A black person is almost four times more likely to be stopped and searched by police in the West Midlands than a white person, new data has shown.
An Asian person is two and a half times as likely to be stopped.
Black people were also disproportionately more likely to be subject to use of force, like being restrained, tasered or taken to the ground.
The West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner David Jamieson said the force-wide findings were “unsatisfactory”.
“It is not acceptable and needs to change,” he added.
Concerns about racism have triggered demonstrations around the world, including the UK, following the death of George Floyd in the United States after his restraint by police officers.
Historic wrongs
In wider comments, the Chief Constable David Thompson apologised to the black community for historic wrongs by the force.
He added: “It’s not just about the past, I recognise we are not a service free from bias, discrimination or, on occasions, even racism.
“We reflect this imperfect society.”
The force data showed analysis of 11,064 stop and searches between January 1 and May 31 this year, and were presented to the PCC’s monthly strategic policing and crime board on Tuesday.
Of those searches, just over a quarter (26.9%) resulted in an arrest, a knife seizure, or other “positive outcome”.
The use of force statistics were based on 5,007 incidents in the same time period.
More than 50% were classed as lower-level use like hand-cuffing “non-compliant” people, to higher level, including use of Pava incapacitant spray (4%), firearms either aimed or fired (3%), Taser deployment (2%), spit guard (2%) and baton-use (1%).
Analysis found use of force against black people was disproportionate (19% of incidents) when looked at against 2011 census data make-up (6%).
The report concluded: “The data shows use of force is disproportionate on the black community rather than the wider BAME community.
“The force cannot satisfactorily account for this and this warrants further assessment.”
Section 60
The report also found a black person was 6.7 times more likely to be stopped and searched under Section 60 rules – where an area has been defined for searches.
In recent months, such areas have been imposed following spikes in knife, gun and violent crime.
Mr Thompson added the powers were necessarily more widely used in higher-crime areas, which also had a more diverse population.
He said: “We are trying to police an unequal society, fairly.”
Mr Thompson added: “The consequential issue can be that policing is more prevalent in those areas and I think some people may feel over-policed.”
He said: “My sense is we’re minimal on the use of these powers, we’ve got control of them, we do have a level of scrutiny, we do have use of body-cam.”
However, data showed despite the force mandating use of body-worn video in all use of force incidents, stop and search, domestic incidents and mental health unit calls, the review found this was not the case.
The report concluded officers’ cameras were used in just over three quarters (77%) of documented use of force incidents, and about two-thirds (65.7%) of stop and searches.
Mr Thompson said: “It will never be 100% because there will be occasions when there are extenuating circumstances.
“Stop-search I am more concerned about.
“This enables us to shine a light in some teams now, to say ‘you just don’t seem to turn your body-cam on when you do a search?’
More work
“I think that is poor practice evidentially, let alone poor practice in terms of future relations and trust, so we definitely need to do more work in that area.”
Only last week, the force pledged to recruit more than 1,000 officers from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds in the next three years.
The force currently counts 10.9% of its officers from BAME communities.
The data also showed more young people aged 18-34 were stopped (63%) and the vast majority were males (87%).
The figures for those two categories on use of force were similar.
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