Profiling Claims Lead to 86 Cases Being Dropped

The state attorney general agreed to drop criminal charges involving 86 cases in which defendants claimed they were targets of racial profiling.

The cases involve minority motorists who were stopped and searched by state troopers and later charged with various drug and weapon offenses.

The decision involved 100 defendants charged from 1989 through 2001, a spokesman for the attorney general said; 59 convictions involve people who have served time, been paroled or will be eligible for parole within a year. Those convictions will be erased, defense attorneys said.

Appeals court rulings allowed defendants stopped before April 20, 1999, to challenge their cases if they thought they were targeted by biased troopers. That was the date the state admitted troopers practiced profiling.