Use-of-force change
The Fire and Police Commission unanimously approves a partial ban on chokeholds by police.
Milwaukee police officers are now expressly forbidden from using chokeholds and other tactics that restrict oxygen flow on suspects, unless caught in a life-or-death situation.
The Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission unanimously approved the partial ban Thursday night, along with other policy measures requiring deescalation techniques when feasible and providing aid to civilians immediately after using force on them.
Additionally, officers now must file a report every time they point a gun at someone.
It is the first piece of reform to be adopted by the Fire and Police Commission that local activists have called for almost daily ever since protests over police brutality erupted across the nation in late May following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, when an officer knelt on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes.
“It’s long overdue,” said Nelson Soler, chairman of the commission. “This is a big, big win for the community, the commission and for MPD with working with us.”
The Milwaukee Police Department’s use-of-force policy now appears to satisfy all the conditions under the Eight Can’t Wait national campaign, which seeks to tighten use-of-force policies across the country while encouraging de-escalation techniques.
Fred Royal, the president of the local NAACP, called it “one of the most progressive use-of-force policies currently being employed or discussed.”
Previously, the Milwaukee Police Department did not train officers to use chokeholds but did not expressly forbid their use, either. Until Thursday, the words “chokehold” and “de-escalation” did not appear in the department’s standard operating procedure about the use of force. They do now.
The commission on Thursday also remained deadlocked on a vote to name the city’s next police chief, with three votes for Maj. Malik Aziz of the Dallas Police Department and three for Supervisory Special Agent Hoyt Mahaley of the FBI.
Soler deferred the chief vote to Jan. 7. By then, he is hoping a seventh person will have joined the commission.
The commission is also still in the process of crafting a standard operating procedure about community-oriented policing — a law enforcement strategy that emphasizes close working relationships with members of various communities.
“The FPC is moving in a direction to ensure law enforcement has some type of accountability and transparency, with community involvement,” Royal said. “I’m glad to see the FPC is realizing the importance.”
Dale Bormann Jr., president of the Milwaukee Police Association, the union representing rank-and-file officers, said in September his organization had no issue with the proposed changes.
Recalling the deaths of Floyd and that of Eric Garner in New York in 2014, other changes approved Thursday require officers to roll suspects onto their side or into a seated position immediately upon being handcuffed when lying on their stomach. They also must use alternative detainment techniques if a suspect claims he or she cannot breathe.
Nationally, chokeholds have received increased scrutiny in recent years after video showed a New York officer putting Garner in one, despite his pleas that he could not breathe. The issue has added significance in Milwaukee, where in April, off-duty officer Michael Mattioli put Joel Acevedo in a chokehold for 10 minutes after a party at Mattioli’s house.
Acevedo died from his injuries days later.
Mattioli has been charged with first-degree reckless homicide and resigned from the department. He has pleaded not guilty.
The use of force policy also now contains an entire section focusing on de-escalation. It stipulates that, when reasonable, officers should consider whether noncompliance from a suspect is deliberate or the result of a mental, physical, drug or language barrier.
The policy lists several de-escalation techniques to slow down a situation, calm a suspect and earn voluntary compliance.