Assignment task:
Many practices of American Police and Sherriff's Department are rooted in the historic pattern of disinclination. Both history and current events demonstrate that law enforcement agencies routinely disproportionately arrest, ticket, and stop minorities in relationship to their percentage of the community's population.
In order to address these inequities, police reform was required. A variety of methods to implement these reforms have been employed. These methods include consent decrees between the Department of Justice and the local agencies, reforms imposed by legislation, and voluntary reforms by the agency itself.
Of course, the durability of these reforms is one of, if not the most important aspect of the reforms.
With these broad concepts in mind, please address the following:
1. Identify a police department that has been subject to a consent decree that has been in effect for at least five years, or has been concluded.
2. Discuss the underlying events that led to the consent decree. While there is usually a specific incident that drives the consent decree, that is almost certainly not the first one. Be sure to examine the history that led up to the consent decree.
3. Compare two of the most important provisions to the underlying causes of the consent decree. Discuss how these provisions are meant to address the failings of the agency.
4. Use the UMD Library, as well as other credible sources to find information to support your discussion of whether or not the consent decree has successfully addressed the concerns it was intended to reform, and if the results are durable. Be sure to address where the consent decree has succeeded, and where it has failed.
5. Discuss, with academic article support, how the consent decree has affected the agency's relationship with the community. In addition to statistical information, such as crime rates, number of citizen complaints, and homicide closure rates, also include the opinion of the community stake holders.
6. Compared to before the time of the consent decree, discuss the overall effect of the consent decree on the relationship between the law enforcement agency and the community.