State Police Address Racial Data Discrepancies In Traffic Stop Reports

MIDDLETOWN, CT — Connecticut State Police this week are addressing an audit report that found police filed false traffic stop records from 2014-21, especially regarding the racial makeup of those pulled over.

The issue is a hot-button one for the community, as police are frequently accused of racially profiling suspects, resulting, critics say, in a disproportionate amount of minorities being pulled over.

State police this week said, in June 2022, in 5 percent of cases, the audit showed a discrepancy between official judicial department data and what police reported to the state's Racial Profiling Prohibition Project Advisory Board.

Reportedly, the data showed more white people were being listed as being pulled over than what was accurate, giving a false impression of the department's data to the racial profiling group.

Police said they were notified of the data problem by Hearst Connecticut Media, which reported on the matter in August 2022.

"The number of discrepancies decreased significantly over time. However, even one discrepancy is too many," wrote Connecticut State Police in a report released this week.

"The state police are deeply committed to ensuring the integrity of Connecticut’s racial profiling data and to maintaining public confidence in the ssential public safety services our troopers provide each day."

The reason for the data issue, police said, has not been finalized and the department is looking into whether the data was deliberately changed, accidentally changed or is a byproduct of technological issues regarding how the data is kept.

Police said two officers were "separated" from Connecticut State Police in 2018 and two others have, since, been "disciplined."

As a result, state police said they are going to update data training for officers and upgrade all its record keeping to be more accurate.

In addition, state police will regularly audit racial profiling reports to make sure the data is correct.

For the full, Hearst Connecticut Media Report on the problem, click on this link.

For the full Connecticut State Police report on the audit and its plan of action, click on this link.