Another point, regarding the "racist" Ferguson cops.
People and the media have been making the argument,
based on a MO DOJ Study, that white folks were stopped less, but were more likely to have contraband, yet less likely to be arrested, therefore: Racist.
I do think it is more complicated than the raw arrest numbers show, simply because most of the black people arrested had outstanding warrants, (369 of 483) where less than half of the whites arrested had outstanding warrants (14 of 36).
I have also seen the conclusion of racism stated because of the likelihood of contraband with a search, but the reasons for the search are ignored, with the implication that those arrested were because contraband was found. Looking at the cause for the search, the vast majority for Blacks (402 of 562) were "Incident to Arrest". So the contraband didn't matter, it was found after an arrest was made.
I would love to see the number run again, with arrests for outstanding warrants removed, to get a better idea of what was actually happening.
Now that is certainly a possibility that racism is behind arrests of Blacks in Ferguson, but whether that is or is not true cannot be determined by that report, simply because of the outstanding warrant numbers. Which is something that I have never seen mentioned in any article, or in any news reports.