, one thing Joshua -- the lead researcher told me, he said putting together this study took a long time. We are two years removed from the initiation of the process and I do not think things have changed expect center story was published, Myrtle call came out and a statement saying she was disappointed in learning about the changes between the first draft and the final draft. She said the citizens of advisory board will bill reviewing the issues read -- raised by the study. What other reactions have you heard? I am finding this is a good reminder of what really happened to the study. The city Council voted to accept the study but there was no further discussion on the recommendations. I think people are reminded about that. They are reading about the changes and things that were toned down but then ultimately, remember, you know, here is a study. There are issues going on. There are communities of color that feel they are targeted. Maybe we should not just shelve it. Take another look at it and see, you know, what if any changes can be made. I have been speaking with Kelly Davis. Her to Her story can be found at voice of San Diego. Thank you.