Read the Justice Department’s Report on the Minneapolis Police Department

3. MPD Has Failed to Sufficiently Address Known Racial Disparities, Missing Race Data, and Allegations of Bias, Damaging Community Trust

MPD and City leadership have been on notice about the kinds of racial disparities and missing race data we identify above for years. They have also been on notice about other complaints of discrimination, including expressions of bias by supervisors. The community, oversight officials, public defenders, government entities, researchers, and the press have been vocal about these issues, filing complaints and sharing detailed reports, qualitative analyses, and historical reviews. Nevertheless, MPD has not adequately addressed the issue of biased policing.

This report is not the first to identify racial disparities in MPD’s law enforcement activities. Over the last decade, multiple reports have identified racial disparities in MPD’s data on stops, searches, and uses of force similar to those we identify in this report including, for example, the 2018 Hennepin County Public Defender report described above on stops and searches (see page 36), a 2021 presentation by a Hennepin County public defender on 2020 stops and searches (showing that Black drivers were more likely to be searched, but also more likely to be let go following a search because nothing was found), and a 2015 ACLU report analyzing data from 2012 to 2014 on low level arrests (showing Black and Native American people were more likely than white people to be arrested for low-level offenses). 52 Several reports contained recommendations for MPD to better track, assess, and reduce disparities.

City and MPD leaders admit they have known about MPD’s shortcomings in this area. Mayor Frey told us after reviewing MDHR’s 2022 report that “[w]e knew, and continue to know, there is disparate treatment” of communities of color. Despite this knowledge, however, MPD has not sufficiently addressed the racial disparities in MPD’s enforcement practices, as discussed above. Perhaps more troubling, neither the City

52 See, e.g., Jay Wong, A Look at Racial Disparities in MPD Traffic Stops and Searches in 2020 (Apr. 22, 2021),

n.pdf/55573/2396/PCOC%20Traffic%20Stop%20Presentation; Picking Up the Pieces: A Minneapolis Case Study, American Civil Liberties Union (2015), [ see also Libor Jany, Hennepin County Report Finds Stark Racial Disparities In Traffic Stops, STAR TRIBUNE (Oct. 5, 2018),

stops/495324581 [ Andy Mannix, Black Drivers Make Up Majority of Minneapolis Police Searches During Routine Traffic Stops, STAR TRIBUNE (Aug. 7, 2020), [ Brandon Stahl, A.J. Lagoe, Steve Eckert, KARE 11 Investigates: New Data Shows MPD Searches Black Drivers at 29 Times the Rate of Whites After Minor Stops, KARE11.COM (May 6, 2021),

data-shows-mpd-searches-black-drivers-at-29-times-the-rate-of-whites-after-minor-stops/89-7d1498a65fe3-4a9b-b1f9-a9dc72600829 [

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