News & Commentary

JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri --  For the seventeenth year in a row, the Missouri Attorney General's office has released a report that shows that people of color are disproportionally stopped and searched by law enforcement. Empower Missouri and the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri believe this year's Vehicle Stops Report (VSR) shows - yet again - the need for improved data-gathering, training, and reform for law enforcement organizations in Missouri.  This year the data shows that, even when accounting for their different proportions of Missouri's driving population, African-Americans were stopped at a rate 75% higher than Whites. Situations in which officers exercise discretion, such as consent searches, are the best indicators of when bias may play a role. "The VSR does not compute these disproportions but our analysis of the data does," said Don Love, co-chair of the Empower Missouri Human Rights Task Force. "Minority drivers are affected by consent searches at a rate at least two and a half times the rate for White drivers in nine jurisdictions that make at least ten consent searches. In one jurisdiction, African-Americans were affected at a rate more than eight times the White rate.""We have a constitutional and ethical obligation to strive for an equitable society where people are not stopped simply because of their race," said Sara Baker, Legislative and Policy Director for the ACLU

Costs of public record arrest reports found illegal, after ACLU of Missouri files suit

The ACLU of Missouri filed a federal lawsuit today against the Rolla Public Library on behalf of a man and an organization denied use of a public room at the Rolla Public Library because of a political viewpoint. 

The ACLU of Missouri filed a federal lawsuit today against the Rolla Public Library on behalf of a man and an organization denied use of a public room at the Rolla Public Library because of a political viewpoint. 

The ACLU of Missouri filed a federal lawsuit today against the Rolla Public Library on behalf of a man and an organization denied use of a public room at the Rolla Public Library because of a political viewpoint. 

"We congratulate Hazelwood School District in reaching the right resolution to the dispute that has disrupted the lives of its students in recent days. 

Hazelwood School District’s decision to retaliate against its students for their peaceful expressive activity is unacceptable and violates their First Amendment and due process rights.

Our schools should demonstrate the American value of free speech to the leaders of tomorrow. We should encourage young people to participate in democracy – not punish them for thoughtfully and peacefully expressing their First Amendment rights as the students at Hazelwood West High School did,” said Jeffrey Mittman, executive director of the ACLU of Missouri. “Nearly 50 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Tinker v. Des Moines that students do not ‘shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.’”

May 12, 2017