Baltimore mayor seeks federal investigation of police department

By Luke Broadwater, the Baltimore Sun

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake asked the Justice Department on Wednesday to conduct a full-scale civil rights investigation into the pattern and practices of the Baltimore Police Department — a probe that would examine excessive force, discriminatory harassment, false arrests, and unlawful stops, searches or arrests.

“We all know that Baltimore continues to have a fractured relationship between the police and the community,” Rawlings-Blake said. “I’m willing to do what it takes to reform my department.”

In the kind of inquiry Rawlings-Blake and the council are seeking, the Justice Department’s civil rights division examines whether officers have a history of discrimination or of using force beyond standard guidelines. Such investigations can lead to consent decrees and years of court monitoring.

It can take the division 18 to 24 months to complete an investigation. The consent decree and associated negotiations for reform can take many more months after that…

The mayor also has pledged to equip officers with body cameras by the end of the year…

A Baltimore Sun investigation last year revealed that the city had paid $5.7 million in court judgments and settlements in 102 civil suits alleging police brutality and other misconduct since 2011. Nearly all of the people involved in the confrontations that led to those lawsuits were cleared of criminal charges.

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