How segregation led to speed traps, traffic tickets and distrust outside St. Louis

Please note that I am posting this to hear opinions of others, not because I support the article.

Please read the article (it's short) before commenting as my quotes are not enough to draw conclusions, thanks!

Ferguson, Missouri, collects around $2 million annually in fines and fees, mostly from traffic tickets -- a 44 percent increase from three years ago, the city's annual budget shows.

Towns that rely largely on revenue from traffic tickets are "over-policed," former St. Louis County Police Chief Tim Fitch once explained to the local radio station KDHX. "The laws are over-enforced," he said. "People really feel harassed," said Thomas Harvey, the director of ArchCity Defenders, a public defenders' group in St. Louis. "If you ask our clients, they believe they're being stopped, first, because they're black. And they also believe that it's not about public safety, it's about generating revenue for the courts."

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People who don't and have never lived in areas like this aren't going to want to believe that the neighborhoods of judges, police officer, lawyers, doctors, and politicians are policed less than poor mostly black areas. You think they're doing drug stings on the million dollar side of town?

a reply to: gorsestar

Police resources are needed more in areas with higher crime. Which side of town is more prone to someone sucker punching an innocent victim as they walk down the street? Do you know any doctors or judges who play "knockout"? Where does more rape and murder occur? Where do more strong arm robberies happen? Your answers will probably show why there is more of a police presence in poorer areas.

originally posted by: Blueracer
a reply to: gorsestar

Police resources are needed more in areas with higher crime. Which side of town is more prone to someone sucker punching an innocent victim as they walk down the street? Do you know any doctors or judges who play "knockout"? Where does more rape and murder occur? Where do more strong arm robberies happen? Your answers will probably show why there is more of a police presence in poorer areas.

In more populous areas like big cities, and luckily th knockout game isn't prevalent enough to require a task force. You're masking the truth with obviously more violent crime that people need as much protection from as the one I mentioned.

We have to examine what motivates crime:

They said, 'If you go in those areas, those people know judges, lawyers, politicians, and we're going to get a phone call and they're going to shut our operation down -- and there goes your overtime,'" he recalled.

The result, official figures show, is that African Americans, particularly young males, are far more likely to be arrested, tried and jailed for drugs and other felony charges than their non-black counterparts.

news.yahoo.com...#

a reply to: gorsestar

Trust me. The cops are more than happy to take a white person to jail.
There a just a lot of black offenders. It doesn't mean they're necessarily picking on black people.
That's not racist, it's just an honest, common sense observation.

It's like wright as many tickets for running a stop sign that with any common sense would not have caused an accident but generates revenue for the city

a reply to: ItCameFromOuterSpace

The truth is so plain. That's not what I'm saying at all. Wealthier districts get policed with favor as opposed to poor districts. The effect is racial not the cause.