Globe Staff Photo / George Rizer

A Boston Globe analysis of traffic tickets and warnings, from every police department in the state, shows differences in race, sex and age in who gets a fine, and who gets a break, for the same offenses.

PART ONE Race, sex, and age drive ticketing On city boulevards and rural lanes, whites and women are far more likely to receive written warnings instead of tickets when stopped for identical traffic offenses, according to a Boston Globe study of newly released state records. Minority officers are stricter on minorities Boston to track all stops by police Graphics: Who gets speeding fines Minority officers Most-favored status One officer's week Town-by-town: Ticketing whites vs. minorities Large departments | All Ticketing women vs. men Large departments | All  PART TWO Punishment varies by town and officer Despite the get-tough image conveyed by police in advertising campaigns, a Globe review of 166,000 citations found that police in Massachusetts warned fully half of the drivers who were cited for violating a traffic law - a rate higher than in other states that have tallied warnings. Graphics: Tickets raise insurance Ranking the departments Littering is worse? Town-by-town: Toughest police on speeders Large departments | All Locals vs. out-of-towners Large departments | All  PART THREE Troopers fair, tough in traffic encounters For more than a decade, the terms ''racial profiling'' and ''state police'' have been linked in the public mind. But a Globe study of whether police issue tickets or a written warnings for speeding and other violations found that the Massachusetts State Police force stands out for its fairness, its evenhanded toughness. Graphics: Frequent ticketers How fast can you go?

FOLLOW-UPS 8/8/2004 Police plan public meeting 5/9/2004 Chiefs deny racial profiling 5/6/2004 Civil rights advocates laud plan 5/5/2004 Police chiefs decry study 5/4/2004 Racial profiling is confirmed Northeastern study [PDF] Report summary Police response [MS Word] Who got a passing grade? 2/16/2004 Police flouting 'no fix' law on tickets 1/21/2004 Profiling study cites dozens of locales Charts Northeastern study [PDF] 1/20/2004 Reilly pushes to end profiling 1/17/2004 Boston police to get tough 9/19/2003 Judge: Suspect to stay jailed 9/18/2003 Seeing bias, evidence tossed 8/5/2003 Deeper look at profiling 7/24/2003 Funding urged for study 5/24/2003 Ticketing cited despite curbs 3/5/2003 Romney backs tracking Task force recruited 1/25/2003 Chief: Glitch caused error 1/8/2003 Task force to review data

OPINION

Globe Editorial: Tickets to fix (July 23, 2003)
Op-Ed: Looking deeper at racial profiling (August 5, 2003)
Globe Editorial: Profiles in prejudice (May 5, 2004)
Op-Ed: Study proves nothing (May 19, 2004)

ONLINE EXTRAS

Q & A Secretary of Public Safety Edward A. Flynn, the senior law enforcement official in Massachusetts, spoke with the Globe and fielded questions regarding this series.

Detailed report [PDF] A closer look at how the Globe analyzed hundreds of thousands of traffic tickets. This document requires Adobe Acrobat

Online chat On July 22, Globe reporter Bill Dedman chatted with Boston.com readers about this series. Read the full transcript.

EARLIER COVERAGE

JANUARY 6, 2003
Traffic citations reveal disparity in police searches
When a police officer in Massachusetts pulls over a car and writes a routine traffic ticket, the officer is far more likely to search the car of a black or Hispanic driver than that of a white driver.

JANUARY 7, 2003
Police not pressed on racial records
State officials have known for nearly two years that some police departments are failing to record the race of drivers on all traffic tickets, as required by law to monitor for racial profiling, but the officials have not questioned those police agencies about the missing information.