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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.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by dcollins on Tuesday December 16 2014, @08:58PM
"The bill is a reauthorization of legislation that expired in 2006. Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) has been trying to revive it since then without success. Scott told the Washington Post the first time the bill passed in 2000, it took years before data started to come in, because of 'the way government works,' and then the bill expired. But if states don’t report information, the federal government could use its power to withhold funds to force compliance. It passed the House last year, but finally moved through the Senate this week on the momentum of post-Ferguson outrage."
My prior understanding (and if you read between the lines above it says the same) is that even when this was previously in force from 2000-2006, states ignored it without any penalty or sanction.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday December 17 2014, @02:54AM
That was my understanding as well - unless the federal government actually *enforces* the thing it's just another "feel good" law in a stack nobody ever reads. My preferred solution would be to tie 100% of federal funds to compliance, phased in over N years (because changing bureaucracies does take time, even with money on the line.) 30% of the way to the "fully active" date, you lose 30% of federal funding if you're not in compliance - that would light a fire under some folks, rather than just letting them wait until the 11th hour and then band together to change the law.
Or heck - if you don't want to mess with funding channels (I'm sure that's a political tangle of Gordian proportions), how about banning all non-compliant police departments from taking part in the military hardware transfer they're so fond of? You want access to the latest fancy military-grade toys, you'd better comply with the laws tracking how abusive you are. Heck, you could even have a graduated response - only the departments that rank in the lowest 10% of questionable violence are eligible to receive the coolest toys.