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- Title
Settling for Silence: How Police Exploit Protective Orders.
- Authors
Hanlock, Chelsea
- Abstract
The national outcry and months of Black Lives Matter protests against police brutality that followed the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor are a resounding demonstration of the public’s interest in combatting police violence, particularly excess force used on Black Americans. While media attention on police killings increased after Ferguson Officer Darren Wilson killed Michael Brown in 2014, one piece of the story is often missing: the story of the officers. In particular, the public rarely learns details about the involved officers’ personnel, disciplinary, or misconduct histories. Strong state confidentiality laws mean that the public cannot access these records. But civil rights suits against police officers should provide one way for the public to learn about officers’ misconduct. This Note shows, however, that police combine protective orders and settlement to bind plaintiffs to silence and keep misconduct records from becoming public. Using a case study of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 suits filed against the New York City Police Department, I find that protective orders are common, and that officers and their city attorneys use them strategically. A textual analysis shows that every protective order explicitly protects police personnel and misconduct records. And cases with protective orders have statistically significantly higher settlement amounts than those without. These results are consistent with a conclusion that NYPD officers, and the City of New York, may pay more to keep misconduct records secret. The standards to modify a protective order are burdensome, and plaintiffs’ and judges’ incentives align against fighting or denying protective orders. Because of these roadblocks, the public has no opportunity to learn about problem officers’ past misconduct that comes to light during civil rights litigation. To facilitate the necessary changes to protect the public and reform or abolish police, the federal government should create a national database of police misconduct records.
- Subjects
BLACK Lives Matter movement; KILLINGS of police; FLOYD, George, ca. 1973-2020; TAYLOR, Breonna, ca. 1993-2020; NEW York (N.Y.). Police Dept.
- Publication
California Law Review, 2021, Vol 109, Issue 4, p1507
- ISSN
0008-1221
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.15779/Z38T727G9B