Black people three times more likely to be searched by South Yorkshire Police, figures show

Human rights organisation Liberty said stops and searches only worsen division in communities and called on the Government to invest in "solutions to tackle the root cause of crime".

Home Office figures show South Yorkshire Police carried out 761 stops and searches on black people in the year to March – equivalent to 22.4 per 1,000 black people in the area based on recent census estimates.

This is compared to a rate of seven per 1,000 white people in South Yorkshire, meaning black people were 3.2 times as likely to be stopped and searched by police.

Across forces in England and Wales, people who self-identified or who police identified as black were 5.5 times more likely to be subject to a stop-and-search last year – down from 6.2 in 2021-22.

These figures come as five Metropolitan Police officers have denied gross misconduct at a disciplinary hearing over the stop and search of athletes Bianca Williams and her partner Ricardo Dos Santos. The couple, who are black, were handcuffed after a stop and search in 2020.

Ms Williams, a 4x100m relay gold medallist, accused the police of having racially profiled them.