Department of Justice Consent Decrees as the Foundation for Community-Initiated Collaborative Police Reform

AuthorDavid L. Douglass
DOI10.1177/1098611117712237
Date01 September 2017
Published date01 September 2017
Subject MatterArticles
Article
Department of Justice
Consent Decrees as
the Foundation for
Community-Initiated
Collaborative Police
Reform
David L. Douglass
1
Abstract
Acting pursuant to authority granted by the Violent Crime Control and Law
Enforcement Act of 1994, 42 U.S.C. §1414, the Department of Justice has entered
into dozens of agreements generally known as consent decrees. Consent decrees are
costly, ad hoc, and necessarily limited responses to a historically rooted and wide-
spread problem, one that has become more prominent, divisive, and volatile as a result
of the ubiquitous video-recording of police–civilian interactions and the divergent
views concerning appropriate police tactics between police and the communities in
which they operate. Collectively, these consent decrees constitute a compendium of
best practices for constitutional, effective, community-oriented policing. This article
argues that they can empower communities to initiate police reform and to educate
communities concerning the elements of effective, constitutional policing, establish
agreement with the police concerning the elements of constitutional and effective
policing, and serve as the foundation for an agreed-upon roadmap for reform, including
measures of progress, accountability, and results.
Keywords
consent decrees, police reform, constitutional policing
1
Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP, Washington, DC, USA
Corresponding Author:
David L. Douglass, Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP, 2099 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Suite
100, Washington, DC 20006-6801, USA.
Email: ddouglass@sheppardmullin.com
Police Quarterly
2017, Vol. 20(3) 322–336
!The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1098611117712237
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