Being pulled over by the cops sucks. Depending on who you are, it can be an easy or harrowing experience. No matter who you are though, one of the most annoying aspects of being pulled over is the police asking you, “Do you know why I pulled you over?” Luckily, starting January 1, drivers in California won’t have to hear it anymore.
The Daily Bulletin reports that the bill A.B. 2773 will require police to explain to drivers why they pulled them over, instead of them stupidly asking drivers if they know the reason. The bill also aims to do away with what are known as pretextual stops – this is when police pull drivers over for minor things like broken tail lights in order to possibly search a person’s vehicle or run their name to find bigger crimes. While these stops are technically legal, the problem is the racial disparities that happen when these stops, occur as The Bulletin points out:
…in recent years, scrutiny of their use has increased as civil rights advocates have pointed out extreme racial disparities in who police pull over.
In Tuesday’s meeting, LAPD officials noted the department had already wound down its own pretextual stop policies after a 2020 internal review found they were largely ineffective as well as disproportionality targeting people of color.
That Office of Inspector General report released showed the LAPD was stopping Black and Latino drivers much more often compared to White drivers for minor traffic violations, as well as subjecting them to more intense searches of their vehicles.
The intent of the searches was to suppress violent crime, Inspector General Mark Smith wrote in the report. But the strategy didn’t work: Officers actually found more drugs and guns when they had a reasonable suspicion they might actually find contraband by stopping a vehicle versus when they initiated a pretextual stop.
To make sure that officers are actually doing what they’re supposed to and not lying about it, the new law also requires police agencies to track if their officers comply with the law. Surprisingly, the LAPD and related agencies seem on board with it. Lizabeth Rhodes, the director of the LAPD’s Office of Constitutional Policing and Policy, claims the department has been having officers tell drivers why they’re being pulled over since 2022; this is just it going from a “suggestion to a legal requirement.” Says Rhodes, “our pretext stop policy talked about ‘shoulds. (A.B. 2773) is the Legislature acting. Now, this is a ‘shall.’”