With the new year comes a fresh batch of legislation across several states restricting aggressive policing and cracking down on law enforcement misconduct.
Leading the charge is Illinois, where lawmakers passed a Safety, Accountability, Fairness and Equity-Today (SAFE-T) Act that bans chokeholds, requires officers to intervene if they observe a fellow officer using too much force and requires all police departments in the state to use body-worn cameras.
The ubiquitous body camera usage also comes with the potential for felony charges if the officers are found to have willfully obstructed justice by tampering with the footage.
On the administrative side, a host of new regulations about handling misconduct complaints, creating a decertification process for officers in Illinois and allowing the attorney general to pursue civil litigation against police departments for violating people’s rights were all enacted as well.