Data: UC cops stepped up traffic stops

The traffic stop that left a motorist dead two weeks ago in Mount Auburn occurred during a dramatic increase in traffic enforcement by University of Cincinnati police.

UC cops have issued more traffic tickets so far this year than in all of 2014, and more than three times as many tickets as in 2012, according to an Enquirer analysis of data from UC researchers.

The recent emphasis on traffic has hit black motorists especially hard: They got more tickets than whites and were arrested more often as a result of traffic stops.

Ray Tensing, the white police officer who shot and killed Samuel DuBose in a July 19 traffic stop, gave 81 percent of the tickets he wrote this year to blacks. UC officers overall gave 62 percent of their tickets to blacks.

“This is troubling,” said Al Gerhardstein, a Cincinnati lawyer who has sued UC police in two fatalities involving Tasers. “We can’t have a policing philosophy that says certain kinds of people aren’t welcome near the campus.”

The data is likely to become part of UC’s promised top-down review of the policies and practices of its police department.

Tensing, who has been charged with murder, shot DuBose in the head shortly after he pulled him over for driving without a front license plate. Tensing said he was being dragged, but video from the officer’s body camera shows him firing the shot seconds after the unarmed DuBose, who is black, starts his car engine.

‘Hard to believe drivers have become that much worse’

The incident has outraged many in the community who believe the traffic stop may have been racially motivated. It also raised questions about UC’s practice of patrolling neighborhoods off campus and prompted Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters to call for disbanding UC’s police department.

Tensing was about a half-mile off campus when he pulled over DuBose.

UC police have added 32 officers in the past year, bringing their total to 73, and have expanded patrols off campus. And although the UC data doesn’t break down stops by location, Deters said the rapid rise in traffic-related tickets indicates UC police are being more aggressive.

“It’s hard to believe drivers have become that much worse,” he said. “If you’re that aggressive in traffic stops that far off campus, I don’t see how that serves the public good.”

Overall, the number of traffic citations issued by UC police has climbed from a total of 286 in 2012 to 932 through July of this year. That’s an increase of 226 percent.

This year already has surpassed last year’s total of 729, with five months still to go.

As UC police have issued more tickets, the share of tickets going to blacks also has increased. In 2012, blacks got 43 percent of all tickets. This year, they got 62 percent. For Tensing, who started in mid-2014, the data showed 114 of his 146 traffic citations went to black motorists.

“It just confirms what we already know, what people already felt and perceived,” said the Rev. Damon Lynch III, a civil rights activist and leader of New Prospect Baptist Church.

“When someone loses their life over a traffic stop, it becomes more than just numbers,” he said. “The numbers just back up that there are people out there being targeted, and too often they are people of color.”

The increase in tickets issued to blacks, by both Tensing and other UC officers, could be influenced by the increase in off-campus patrols. Blacks make up about 8 percent of UC’s undergraduate population, while the black population in neighborhoods around campus is significantly higher.

In Mount Auburn, where DuBose was killed, blacks make up about 66 percent of the population.

What’s behind the racial disparity?

UC officials wouldn’t comment on the data or the police department’s practices, but UC President Santa Ono has promised a comprehensive, external review of the department. After Dubose’s death, UC suspended off-campus patrols pending the outcome of its review.

“I know it’s going to take time and there’s work to be done, but I and the university and the board of trustees are all focused on moving us to a better place,” Ono told The Enquirer Thursday.

The racial disparity is clear in the numbers. But Robin Engel, a researcher with UC’s Institute of Crime Science, said the university wants to find out why. It’s a common problem nationwide, and Engel said there could be many reasons for it, from the racial makeup of the population to driving habits to racial profiling.

“Understanding why there are racial disparities is the best way to reduce them,” she said.

Engel said she has worked for several years with UC and Cincinnati police to study crime patterns, an effort to make campus and surrounding neighborhoods safer. She said one possible explanation for the uptick in traffic enforcement is an agreement a few years ago between city police and UC to give campus police responsibility for more routine patrols off campus.

Engel said she didn’t realize that shift may have led to an increase in traffic enforcement until she crunched the numbers this past week. And she hopes additional research will determine what’s behind the increase.

“Traffic enforcement can be used as a very effective tool in reducing crime in an area,” she said. “However, that has to be balanced with an equitable approach. We need to engage in both effective and equitable practices.”

Deters said it’s time to re-examine UC police overall, especially when it comes to traffic stops.

“UC police have a unique role in the community,” he said. “But policing a university is different than policing an urban community.”