Civilian board approves changes to pursuit policy
Flynn ordered to overhaul rules to allow chases
Milwaukee police officers will be allowed to chase cars with ties to drug dealing or reckless driving in some specific circumstances under a change to the department’s pursuit policy from Chief Edward Flynn.
Flynn’s changes were approved unanimously Thursday by the city’s Fire and Police Commission.
Flynn put forward the revisions, which he calls a “good faith effort,” to the commission after the civilian oversight board issued a rare directive this summer ordering him to overhaul the policy.
At Thursday’s meeting, Flynn urged officials to make sure there are serious penalties for those who flee police in high-speed chases “if we are going to risk literally life and limb to pursue people.”
“Lives are at risk when we engage in high-speed pursuits,” Flynn said.
He added that there are regulations in place so people aren’t targeted simply because of things like the suspicions of neighbors or anonymous tips.
“It can’t be a mere hunch or a suspicion or somebody said something,” Flynn said.
In a letter to the board, Flynn said he developed the changes after discussing it with his command staff, reviewing policies of other metropolitan police agencies and consulting with “special interest groups” related to public safety.
“I suspect that people who have expressed the concerns that led to the directive and which motivated my consideration of revising the present pursuit policy will not be satisfied across the board,” Flynn wrote in his letter.
In its July 13 directive, the commission ordered Flynn to change the policy so officers could chase those on a to-be-created “high-value target” list of vehicles used in rolling drug houses, a practice explored by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, as well as vehicles that have fled from police at least twice before.
The board also said officers should be allowed to chase fleeing vehicles when police have probable cause to believe the vehicle engaged in “excessively reckless driving.”
Although Flynn’s proposal does not mention a “high-value target” list of vehicles, it does state officers could chase if the occupants are “engaged in drug dealing proximate in time” to the start of the pursuit.
It also says officers can chase if the “necessity of immediate apprehension outweighs the level of danger created by the vehicle pursuit, as in the case of the vehicle engaged in reckless driving.”
The existing policy permits officers to chase a vehicle if they have probable cause that it, or the people inside, was involved in a violent felony. The department tightened the policy so officers could not chase for misdemeanor offenses, such as drug possession, or nonviolent felonies, such as burglary.
The change came in 2010 after four bystanders were killed by drivers fleeing police. Since then, the pursuit policy has been debated and criticized on and off. The debate took on new life in April when a majority of Common Council members sent a letter to the Fire and Police Commission calling on board members to order Flynn to “re-prioritize traffic enforcement activity and to redraw his pursuit policy.”
The Fire and Police Commission’s meeting Thursday was the board’s first since the publication of a draft report of a federal review of the Milwaukee Police Department.
Although the report has not been finalized and the police chief says the draft contains inaccuracies, aldermen and social justice advocates said it raises valid concerns that need to be addressed.
The draft — which appeared to have been written in mid-2016 — was highly critical of the Police Department, saying it fails the community and its own officers by not communicating clearly, making too many traffic stops and applying inconsistent standards when disciplining officers.
The draft also offered critiques and recommendations for the Fire and Police Commission.