A MarshallProject and WEWS investigation found that the majority of drivers cited for traffic violations by Bratenahl police since 2020 were Black.
Carolyn Quinnie said she’s been pulled over or followed by Bratenahl police on more than one occasion on her short drive home to Cleveland from Bratenahl where she works as an in-home private caretaker.
Longtime Bratenahl Mayor John Licastro said the village's officers patrol side streets and a three-mile stretch of Interstate 90 that runs along the village's southern edge. People were arriving for Mayor’s Court, which hears traffic citations and local ordinance violations. Once hearings started, village prosecutor Tom Hanculak, an attorney who represents police unions in his private practice and earns $11,000 annually to hear cases for Bratenahl, huddled individually with drivers in a corner to discuss charges.
Truck driver Isaac Williams, 57, of South Euclid, faced a charge of not moving over when passing a public safety vehicle on the roadway. Bratenahl officials tried to stop The Marshall Project-Cleveland from attending Mayor’s Court after being told a reporter and photographer would attend. In 2014, Gov. John Kasich called on law enforcement leaders to change how agencies police communities of color.
“My No. 1 goal was to ramp up professionalism in the police department,” he said. “I can definitely state I've never said to cite any one group or not cite any one group.” “We truly are about transparency and making corrections that need to be made,” LoBello said. “If there is an issue that needs to be addressed by the Bratenahl Police Department, we want to address it. We want it to be brought to our attention.”
In Los Angeles, the police department and its civilian oversight commission changed a policy in March that required officers to reduce traffic stops for minor violations such as broken tail lights and expired registrations. Officers are now stopping far fewer drivers for minor offenses since the policy started, the Los Angeles Times recently reported.
He said the village “is very generous in court” and goes out of its way to reduce the number of citations for drivers and doesn’t charge additional fees for a payment plan. “Aside from the fines, you have to look at the time people have to take off work, parking fees, the potential for them to get points on their license … and if their license is suspended, then they have to pay reinstatement fees,” he said. “It becomes a self-perpetuating cycle that motorists — particularly Black motorists — find themselves in.”
Cuyahoga Common Pleas Court Judge Shirley Strickland Saffold, a Black Bratenahl resident, called village officers “professional, respectful and mostly honorable people.” But the judge said the traffic data shows a problem exists.
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