Better policing will improve trust in criminal justice, task force says
The legal profession can help build trust in the American criminal justice system in part by encouraging best practices by police departments, according to an ABA task force report.
The 15-member ABA Task Force on Building Public Trust in the American Justice System looked at how police departments can help repair frayed relationships between police and communities of color. Besides encouraging best practices, the ABA and other bar groups can also build consensus about needed reforms and can educate the public about how the criminal justice system works, the report said.
The ABA Board of Governors accepted the report and the three recommendations when it met during the midyear meeting in Miami.
The ABA task force report (PDF) identified several policies and practices by police departments that have created distrust among communities of color. Those areas include:
- Disparities in the rate at which whites and blacks are subjected to police investigative stops: “Ensuring that investigative stops are initiated for good and valid reasons promotes respect for those conducting the stops,” the report says.
- Confrontational police interactions: “Interacting with commu-nities in a professional and courteous way presents an opportunity to improve perceptions on all sides of the encounter,” the report says.
- The arrests of minorities for minor offenses at higher rates than whites.
- Excessive use of force: “Police officers perform dangerous work that can require the use of lethal and nonlethal force,” the report says. “But when force is exercised without justification or restraint, it undermines confidence in law enforcement.”
- Harsher treatment of minorities at multiple stages of the criminal justice system, including bail, plea bargaining and sentencing.
- Inadequate law enforcement training and oversight: “There is also a role for external oversight,” the report says. “The perception that police departments constitute law unto themselves undermines public trust.”
The report cautions that it should not be construed “as a sweeping denunciation of police methods and motives.”
“A productive discussion about how to narrow the rift between communities of color and law enforcement requires all participants to approach each other with open minds and without hostility,” the task force says in the report, “and to base decisions on evidence rather than preconceived ideas, particularly because this is a context where emotions can run high.”
The ABA task force was chaired by Theodore Wells Jr. of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. Monique Dixon of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund was the task force reporter. Task force members included representatives from law enforcement, prosecutors’ offices, the judiciary, state and federal government, law firms and nonprofits.
The ABA Board of Governors has created a five-member working group to collaborate with the appropriate entities for consideration and implementation of the report.
