Sam DuBose, the unarmed man fatally shot by a University of Cincinnati police officer during a traffic stop recently, had a long rap sheet, and that rap sheet tells a tale of what it's like to be a black man on the road.
The Cincinnati Enquirer did a deep dive into DuBose's arrest record and found a familiar pattern. DuBose would be pulled over for something minor, given a ticket or a misdemeanor charge, and forced to pay up. He was pulled over a crazy number of times — more than 50 over about two decades — and his fines totaled about $12,000 over his life.
DuBose was never caught with a gun and never convicted of a violent crime, the Enquirer found. Many, many times, though, he was caught with a small amount of weed for personal use and arrested. Once, about a decade ago, he was charged with trafficking marijuana and sentenced to prison time.
One year, 1998, his worst year for police encounters, DuBose was arrested nine times in this manner.
The phenomenon known as "driving while black" is, of course, not new news. A black driver is about 31 percent more likely to be pulled over than a white driver, or about 23 percent more likely than a Hispanic driver, according to Justice Department Statistics.
The phenomenon of local governments disproportionately targeting black citizens for fines is more of a recent topic, as the Justice Department report on Ferguson, spurred by the shooting of another unarmed black man, shows.
"These traffic stops for minor offenses accomplish nothing," John Roman, a senior fellow with the Urban Institute who studies policing told the Enquirer, noting that non-violent offenders are hit with huge amounts of fines. "It's a lot of money spent perpetuating a cycle. ... There are fines associated with these low-level offenses, which can cause someone to commit another low-level offense to get the revenue to pay the fine."
The officer who shot DuBose is currently awaiting trial for DuBose's murder in that case.
