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Report - Black Missouri Drivers Still Get Stopped More Often

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A new report shows there was a slight improvement last year in the disproportionate rate at which black drivers in Missouri were pulled over, but that it was still far from equal.

The state attorney general's office's annual report released Wednesday shows that blacks were 69 percent more likely than white motorists to get stopped.

That's an improvement on 2014, when blacks were 75 percent more likely to get stopped based on their proportionate share of the driving-age population. That was the highest disparity since data collection began in 2000.

The August 2014 killing of a black teenager by a white police officer in Ferguson helped bring attention to the treatment of blacks by the police in Missouri and elsewhere.

The new report shows blacks in the St. Louis suburbs were again pulled over at a lower rate than the statewide average, but were still far more likely than whites to get stopped.

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