Elgin traffic stop data shows black people stopped more

Blacks were disproportionately stopped and more likely to be asked for consent for vehicle searches during traffic stops in 2013 in Elgin, but police say there is no indication that's due to racial profiling.

Elgin police conducted 10,608 traffic stops in 2013, of which 44.8 percent involved white drivers, 38 percent Hispanic drivers, 13 percent black drivers, and 3.9 percent Asian drivers, according to a Daily Herald analysis of the most recent Illinois Traffic Stop Study.

More blacks — and to a much smaller extent, whites — were stopped compared to their percentage of the population in Elgin, while the opposite was true for Hispanic and Asian drivers. Police asked to search a total of 62 vehicles in 2013.

Elgin's population in 2010 was 42.6 percent white, 43.6 percent Hispanic, 7.4 percent black, and 5.4 percent Asian, as per the most recent U.S. Census data.

“We can't know what's going on in every individual circumstance, but I would think researchers would say reasonably confidently that there is a different set of standards for stopping African-Americans and then whatever escalates the stop after that,” said Ed Yohnka, director of communications for the American Civil Liberties of Illinois.

“Frankly, we see that pretty typically, both in the statewide numbers and as we look at the communities across the state of Illinois.”

Deputy Police Chief Bill Wolf said the department's approach to traffic enforcement is data-driven, which means officers on patrol target areas with higher accident and crime rates. Randall Road has high numbers of accidents, while parts of downtown and the near east and west sides — which comprise large numbers of minority residents — are high in both accidents and crime, Wolf said.

Another tool used to assign patrols is software that analyzes race-blind crime data to predict where crime is more likely to occur, Wolf said.

Seven percent of all 2013 traffic stops were done via roadside safety checks, also race-blind, and 3 percent of stops were conducted by the gang unit, whose list of active gang members are mostly minorities, Elgin Police Cmdr. Ana Lalley said. Traffic enforcement also derives from residents' complaints, she said.

“It's not just doing traffic stops for the sake of traffic stops,” she said.

The Daily Herald's analysis also shows that once drivers were stopped in Elgin, whites were less likely to get citations than minorities, and Hispanics were most likely to get citations among all groups.

“When you look at the numbers after what happens when people get stopped, there's just a different rationale that gets used,” Yohnka said.

Hispanics received 75 percent of the 1,141 citations issued in 2013 for driving without a license, or with a suspended or revoked license, which are mandatory, Wolf said. Altogether, police issued 4,726 citations.

Elgin police issue fewer citations overall compared to the statewide average, he pointed out.

“We really, truly believe in more of an educational approach to traffic safety and to drivers,” he said.

Elgin police asked 1 percent of black drivers to give consent for searches, compared to 0.3 percent of whites and 0.8 percent of Hispanics. However, contraband was found in 36 percent of white drivers' vehicles, which was more often than in black drivers' vehicles, at 31 percent, and Hispanics' vehicles, at 18 percent, the analysis shows.

That's something the ACLU sees across Illinois “time and time again,” Yohnka said. “Whatever the gut hunch is that causes an officer to ask for a consent search — those standards are different depending on the color of your skin.”

There are different reasons why officers ask to search vehicles, Wolf said. “If (the record) shows they have been arrested before, probably there's going to be a better chance you're going to ask for consent (to search),” he said.

Wolf also pointed out that officers asked to search vehicles in just 62 out of more than 10,600 traffic stops. “It's basically nothing,” he said.

By comparison, Aurora police asked for search consent in 1,376 stops out of more than 36,200 stops in 2013, while Waukegan police asked for that in 210 out of about 6,600 stops in 2013.

Traci Ellis of Elgin, who works as assistant director for the Center for Affirmative Action & Diversity Resources at Northern Illinois University, said she wasn't surprised to hear about disparities involving blacks stopped in Elgin.

“This is a national issue,” she said. “I'm also not surprised that Elgin doesn't have a major problem. It's very small numbers. For a city of our size, it could be far worse.”

That is a testament to the police department's focus on community policing, Ellis said.

“(Police Chief) Jeff Swoboda is doing a great job of trying to connect with the community, keep a finger on the pulse of what is happening in the community,” she said. “He knows the concerns of the black community, and so I think he is doing all that he can to address that.”

The Elgin Police Department believes it does a good job of policing itself, Wolf said.

All stops are audio- and video-recorded, and shift supervisors review 20 random traffic stops per month, he said. Also, the department's policy forbids racial profiling, and cultural diversity training has been provided to officers, he said.

“We've never seen any indication that we have officers making stops based on somebody's' race — that's the bottom line,” Wolf said.

Still, a thorough records analysis to see if individual officers are disproportionately stopping drivers of a certain race hasn't been done for the last two years, Wolf acknowledged. “We will do that soon,” he said.

The Illinois Traffic Stop Study Act requires law enforcement to provide yearly data to the Illinois Department of Public Transportation, which in turns compiles the traffic stop study. That can help identify problematic behaviors and practices, Yohnka said.

“This is not to say that every law enforcement agency is bad,” he said. “This is a tool for the supervisors and the chief of police to take a look at what is happening in the streets.”