Reducing Ethnic Profiling in the European Union - Open Society ...

officers’ stops are not detecting crime: only one percent of their stops lead to a fullarrest, three percent to a short-term arrest (e.g. to verify identity) and 18 percent topetty offense procedures being instigated (a broad category of minor administrativeinfractions and misdemeanors). In sum, large numbers of people were inconveniencedby police stops with little result, and those people were disproportionately Roma.In Spain, some ethnic groups were stopped more than others, but all were stoppedmore, and sometimes far more than white Spaniards. 151 In Girona, the municipalpolice stopped Moroccans 6.7 times more often than Spaniards, and Romanians10 times more often. Yet they only detected offenses in nine percent of stops ofMoroccans compared to 17 percent of stops of Spaniards and 19 percent of stops ofRomanians. The Mossos d’Esquadra (the regional police that also patrols Girona)not only stopped ethnic groups more often (Romanians 6.1 times more often, andMoroccans 10 times more often than Spaniards), they also went on to search ethnicminorities at disproportionate rates (70 percent of Moroccans and 77 percent ofRomanians compared to 52 percent of Spaniards). The overall picture was one ofdisproportionate treatment of ethnic minority groups with little or no basis in greaterpolice efficiency.The data also clearly showed that specific operations and types of deployment led tomore ethnic profiling. Operations that give officers greater discretion to stop peopleincrease disproportionate stops of minorities. Requiring officers to gather stop dataand, in doing so, to record their grounds—or the reason for suspicion—for the stop,reduced discretion and increased the effectiveness of officers’ use of stops. In bothHungary and Spain, officers tended to make fewer stops over the period that theywere required to record stops, but the proportion of their stops that produced anarrest or other law enforcement outcome increased. When officers have to developclear and individualized grounds for stops, and when their supervisors hold them toaccount, they are more effective.In Fuenlabrada, the second Spanish pilot site, the municipal police had similar ratesof disproportionality as Girona at the start of the project. But over the six months ofthe pilot project, they reduced the disproportionality in the rate at which they stoppedpersons of immigrant origin. Furthermore, the total number of stops fell by wellover half, while the percentage of stops that produced positive outcomes increasedby nearly three times. By making better use of data, the Fuenlabrada police becamemore efficient: they made fewer stops, but the stops were more effective. Fuenlabrada’spolice managers and supervisors achieved these remarkable results by makingsystemic use of the STEPSS data both for closer supervision of individual patrolofficers and in force-wide management of operations and personnel deployment.The data enabled them to factor disproportionate ethnic impacts into their strategicdecision-making and reduce unfair policing while enhancing efficiency. 152 Importantly,these results have been sustained over time in Fuenlabrada.REDUCING ETHNIC PROFILING IN THE EUROPEAN UNION 83