It’s the first time in Colorado’s history that a city has entered into a consent decree agreement with the state, and it was made possible by a law passed in the wake of Elijah McClain’s death.
This week, criminal trials for the three officers who forcibly stopped and subdued McClain are underway. That may result in personal, criminal responsibility for his death. The reforms required in Aurora are another form of responsibility: they are an attempt, for the first time in state history, to establish that individual incidents can be the product of a system that has not valued the lives of all people in the community. It’s an attempt to hold an entire system accountable, and ultimately, to improve public safety.
Almost two years since the decree was established, everyone involved agrees that progress has been slow, perhaps out of necessity, and has been made mostly behind closed doors. It is testing the patience and trust of a community in which some people say they can’t wait.
It looks like Colorado’s Attorney General and his office really did a thorough investigation on the Aurora police department. Nearly half the people they used forced against were black yet only 15% of their population is black. The city and Attorney General signed on a consent degree to try and reform the department as well has fix training for incoming officers and change the hiring process. The consent degree is suppose to last five years. My question is are people going to continue to keep watch on this department? Since we don’t actual know these reform policies, how do we know they will actually be follow and help?
While it is good that the state of Colorado is taking the step to better their police department, giving themselves 5 years to implement and adopt the decree and the reforms that come along with it are a little peculiar in my opinion. Would this not be a process that the city would like to continue, even past 5 years? Society changes, the world changes; putting a 5 year limit to their learning and the departments’ reform could easily result in them taking on a mindset of “only 5 years of this, and then we’ll be done”. Reform and better treatment of citizens should be something that’s continued throughout the years and constantly taught.
Jirah, I agree with your question and as Jordan stated above I think we should further look into how these reforms are being measured and if anyone is reviewing the 5 year process. On top of those questions I wonder why after 2 years very little has been done, as the article states citizens saw minuscule changes to the behavior. After 2 years change has been so small, is it possible to believe any real change will occur after 5 years? After the 5 years is over will the everything go back to how it was before? Who else can step in a help change the role of policing in areas like this and make a long term difference?