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Law Requiring Cops To Report How Many People They Shoot Awaits Obama's Signature

posted by Blackmoore on Tuesday December 16 2014, @08:30PM   Printer-friendly
from the too-many-to-count dept.

"gewg_" writes:

The Center for American Progress reports

Congress [just] passed a bill that could result in complete, national data on police shootings and other deaths in law enforcement custody.

Right now, we have nothing close to that. Police departments are not required to report information about police to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Some do, others don't, others submit it some years and not others or submit potentially incomplete numbers, making it near-impossible to know how many people police kill every year. Based on the figures that are reported to the federal government, ProPublica recently concluded that young black men are 21 times more likely to be killed by police than whites.

Under the bill awaiting Obama's signature, states receiving federal funds would be required to report every quarter on deaths in law enforcement custody. This includes not [only] those who are killed by police during a stop, arrest, or other interaction. It also includes those who die in jail or prison. [Additionally,] it requires details about these shootings including gender, race, as well as at least some circumstances surrounding the death.

 
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  • (Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday December 16 2014, @10:06PM

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday December 16 2014, @10:06PM (#126637) Journal

    Federalism. The reasoning is federalism.

    Many many many people believe the federal government can't dictate how states and municipalities enforce laws. Sometimes up to and including rejecting enforcement of the bill of rights. I'm not trying to start a quarrel about how wrong they are, just that their attitudes influence the relationship between the federal government and more local law enforcement.

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  • (Score: 2) by wantkitteh on Wednesday December 17 2014, @12:35PM

    by wantkitteh (3362) on Wednesday December 17 2014, @12:35PM (#126831) Homepage Journal

    I've seen a few documentaries about enforcement of marijuana prohibition laws in the US on the TV over here in the UK. It seems they all feature a thread about some cop somewhere who can't accept that state marijuana legalisation has taken place and keeps harassing the clinics and dispensaries and arresting the people who work there. Not saying anything about marijuana legalisation, just that the state/federal jurisdiction conflict works both ways.