THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 2014
TRANSPORTATION
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University research: race plays role in traffic stops
DALTON KINGERY
news@kansan.com
A team of University professors has completed research that suggests race is a significant factor in determining who gets pulled over more frequently by police.
The research, funded by the National Science Foundation, will be published in the upcoming book "Pulled Over: How Police Stops Define Race and Citizenship." The book, co-authored by University professors Charles Epp, Don Haider-Markel and Steven Maynard-Moody, is scheduled to be released in April by the University of Chicago Press and focuses on the disproportionate rate at which police pull over minority drivers.
The researchers released select information from the book as a preview for potential readers.
Police routinely stop drivers for committing minor violations, such as driving a couple of miles per hour over the speed limit, or having a burned-out license-plate light.
to check for criminal activity. These stops, called investigatory stops, involve minority drivers far more frequently than white drivers, according to the research.
Based on the professors' findings, a black man 25 years or younger has a 28 percent chance of being stopped by police for an investigatory stop over the course of one year. This figure stands in stark contrast to those of white men and women in the same age range, who stand at 12.5 percent and 7 percent, respectively.
The researchers are hopeful that their findings can become a catalyst for change in police practices, and believe that law enforcement agencies will be receptive to their findings.
The researchers believe that this disparity poses a problem because it negatively affects the way that minority citizens perceive the police force, and makes it more difficult for law enforcement officers to effectively perform their duties.
Epp was also quick to defuse any notions that the research would be received antagonistically by law enforcement agencies.
wants to hear more," Epp said.
"We're optimistic that the findings will be well-received."
"I've talked to a lot of groups about our research, and almost everyone is interested and
"I've talked to police officers, and they are always very interested in the research, and open to internal reform." Epp said. "We are not suggesting that individual police officers are being deliberately racist."
Edited by Stella Liang
KEY POINTS
University researchers investigated the role race plays in traffic stops.
Findings indicate police pull over minority drivers more frequently than white drivers.
Researchers believe the findings will be well-received and lead to constructive reform of police policies.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
University professors release their research on race and police stops in their book, "Pulled Over: How Police Stops Define Race and Citizenship."
In 1989, Charlie Sheen told the L.A. Times that KU had once offered him a baseball scholarship. KU Athletics questions the validity of his statement.
FOLLOW USON
NATION
California gold discovery spurs rush of theories
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LOS ANGELES — Word last week that a Northern California couple found $10 million in gold coins while walking their dog has set off a Gold Rush of theories over who left behind all that loot.
David Hall. co-founder of Professional Coin Grading Service, poses with some of 1,427 Gold-Rush era U.S. gold coins, at his California office Tuesday, Feb. 25.. A California couple out walking their dog on their property stumbled across $10 million of buried, rare, mint-condition gold coins.
One is that Jesse James' gang deposited it in hopes of some day financing a second Civil War. Another postulates that the gold originally belonged to gentleman robber Black Bart, who wrote poetry when he wasn't sticking up stagecoaches.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
But the theory gaining the most traction this week is that the hoard is made up of most of the $30,000 in gold coins that Walter Dimmick stole from the U.S. Mint in San Francisco in 1901. The coins were never recovered.
That theory, from fishing guide and amateur coin historian Jack Trout, set off a flurry of calls to the U.S. Mint after it was reported by the San Francisco Chronicle on Monday.
The Northern California couple's coins are called the Saddle Ridge Hoard after the area of the couple's land where they were discovered.
any United States Mint facility," mint officials said in a statement issued Tuesday.
"We do not have any information linking the Saddle Ridge Hoard coins to any thefts at
"There is no real direct proof, but I am getting more research in on this," he told The Associated Press by phone Tuesday from Chile, where he lives part of the year.
Although Trout acknowledges he can't prove his theory, he still thinks he's right.
Dimmick is said to have spirited six sealed bags — each filled with 250 $20 gold pieces — out of the mint, where he was the chief cashier.
The Saddle Ridge Hoard contains 1,400 $20 gold pieces, 50 $10 gold pieces and four $5 gold pieces, with a range of dates beginning in 1847 and extending to 1894.
Don Kagin is a rare coin dealer who represents the couple who stumbled upon the coins, which have a face value of about $28,000. He said the San Francisco Mint heist was one of the first possibilities he and his staff checked out.
Even if the mint had coins on hand covering a span of 47 years, which is unlikely, those in the hoard include some so badly worn that they wouldn't have been there, said David McCarthy, Kagin's chief numismatist.
Another coin, dated 1876,
was in such pristine condition that it wouldn't have been there either.
"It doesn't have a single marking on it," McCarthy said. "That coin couldn't have sat in a bag in the San Francisco Mint and looked like that. It would have had what we call
"bag marks' all over it."
As for some of the other theories:
— The Jesse James one fails to account for the fact the Missouri outlaw died 12 years before the last coin was struck and was born the year the first one was.
Black Bart robbed stages only between 1877 and 1883, when he was caught and sent to prison.
The finders, who have chosen to remain anonymous, have their own theory.
They've done some research, Kagin said, and believe their
property in California's Gold Rush country was occupied at the time by someone in the mining industry. That person must have squirreled away the coins over time.
Why the owner never came back for the coins, well, that's another mystery.
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