Hennepin County Attorney’s Office publishes Non-Public Safety Traffic Stop Policy toolkit

The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office published a Non-Public Safety Traffic Stop Policy toolkit Friday, two days after announcing its policy designed to re-allocate system resources toward dangerous driving instead of minor infractions.

ACCESS THE TOOLKIT

Created for officials and the general public, the toolkit provides a significant amount of data relevant to the crafting of the policy, real-world examples around the country (and across the river in Ramsey County) of how similar policies have been enacted and the results, and a list of additional resources specific to Minnesota.

“We built this toolkit for one reason: to show our work to the community,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said. “Our office creates solutions backed by massive amounts of evidence and data, and this toolkit is meant to help the community understand why we do what we do.”

These stops simply aren’t worth the cost. The data is clear and consistent across the country. Study after study has shown a failure rate of around 99 percent in recovering contraband.

According to MPD data on equipment and moving violations from 2017 and 2018, a gun was recovered in less than half of one percent of time. This is a gun recovery failure rate of 99.5 percent.

We can’t spend our limited time and money on a tactic that fails 99 times out of a hundred.

Here are a couple more data points:

Following an 80 percent reduction in equipment stops in Fayetteville, North Carolina, the number of public safety stops increased and traffic accidents decreased. There was no change in violent crime or property crime.
Another study analyzed 3.5 million stops in Connecticut. After deprioritizing NPS stops, DUI arrests increased, showing better allocation of limited resources.

In response to the HCAO’s rollout of its Non-Public Safety Traffic Stop Policy, there has been baseless fearmongering in an attempt to heighten people’s understandable anxieties about crime, going so far as to say the policy puts every family in greater danger.

It’s false, as proven by volumes of research, which you can find in the toolkit.

Opponents of this policy have never produced system-level data to support their claim. They still haven’t. Instead, they rely on weaponizing fear; it’s the only option for those with no solutions.

The media, and all of us, must demand system-level data that proves their dangerous claims are based in fact.

Our office will continue to rely on data, research, and real-world case studies to inform our strategies.

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