Monitoring Law Enforcement Consent Decrees: An Introduction & Starter Toolkit

• NCJ Number: 309621
• Author(s): Matthew Barge; Barry Friedman; Maureen McGough
• Date Published: October 2024
• Length: 118 pages
• Grant Number(s): 15PBJA-21-GK-04011-JAGT
• Agencies: BJA-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research); Report (Grant Sponsored)

Annotation

This publication of the Law Enforcement Lab and the Policing Project of the NYU School of Law serves as an introduction and starter toolkit for monitoring law enforcement consent decrees.

Abstract

This guide published by the Law Enforcement Lab and the Policing Project of the NYU School of Law addresses the monitoring of law enforcement consent decrees. It provides a detailed overview of what monitors do and how they do their work as well as a toolkit that monitors can use to support consent decree implementation. The materials address the role, duties, and responsibilities of a consent decree monitor, which is typically, an outside, independent entity charged with overseeing and assessing a law enforcement agency’s progress under a consent decree. The guide has been constructed to provide information that may be especially useful to individuals interested in consent decree monitoring, new to monitoring, or interested in learning more about consent decree implementation. The guide also seeks to offer guidance that can be useful to jurisdictions who entered into a consent decree and the law enforcement agencies that such decrees address. Specifically, this guide addresses the oversight and implementation of consent decrees and settlement agreements addressing the performance of law enforcement agencies. These formal mechanisms address a “pattern and practice” of unlawful policing identified by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and typically consist of specific measures that jurisdictions and their law enforcement agencies agree to implement to address the unlawful pattern or practice. At the same time, much of the guide’s advice may be applicable for law enforcement consent decrees involving state attorneys general or other state and local agencies with authority to address a “pattern or practice” of unlawful policing.