The Fort Worth police department has solid policies but officers are typically not held accountable for not following the rules, reforms required

The city of Fort Worth in Texas According to a report that was distributed on Tuesday, the Fort Worth Police Department has sound policies, but officers are often not held accountable for failing to follow the rules.

The evaluation showed that the department is, in many respects, professional and up to date, but it also identified significant areas for improvement.

According to the report, “the real experience of some members of the community is significantly different,” specifically referring to individuals of color and those living in low-income communities. “A ‘command and control’ strategy to police is much too often defined by daily interactions, which leads to needless uses of force,”

Late in 2019, a panel of criminal justice experts was assembled in response to the fatal shooting of Atatiana Jefferson in her own house by a former officer of the Forth Worth Police Department. Aaron Dean. It was the intention of the group’s work to expand upon the work that had been done by the city’s Task Force on Race and Culture.

Following a number of postponements, Dean’s trial is reportedly expected to get underway after the Thanksgiving holiday.

In the years that have passed since Atatiana Jefferson was murdered by a police officer in Fort Worth, an independent panel has conducted an in-depth investigation into the police department and what aspects of it require reform.

Alex del Carmen, who is also the head of the Institute of Predictive Analytics in Criminal Justice at Tarleton State University, took on the role of co-chair of the panel. Carmen expressed his hope that the findings would ensure that the police force would learn and develop in the future.

“We’re not going to sugar coat it,” del Carmen added. “We’re not going to sugar coat it.” “We feel that the community is entitled to know the truth. We think it’s important that the police department knows the truth. We feel that you, as the leaders, are also entitled to know the truth.

On Tuesday, members of the city council in Fort Worth were given the commission’s final report to review. Several topics, including crisis intervention, the use of force, and escalation, were investigated as part of this study. According to the findings of the report’s specialists, there were “major cases” of law enforcement officials failing to de-escalate situations and occasionally resorting to the use of unlawful force.

Theron Bowman, a former chief of police in Arlington, who is currently serving as a panel co-chair, stated that one of the proposals was to implement what is known as the “LEED” approach. According to Bowman, the concept incentivizes law enforcement officials to “listen and explain with dignity and equity.”

As an illustration, he cited a stop at a traffic light.

“Just like you, if you had similar situation, you would be dissatisfied with the officers if the officer went up to the car, used obscene language, called him, or anything else like that. Dissatisfied with the results of it all. “more likely to put up a fight,” he elaborated.

A structured bystander program, which encourages officers to act if they notice another officer engaging in conduct or behavior that is inconsistent with the policy, is another thing that the panelists are proposing the police department adopt.

Auditing the implementation on reporting and conducting a review of the use of force are both equally significant. “What gets measured, gets done,” Bowman stated. [Citation needed] “You can’t anticipate what you haven’t inspected,” as the saying goes.

A longtime opponent, Pastor Kyev Tatum, is currently advocating for the department to be placed under a consent order issued by the Justice Department.

“What frustrates us is that we know they’re breaking the general orders, the leadership knows they’re breaking the general orders, but they’re allowing those officers to stay on the street with no discipline we know of and then the behavior continues,” Tatum said. “What frustrates us is that we know they’re breaking the general orders, and the leadership knows they’re breaking the general orders.”

The advisors lauded Police Chief Neil Noakes’s work and acknowledged that the agency is moving in a constructive direction.

“”The most important thing to take away from this is the fact that this issue did not arise before the passage of two years,” del Carmen stated. “This is a problem that has been going on for a very very very long time.”

Noakes, for his part, stated that the agency is aware of its shortcomings and is committed to making improvements.