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The Chronicle series also dealt with race, pointing out that typically more than 40 percent of those upon whom force was used were blacks, though they make up only 7.8 per cent of the city's population.

Interesting statistic but useless on its own. Perhaps if they told us what percentage blacks were out of the total number resisting arrest, we might see that the department shows remarkable restraint in the application of force in force-deserving situations. That's not to say that racism doesn't exist and a full view of the stats might bear out what the article is attempting to imply. But that use of a percentage-of-the-population stat is just another over-played race card and fewer and fewer people are buying it.