Researchers Dispute DOJ Findings of Racial Bias by Minneapolis PD

Two criminal justice professors and crime data researchers are disputing the methodology used in analyzing the data in the U.S. Department of Justice’s report that triggered a federal consent decree for the Minneapolis Police Department last month.

In a City Journal article, Jukka Savolainen, a former director of the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data and a professor of criminology and criminal justice at Wayne State University; and John Paul Wright, a professor at the University of Cincinnati School of Criminal Justice argued the DOJ investigators used broad demographics and incomplete analysis to conclude the Minneapolis PD is racist in its policing.

“We read the report with keen interest, knowing how challenging it is to demonstrate discrimination, especially with non-experimental data. The report contains glaring oversights that overturn its conclusions,” the two professors wrote.

“The rate of any violent crime among black Minneapolis residents is 27 times higher than among white residents. Given these massive differences in criminal behavior, the disparities in policing are, if anything, smaller than one might expect…

“What does the DOJ report say about racial differences in criminal offending in Minneapolis? Absolutely nothing. The DOJ Civil Rights Division spent years investigating the MPD but did not bother to examine the nature of the crime problem in the city,” they wrote.