A new report finds that the New York City Police Department doesn’t adequately train or punish officers in the matter of excessive force.
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The changes, which include a system to track almost all instances in which force is used, comes on the same day that the inspector general of the NYPD issued a report scrutinizing how the department has historically handled complaints about excessive force.
Commissioner William Bratton formally announced the new policies and addressed the inspector general’s report at a press conference on Thursday afternoon.
The new policies will result in “significant reductions in the use of force by our officers”, he said. Officers may face dismissal or other disciplinary measures if they see another officer using excessive force and ignore it, or if they don’t seek medical assistance when it is requested.
It also says the NYPD often declines to discipline officers when they cross the line. “I think one of the most powerful forces affecting New York City and its police department is this growing awareness in the rest of America – it’s the policing equivalent of the Confederate flag”. Previously, the NYPD only produced reports on shooting incidents.
The new use-of-force guidelines aim to provide a few clarity to confusing rules about the use of force, how it’s defined and how to investigate it, NYPD officials said.
– Current guidelines do not “properly instruct officers to de‐escalate encounters with the public”.
► Publish an annual report of every time officers used force. “In dozens of incidents, officers were presented with the opportunity to de-escalate the situation but ultimately did not”, the report concluded. Additionally, the report recommends more training on how to avoid violent confrontations.
“If the department had already acknowledged its reporting and collection of this information was inadequate both internally and in its communication with the federal government, it shows Bratton’s previous testimony to the Council at an oversight hearing as disingenuous and factually inconsistent”, Gonzalez said.
“More paperwork coupled with a serious shortage of police officers and the continual second-guessing of their actions is a formula for disaster”, Mr. Lynch said.
“There’s a new national awareness and movement about racial bias and policing, and this is a very good development”, says Harry Levine, professor of sociology at Queens College who studies the arrest patterns of the NYPD. We’ve lived through the era of reactive policing where cops could do nothing but respond to 911 calls, causing crime and disorderly behavior to run rampant in our neighborhoods.
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In late 2014, Reason TV reported from a pro-NYPD rally held after massive protests critical of the NYPD erupted all over New York City following the non-indictment of Officer Daniel Pantaleo in the death of Eric Garner.
