The Los Angeles Police Department’s oversight board considered Tuesday whether to permanently restrict certain types of pretext traffic stops, where officers use traffic violations as lawful reasons to stop motorists in order to look for evidence of more serious crimes.
The Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners heard presentations from the Push LA coalition, which is urging the City to ban most pretextual stops, and from members of the LAPD command staff, who defended the stops as Constitutional and important in efforts to prevent violence and find illegally possessed guns.
“If the City were to move forward with a stronger approach, it would help reduce racial disparities and disproportionate stops of black and brown folks,” said Chauncee Smith of Catalyst California, part of the Push LA effort to further limit the stops and end certain types of traffic enforcement by police entirely…