The Justice Department's new investigation into the Minneapolis Police Department will look into the ongoing practices and examine possible legal violations, reminiscent of past probes under the Obama administration.
Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the investigation on Wednesday in the aftermath of Derek Chauvin's murder conviction for George Floyd's death. He mentioned possible remedies that have been used in previous cases involving Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri.
"Usually when the Justice Department finds unlawful practices or patterns of practices the local police department enters into a settlement agreement or a consent decree to ensure that prompt and effective action is taken to align policing practices with the law," Garland said.
The Baltimore consent decree, entered into by the city in April 2017 following the death of Freddie Gray, called for changes that included instituting a community oversight task force, mandatory annual training for community policing and "problem-oriented" policing, new policies regarding stops, searches, arrests, use of force, and transporting people in custody.
Gray died after he was transported in a police vechile without being buckled in. None of the six officers involved were convicted, and four of them had their cases taken to trial. In September 2017, the DOJ announced that their own investigation yielded insufficient evidence to support federal civil rights charges against any of them.
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