Connecticut police treated Black and Hispanic drivers more harshly than white drivers stopped in similar circumstances, and searched them more while finding less, the state's own traffic-stop analysis found.
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The Connecticut Racial Profiling Prohibition Project's 2023-24 traffic-stop analysis, released June 2026 and based on data police agencies are required to submit (about 358,000 stops in 2023 and 413,000 in 2024), found that statewide Black drivers were 15.5% and Hispanic drivers 23.1% more likely than white drivers to receive a more severe outcome in 2024, such as an arrest or a precursor to one, after controlling for circumstances, and that both groups were disproportionately searched yet less likely to be found with contraband. Across its four tests, 38 municipal departments and 4 Connecticut State Police troops were flagged at least once and 10 departments and 2 troops in both years. Only the Meriden Police Department was selected for a follow-up review, which found Black and Hispanic drivers there were searched at higher rates but with lower contraband 'hit rates'; Meriden cited its Data-Driven Approaches to Traffic Safety deployment of enforcement in high-risk areas.
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