Police department diversity lags badly across Mid-Atlantic region, when you can get data
The killing of George Floyd seared in our mind the picture of a white cop kneeling on a Black man s neck. We check the racial breakdown of police departments.
Frank Scandale, USA Today Network
Published
2:36 am UTC May. 20, 2021
Since George Floyd was murdered by a Minneapolis police officer, the image of a white police officer kneeling on a Black man’s neck drew into the spotlight the question of diversity in police departments around the country.
An investigation by the USA Today Network’s Atlantic Region found that it appears that most police departments failed to come close to matching their ranks, in terms of diversity, with the constituents they are sworn to protect.
Suffolk County Sheriff Steven W. Tompkins was elected to the Vice Presidency of Region I for the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE).
Already serving as the President of the Massachusetts Chapter of NOBLE, Sheriff Tompkins will now represent the Region I states of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York, with planned expansion into New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
“I am so honored to have been elected to represent NOBLE’s Region I as Vice President and I am looking forward to my work in this additional capacity,” said Sheriff Tompkins. “As I’ve said to NOBLE’s membership body and leadership, I intend to continue the fight for equitable public safety and sustainable, systemic change while examining internal and external law enforcement policies and reform, and I will work collaboratively to move the organization forward as a committed justice partner that will influence the public safety debate on the local and national stage.
Chairman and members of the committee,
My name is Jillian E. Snider, and I am the policy director of criminal justice and civil liberties at the R Street Institute, which is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, public policy research organization. Our mission is to engage in policy research and outreach to promote free markets and limited, effective government in many areas, including criminal justice reform, and that is why SB 111 is of special interest to us.
Delaware currently has a population of approximately one million citizens. According to a 2019 report, 30,038 individuals were arrested in that year, and more than 75 percent of those individuals were charged with low-level offenses.[1] [1] An overwhelming majority of these individuals will suffer endless effects due to their criminal history.
Qualified Immunity Is Still the Key to Real Police Reform SHARE
As we approach the one‐year anniversary of George Floyd’s murder by Minneapolis police, Congress stands at a crossroads: It can deliver the real reform it has repeatedly promised by overhauling qualified immunity, or it can settle for a package of largely meaningless window dressing that leaves untouched our indefensible policy of near‐zero accountability for police. From a purely policy standpoint, the choice is a no‐brainer. As explained below, it’s good politics as well.
To briefly recap, there is bipartisan agreement that American policing stands in desperate need of reform, particularly with respect to excessive force, racial disparities, and accountability. Acknowledging the ongoing crisis of public confidence in police, Congress has spent the past year working to identify key problems and assessing proposed solutions. In the course of those discussions, a single issue has come to p
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Law enforcement groups are urging Congress to fix a flaw in the leading police reform package that they believe will lead to more shootings and deaths exactly the opposite intent of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
In letters to Congress, the police are warning that the legislation will end the use of Tasers, seen by many as a less harmful way to subdue suspects.
At issue is language calling the use of electronic control weapons (including Tasers) “deadly force,” the same as firearms. The bill rushed through the House said that when used against a suspect “multiple” times, it becomes a deadly force weapon.