"Speeding While Black: Black Motorists Face More-Serious Charges for Excessive Speeding than White Motorists Do"

The title of this post is the title of this short new research brief from RAND, which presents these key findings: 

In 25 U.S. states, motorists accused of excessive speeding can face either a criminal misdemeanor or a traffic infraction, and the charge is at the discretion of law enforcement officers and the courts.  Using data on speeding violations in 18 Virginia counties over a nine-year period, researchers found large racial disparities in who was convicted of a misdemeanor.

Black motorists cited for speeding were almost twice as likely as White motorists to be convicted of a misdemeanor when their speed was in the range that qualified for the more serious charge.

Whom Officers Charged Explained 55% of the Disparity: Among cited motorists speeding at an excessive level, Black motorists were more likely than White motorists to be charged with a misdemeanor instead of an infraction....

Whom Courts Convicted Explained 45% of the Disparity: Among motorists charged with a misdemeanor by law enforcement, Black motorists were more likely than White motorists to be convicted of a misdemeanor by the court.

The full 73-page RAND research report on which this brief is based, titled "Racial Disparities in Misdemeanor Speeding Convictions," is available at this link. Here is part of its initial summary:

Overall Racial Disparity

Among motorists cited for speeding in a range that qualified for a misdemeanor, Black motorists were almost twice as likely as White motorists to be convicted of a misdemeanor. White motorists were convicted of a misdemeanor 19 percent of the time, and Black motorists were convicted 36 percent of the time. 

Significant racial disparities were present at both the law enforcement and the court stages.  We found that 55 percent of the overall racial disparity in conviction rates could be explained by what happened at the law enforcement stage (i.e., by whom law enforcement charged with a misdemeanor), and the remaining 45 percent of the disparity was explained by what happened at the court stage (i.e., by whom the court convicted of a misdemeanor).

Racial Disparities at the Law Enforcement Stage

The county in which a motorist was cited explained almost half of the racial disparity in whom law enforcement charged with a misdemeanor.  Further analyses indicated that location explained such a substantial proportion of the overall disparity at this stage because law enforcement officers offered fewer charge discounts overall in the counties in which Black motorists made up a larger percentage of cited motorists.  We were not able to determine whether there was a race-neutral reason for why enforcement was stricter in these counties.

Almost half of the racial disparity in whom law enforcement charged with a misdemeanor was unexplained by any of the case characteristics that we could control for.  This remaining racial disparity might reflect either disparate treatment by law enforcement officers or underlying racial differences in omitted variables.

Racial Disparities at the Court Stage

About four-fifths of the racial disparity in whom the court convicted of a misdemeanor could be explained by observable case characteristics. In our study, one of the primary reasons that racial disparities occurred at the court stage was because Black motorists were significantly less likely than White motorists to attend the required court appearance to adjudicate a misdemeanor charge.  Although there are several potential policy options to address this — including text message reminders or the adjudication of cases through online platforms — the optimal option will depend on first understanding why this racial difference in court appearance rates occurs.  Another key reason that Black motorists were more likely to be convicted of a misdemeanor at the court stage was that they were less likely to have a lawyer present at their court appearance.  Having an attorney present significantly lowered the likelihood that a motorist was convicted of a misdemeanor, but in Virginia, attorneys are not provided by the court for these violations and must be retained at the motorist’s expense.