NEW ORLEANS — A judge decided Tuesday that the New Orleans Police Department can start to end the long-term federal oversight. The city and the Justice Department had asked the judge to end the monitoring program, which he did.
Judge Susie Morgan of the U.S. District Court said that the police department has become more open and responsible, but that more work needs to be done over the next two years while the program ends.
During a hearing, Morgan said, “The court is very proud of what the NOPD has done.” “The civilians and sworn NOPD members worked hard, and it paid off.” It’s a very different NOPD from the one that led to the 2011 DOJ probe.
The city made a motion at the last minute to end federal oversight right away, but Morgan turned it down, calling it “political gamesmanship.”
She said, “The city can’t have it both ways.”
The city of New Orleans agreed to what it called “the nation’s most expansive” federal oversight plan in 2013. This was after an investigation by the U.S. Justice Department found proof of racial bias, wrongdoing, and a culture of impunity. The police department had been unfair to the city’s Black community for a long time and had been involved in several high-profile scandals, such as an officer ordering a murder in 1994 and an effort to hide the fact that police killed unarmed civilians after Hurricane Katrina.
Some people say the police haven’t done enough to change and win back the public’s trust, but at a hearing on Monday, Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick told Morgan that the NOPD has created a “new culture.”
Since control began years ago, the department has set up a system of audits and data analysis, made things more clear by revising and posting online training materials and policies, and stepped up efforts to reduce long-standing problems like payroll fraud, according to police officials.
Deputy Superintendent Nicholas Gernon told the judge on Monday, “This is how we do business these days.”
Morgan praised the department for changing, but he also told the city that more work needs to be done.
“One goal is to make sure that these steps are taken in a way that doesn’t let you slip or fall.” He said Monday, “That’s why all the safety measures you put in place matter.” “That’s why I think it’s important for the department of justice, the monitors, and the court to be involved until everyone is sure that all the rules are in place and will stay in place even if the leaders and officers change.”
A lot of concerns were brought up by advocacy groups and watchdogs during a public comment time. Police officials say they are trying to address these concerns.
Most reports say that plans to set up community advisory boards that would meet with the cops and make suggestions have stalled. However, the city hired a full-time worker in December to try to bring these groups back to life in the coming months.
There are still too many sex crimes for detectives to handle, so far fewer are solved than the national rate. The number of cops working on these cases has grown from 17 to 25 in the last three weeks, according to the NOPD. Eight more detectives have been assigned to them.
The city’s Office of the Independent Police Monitor said that last year, nearly 90% of police uses of force were against Black people. This is in a city that is just over 50% Black. Based on analysis from the Justice Department, federal monitors appointed by the court looked into the NOPD’s use of force and found no proof of bias. The NOPD also wants to hire Sigma Squared, a company that was co-founded by Harvard University economist Roland Fryer to help them do a better job of looking for possible bias in the way they do their jobs. Fryer did not answer when asked for a statement.
“It shows that we’re going above and beyond what’s required,” Gernon told the judge on Monday.
But Antonia Mar, an organizer with the group New Orleans for Community Oversight of Police, said she thought federal and NOPD officials had mostly “shrugged their shoulders at community input.” This was despite the fact that hundreds of pages of public comments and testimony, most of which were critical of the NOPD, had been sent to the court in the past few months. Mar and other people who want to change the way the police work said they thought the NOPD was rushing to make changes that were long overdue at the last minute.
The city also brought up an old motion on Friday that asked Morgan to end federal control right away. But she turned it down. The judge instead approved the city and Justice Department’s request for a two-year “sustainment period” to give the NOPD time to fix any problems that were still open and show that the changes that were already in place were still in effect.
A lawyer from the Justice Department told Morgan on Monday that the city needs to make more changes before it can fully leave federal oversight. He said that the Justice Department would keep looking over audits, policies, and data during the sustainment time.
“Perfection is not the goal here,” Geissler said. “The goal here is constitutional policing with a long-term solution.” “Let’s not let perfection stand in the way of good, and let’t settle for less than good.”
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