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A pretext is a lie, a false justification to avoid accountability. A pretextual stop occurs when a police officer pulls someone over for a minor traffic violation merely as an excuse to investigate whether the person has any outstanding warrants or contraband. Promoted as an integral part of the war on drugs in the 1990s, the practice continues to be widespread throughout the United States. Since nearly everybody commits some form of technical violation when they drive, police officers have the de facto ability to investigate people at random. However, these fishing expeditions are not conducted randomly. Instead, police officers try to maximize their chances of finding someone with contraband or an outstanding warrant by targeting people believed to be more involved in serious crime. Ultimately, by asking police officers to follow their “gut” rather than evidence-based procedure the practice of pretextual stops enables racial profiling. Study after study has shown that people of color are much more likely to endure fruitless investigations during traffic stops. This is especially true for stops justified by non-moving violations, such as having items hanging from the rearview mirror.
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Epp, C. R., Maynard-Moody, S., and Haider-Markel, D. P. (2014) Pulled Over: How Police Stops Define Race and Citizenship. The University of Chicago Press.
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Harris, D. (2002) Profiles in Injustice: Why Racial Profiling Cannot Work. The New Press.
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Harris, K., Hecker, S., Iguina González, C., and Jain, A. (2023) The road to driving equality: a blueprint for cities to reduce traffic stops. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4517462
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Pierson, E., Simoiu, C., Overgoor, J., Corbett-Davies, S., Jenson, D., Shoemaker, A. et al (2020) A large-scale analysis of racial disparities in police stops across the United States. Nature Human Behaviour, 4(7): 736–45.
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The Policing Project (n.d.) Pretextual traffic stops. Available from: https://www.policingproject.org/pretextual-traffic
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The Vera Institute of Justice (2021) Investing in Evidence-Based Alternatives to Policing: Non-Police Responses to Traffic Safety. Available from: https://www.vera.org/downloads/publications/alternatives-to-policing-traffic-enforcement-fact-sheet.pdf
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Weisburd, D. (2017) Proactive policing and crime control. Nature Human Behaviour, 1(10): 707 –8.
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