Our Demands
1. Safety                Â
2. Accountability        Â
3. Community Connection
1. We Demand Safety
Police Safely to Preserve Lives
Universally outlaw head and neck maneuvers
- Goal: Save lives
- Plan: Fire, Arrest, Charge, Independently Prosecute Violating Officers
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Prioritize Maintenance of Life of People in Police Custody
- Goal: Bring people to the justice system; Don't be the justice system
- Plan: Implement Restrictive Use of Force Policies. Fire, Arrest, Charge, Independently Prosecute Violating Officers
Train for and utilize high quality CPR in rare instances when things go awry
Reward Safe Policing Practices
- Goal: Incentivize officers to avoid use of excessive force
- Plan: Provide tiered, quarterly, monetary bonuses and recognition to officers who avoid excessive force
Excessive force complaint discrepancies will be determined by a Police Action Review Board composed of citizens and police
- Goal: Save officer & citizen lives
- Plan: Train for and enforce strict de-escalation and escalation protocols
Studies show restrictive use of force policies save officer lives and save citizen lives without increasing crime​
Take Complaints Against Officers Seriously
- Goal: Maintain safety, integrity and quality standards in police departments
- Plan: Re-train officers when complaints indicate a pattern of wrong doing
A citizen and police-based Police Action Review Board receives all complaints and decides disciplinary actions
Make officer disciplinary records available to public
Require Bi-annual, In-person, Implicit Bias Training
- Goal: Recognize and counteract prejudicial police practices
- Plan: Train officers to combat tendencies toward bias
Require remediation prior to return to duty if assessments are failed
Require Five, Annual, Weaponless Shifts in Urban Emergency Department Psychiatric Units
- Goal: To hone non-violent situation de-escalation skills
- Plan: Partner with healthcare professionals to sharpen proven, non-violent, weapon-free, de-escalation techniques
Many health care professionals risk their lives to serve the community in dangerous conditions daily; lacking the weapons police have, they are forced to rely upon non-violent de-escalation techniques to keep themselves and their departments safe
Police can learn and utilize these techniques to safely serve the community​
2. We Demand Accountability
Hold Officers Accountable to Decrease Dangerous Practices
Mandate that All Police Officers Properly Use Functioning Body Cameras While On-Duty
- Goal: Record un-editable police-citizen interactions as objective evidence of occurrences
- Plan: Record video and audio of all communications and contact with citizens from start of dispatch or patrol incident to citizen release or hand-off in police headquarters
Mandate that unedited body camera footage be released to the citizen or family (if citizen is deceased) involved in police incidents within 48 hours of request.
Install Local Police Oversight Commissions
- Goal: Provide community oversight of controversial police actions
- Plan: Install a non-partisan, multi cultural, citizen-based Police Oversight Commission to review controversial cases and provide decisive guidelines that police departments must follow
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Install Local Police Oversight Commissions
- Goal: Provide community oversight of controversial police actions
- Plan: Install a non-partisan, multi cultural, citizen-based Police Oversight Commission to review controversial cases and provide decisive guidelines that police departments must follow
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Enact Effective Federal Legislation
- Goal: Standardize national policies to keep citizens and police safe
- Plan: Enact federal legislation that mandates oversight of and accountability for safe, non-discriminatory tactics of local police departments
The President's 21st Century Policing Task Force already does this. Enact and enforce it nation wide
Hire Independent Auditors and Independent Prosecutors with Subpoena Power
- Goal: Hold officers accountable when they violate departmental policies, local, state and federal laws
- Plan: Effectively assess officers' actions and, when appropriate, prosecute officers independently, without conflicts of interest
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3. We Demand Community Connection
Develop Strong Community Ties to Humanize Officers & Citizens
Incentivize Positive Community Policing
- Goal: Instill a sense of comfort, pride and duty to community
- Plan: Enact targeted measures (below) to positively integrate police officers into the fiber of the community they serve
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Provide Housing Discounts and Tax Breaks to Officers who Live in the Neighborhood they Police
- Goal: Instill a sense of comfort, pride and duty to community in police officers
- Plan: Create local, state and federal programs granting officers monetary incentives to live full-time in the communities they police
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Mandate that at least 20% of Officers Live within the Community They Police
- Goal: Instill a sense of comfort, pride and community-duty in police officers
- Plan: Create local, state and federal programs granting officers monetary incentives to live full-time in the communities they police
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Provide Police Department Employment Training to Promising Under-represented Minority Community Youths
- Goal: ​Build upon strong community ties to improve policing while providing career-building opportunities
- Plan: Utilize grants for police academy scholarships, internships and summer jobs for underrepresented minorities
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Facilitate Bonding Opportunities Between Police Officers and Minorities in the Communities They Police
- Goal: Build relationships and mutual trust
​- Plan: Require a variety of impactful, regularly-scheduled community outreach events
It's hard to use deadly force on someone after you've done this, this, this or even this with them​
Coordinate monthly neighborhood lunch events at neutral venues with police and the community
Institute twice yearly in-home family dinners with pre-approved, under-represented minority families living within the officer's jurisdiction
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B.R.E.A.T.H.E. Justice 365
©2020 by B.R.E.A.T.H.E. Justice 365.
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