Causes.com
| 6.16.23
DOJ Exposes Discrimination in Minneapolis Police Department
Do you support an overhaul of the Minneapolis police department?
What’s the story?
- Three years after George Floyd’s murder, the Justice Department released an account of discrimination and systemic abuse by the Minneapolis police.
- The DOJ has been investigating the police department since Floyd’s death led to Black Lives Matter protests nationwide. The final report found “reasonable cause to believe” that officers engaged in a “pattern or practice of conduct that deprives people of their rights under the Constitution and federal law.”
What’s in the report?
- The DOJ called for a complete restructuring of the Minneapolis police department (MPD). The report accused officers of unlawful discrimination towards Black and Native Americans, continuously failing to take health complaints from arrestees seriously, and violating the First Amendment rights of journalists and demonstrators.
- The account laid out 19 police shootings from Jan. 2016 to Aug. 2022 that included “unconstitutional uses of deadly force,” with some police shooting “without first determining whether there was an immediate threat of harm to the officers or others.”
- The DOJ said the Minneapolis government has repeatedly violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by discriminating against those with behavioral health disabilities and responding to many mental health-related calls with unnecessary force.
- Investigators found that following the death of Floyd, when the MPD was receiving harsh opposition from the public, “officers suddenly stopped reporting race and gender” in their police reports.
- The DOJ’s account included recommendations for the MPD to improve public safety: revising policies to emphasize avoiding the use of force, improving training to prevent the use of force, developing approaches to handle mental health calls appropriately, analyzing data to decrease discrimination, and more.
What they’re saying
- L. Chris Stewart, a lawyer who represented the Floyd family, applauded the report, adding:
“There are a lot of great officers, and this hopefully will get rid of the ones not upholding the badge.”
- Newly appointed Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara said:
“[W]e will change the narrative around policing in this city.”
- Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said:
“Such conduct is deeply disturbing and it erodes the community’s trust in law enforcement.”
- Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said the city understands that change is “non-negotiable.” He continued:
“Our success will be defined by people feeling safer when interacting with police in our city. We are not going to stop until every single person in every single neighborhood and zip code feels safe interacting with police.”
What’s next?
- The DOJ and Minneapolis officials agreed to negotiate a court-enforced consent decree, according to Garland. If the city doesn’t follow through with the deal, the DOJ will overhaul the police force.
- The DOJ is investigating similar issues in other police forces as well, including gender bias in New York City, mental health discrimination in Oklahoma, excessive force by the police in Arizona and Louisiana, and racial and gender biases in Massachusetts.
Do you support an overhaul of the Minneapolis police department?
-Jamie Epstein
(Photo credit: Flickr/Tony Webster)
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The Minneapolis Police Department should be reformed, but it should also be an example of how to reform other police departments across the country.
3 years after George Floyd, unarmed Black people are still being profiled, attacked, and killed at the hands of police, and it must stop.
If we can't reform these police departments, then how will innocent people ever be safe in this country?
Is the average person safer in downtown Mpls today or before George Floyd?
No police department should be held in higher esteem than the populations they are directed to protect. Discrimination can be a two-edged sword, but its basis must also be considered.
If it is based on superficially created prejudices, based on (racial characteristics, and actual sexual identity prejudices) it must not be tolerated, and should not only be dismantled as a policy but must be exposed to the knowledge of the public.
So many other police departments need reforms as well!
I hope the change is for the better and lasting.
Finally, it will come to an end? I surely hope so. They have been torturing and murdering American Indians in their jails since they first built them! They also have a huge listing of "missing American Indian women" that they are never to quick to look for. I wonder why? Nothing to find?
NOT defund, but redirect, re-educate, include instead of exclude. It ca. Be done, it must be done.
Justice must be equal to be just.
We have a long way to go...
And other police departments that are the same or worse.
Considering how Minneapolis has become less safe since the riots, I am sure this will help make thinks safer.
I support police reform in EVERY state!
I have seen reorganization under federal supervision. It sucked
Minneapolis is one of a dozen (Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Springfield MA to name a few) city police departments that are under DOJ consent decrees.
A 2 year investigation of 198 encounters from 2016 through 2022 found minority (American Indian, Asian, black, Hispanic, etc) residents were stopped 6X more often than white residents, deadly force was used without immediate threat, chokeholds were still being used after being banned in 2020, routine failure to administer aid to people in custody, and a reporter was pepper sprayed.
Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) agreed to negotiate a consent decree with DOJ that includes 28 remedial measures. Officers can no longer pull people over for mechanical problems like broken tail lights nor can they frisk people who smell of marijuana. Other reforms include body and dash cams, training how to respond to to behavioral and mental health problems and de-escalation techniques.
Aurora (CO) which is under a state AG consent decree is using an AI system to monitor video from body and dash cans to identify problematic behaviors for retraining.
Truleo's natural language processing AI analyzes officers' interactions with the public, raising questions about efficacy and civilian privacy."
" Truleo, a Chicago-based company which offers AI natural language processing for audio transcription logs ripped from already controversial body camera recordings. The partnership raises concerns regarding data privacy and surveillance, as well as efficacy and bias issues that come with AI automation."
"Founded in 2019 through a partnership with FBI National Academy Associates, Inc., Truleo now possesses a growing client list that already includes departments in California, Alabama, Pennsylvania, and Florida. Seattle’s police department just re-upped on a two-year contract with the company. Police in Aurora, Colorado—currently under a state attorney general consent decree regarding racial bias and excessive use of force—are also in line for the software, which reportedly costs roughly $50 per officer, per month."
"Truleo’s website says it “leverages” proprietary natural language processing (NLP) software to analyze, flag, and categorize transcripts of police officers’ interactions with citizens in the hopes of improving professionalism and efficacy. Transcript logs are classified based on certain parameters, and presented to customers via detailed reports to use as they deem appropriate. For example, Aurora’s police chief, Art Avecedo, said in a separate interviewposted on Truleo’s website that the service can “identify patterns of conduct early on—to provide counseling and training, and the opportunity to intervene [in unprofessional behavior] far earlier than [they’ve] traditionally been able to.”
"Truleo software “relies on computers’ GPU” and is only installed within a police department’s cloud environment. “We don’t have logins or access to that information,”
[Note: Tik Tok could learn from this security]
https://www.causes.com/comments/79939
https://www.causes.com/comments/90321
https://www.popsci.com/technology/police-body-cam-ai-truleo/?amp
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tylerroush/2023/03/31/minneapolis-approves-police-overhaul-3-years-after-george-floyds-death/?sh=2413a2207e0c
https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2023/06/16/doj-minneapolis-police-had-pattern-of-racist-violent-behavior/amp/
YES!!!! As well as the overhaul of all police departments that have similiar discriminatory practices and over use of unwarranted force. If police departments wants the public to trust them and thus cooperate with them, then they have to demonstrate that they are trustworthy. Unfortunately, what we've seen nationwide is that many police departments are not trustworthy and do more harm than good.
Of course we support an overhaul of ANY police department with racism issues that result in needless deaths! Even better would be Federal guidance on proper procedures to avoid violations of constitutional rights and federal law, initiated by the US Congress and administrated and distributed by main Justice.