Detroit Free Press Editorial Board
Accusing anyone of racism is a sure way to elicit a defensive response. Suggest that institutional racism is rampant, and most white Americans will react with the same reflexive denial, insisting they neither practice nor condone it.
But institutional racism isn t an attitude, or a policy; it s an outcome. To diminish it and ultimately eradicate it, we first have to measure it.
So we re asking leaders in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties to undertake an extraordinary effort: Gather the data necessary to document, and quantify, the racial inequities that infect each county s criminal justice system, following the example of civic leaders in Washtenaw County.