Police reform in the United States
Specific goals may include: lowering the criminal intent standard, limiting or abolishing qualified immunity for law enforcement officers, sensitivity training, conflict prevention and mediation training, updating legal frameworks, and granting administrative subpoena power to the U.S. Department of Justice for "pattern or practice" investigations into police misconduct and police brutality.
[7] Mapp v. Ohio found that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment protection against "unreasonable searches and seizures" may not be used in criminal prosecutions.
Civilian review boards tend to focus on individual complaints, rather than broader organizational issues that may result in long-term improvements.
The ability to identify police officers who are susceptible to behavioral issues and violence in high intensity situations can help leaders in law enforcement in being proactive against misconduct.
The identifiers used often flag officers that in reality pose a minimal threat, while those that would benefit from additional oversight fly under the radar.
[13] As a result, numerous departments have entered into consent decrees or memoranda of understanding, requiring them to make organizational reforms.
Some law enforcement agencies in the United States in the early 2000s and 2010s began to emphasize de-escalation as a method of conflict resolution and obtaining voluntary compliance.
Georgia Ann Robinson, the first black policewoman hired by the Los Angeles Police Department in 1919, was part of such early reform efforts.
[7] Mapp v. Ohio found that evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment protection against "unreasonable searches and seizures" may not be used in criminal prosecutions.
Civilian review boards tend to focus on individual complaints, rather than broader organizational issues that may result in long-term improvements.
[25] As a result, numerous departments have entered into consent decrees or memoranda of understanding, requiring the agencies to make organizational reforms.
[27]Some law enforcement agencies in the United States in the early 2000s and 2010s began to emphasize de-escalation as a method of conflict resolution and obtaining voluntary compliance.
In the specific case of the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson in August 2014, an investigation by the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division concluded that, while there were not sufficient grounds to charge the police officer who shot Brown with a criminal offense, the Ferguson Police Department as a whole "was routinely violating the constitutional rights of its black residents.
"[33][34] Members of the Congressional Black Caucus indicated their appreciation of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, and said that while many American police officers serve honorably, the problems found in Ferguson such as the use of fines to generate revenue instead of promoting safety and justice, the use of excessive force, and unconstitutional practices may also be found in other communities in the United States.
[47] On July 7, 2016, after police shootings of black individuals in St Paul, Minnesota and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Obama said that "When incidents like this occur, there's a big chunk of our fellow citizenry that feels as if it's because of the color of their skin, they are not being treated the same...
Oakland's mayor, Libby Schaaf, said at a news conference, "I am here to run a police department, not a frat house," and that she wants "to root out what is clearly a toxic, macho culture."
Peter Keane, a former San Francisco police commissioner and law professor at Golden Gate University, said, "I think she can find someone who is really ruthless about instituting reforms of these kinds of things" but "You can't do any of this stuff with an internal candidate.
"[54] On June 27, 2016, a federal judge sentenced Paul Tanaka, a former second-in-command of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, to five years in prison.
The Los Angeles Times reported that "Prosecutors accused him of overseeing a scheme in which underlings tried to intimidate the lead FBI agent on the inquiry, concealed the whereabouts of an inmate who was working as a federal informant and pressured deputies not to cooperate with the investigation".
[55] Police chiefs of Chicago, San Francisco, Baltimore, and Oakland were fired or resigned in 2015 and 2016 after various controversies, often involving issues of race and allegations of use of excessive force by officers.
Baltimore's chief was fired after a citizen died in police custody in controversial circumstances, riots after the death, and amidst a crime surge.
[62] In the year after this event, multiple states, including Massachusetts[63] and Colorado[64] passed bipartisan measures which significantly altered law enforcement practices.
At the national level, both House Democrats and Senate Republicans proposed separate pieces of new legislation which would enact similar changes federally.
Specifically, the law states that officers charged with murder or manslaughter are restricted in claiming that the act was justified if their own negligence leading up to the incident resulted in the necessary use of such force.
Lexipol, a Texas-based public safety training and consulting company, has opposed efforts to reform use of force standards.
Lexipol declines to include common reform proposals in its manuals, such as a use-of-force continuum, de-escalation policies, or rules prohibiting chokeholds or shooting into cars, and advocates against measures it perceives would undermine police officers' discretion to use force.
