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“INTRODUCTION OF LAW ENFORCEMENT TRUST AND INTEGRITY ACT OF 2015” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E967-E968 on June 24, 2015.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
INTRODUCTION OF LAW ENFORCEMENT TRUST AND INTEGRITY ACT OF 2015
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HON. JOHN CONYERS, JR.
of michigan
in the house of representatives
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, on behalf of myself and Ms. Jackson Lee, I am pleased to introduce the Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act of 2015, along with additional cosponsors. This legislation has a history of support by both police and civil rights organizations around the country and is focused on building trust between law enforcement agencies, officials and the people they serve.
Over the past two decades, tensions between police and communities of color have grown as allegations of bias-based policing by law enforcement agents, sometimes supported by data collection efforts and video evidence, have increased in number and frequency. Since the tragic police-involved shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, there has been public outcry for Congressional action to address police accountability and public safety issues through the adoption of substantive law enforcement policy reforms.
Despite the fact that the majority of law enforcement officers perform their duties professionally and without bias, the relationship between the police and some of minority communities has deteriorated to such a degree that federal action is required to begin addressing the issue. With recent Washington Post reports of almost 400 police-involved shooting fatalities in the first five months of 2015, all should agree that the time for bipartisan action is long overdue.
The Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act is designed to provide incentives for local police organizations to voluntarily adopt standards to ensure that incidents of deadly force or misconduct will be minimized through appropriate management and training protocols and properly investigated, should they occur. The bill authorizes the Department of Justice to work cooperatively with independent accreditation, law enforcement and community-based organizations to further develop and refine accreditation standards, and further authorizes the Attorney General to make grants to law enforcement agencies for the purpose of obtaining accreditation from certified law enforcement accreditation organizations.
Beyond the human toll created by law enforcement accountability issues, there remains the fiscal impact created by the high cost of litigation settlements for police abuse claims. Currently, there are no federally recognized minimum standards for operating a law enforcement agency. The ad hoc nature of police management has accordingly left many officers and agencies in the dark about how to cope with changes in their communities. While most cities fail to systematically track the cost of litigation, the cost reports for major cities have proven staggering. In New York City alone, during Mayor Michael Bloomberg's three term tenure, NYPD payouts were in excess of $1 billion for policing claims. For small departments, the cost of a single high profile incident could prove crippling in its impact on public safety.
While the Department of Justice has a range of criminal and civil authority to address policing issues, the Civil Rights Division will never have the resources necessary to investigate more than a small fraction of those departments engaged in unconstitutional conduct, even with the enhanced funding and task force authority granted by this legislation. Through the support of a robust accreditation regime, like that existing in healthcare, Congress can ensure that all communities have the best trained and managed police departments. Only by establishing acceptable police operations standards can we begin to preemptively address issues like use of force and heal the rifts within our communities.
Media reports from Baltimore and other cities depicting confrontations between protestors and their police departments illustrate the current divide between law enforcement and the communities they police. In the past years, cities from New York to Cincinnati and Miami to Los Angeles have experienced unrest following controversial use of force incidents by their police. Absent a climate of trust and accountability, community needs are not served and the jobs of the police officers become more difficult and dangerous.
The energies of Congress should be focused on the adoption of legislative priorities that address the substance of law enforcement management and strengthen the current battery of tools available to sanction misconduct. As a Congress we have been enthusiastic about supporting programs designed to get officers on the street. We must be just as willing to support programs designed to train and manage them after they get there. The current national climate requires decisive action to implement solutions. Out of respect for all who have lost their lives over the last nine months--both law enforcement and civilian--I hope you will join Ms. Jackson Lee and myself in supporting legislation that initiates the reforms necessary to restore public trust and accountability to law enforcement.
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