Trump’s order seeking to loosen police oversight leaves those in accountability confused. Spokane benefits from that oversight, ombudsman says
A new executive order signed by President Donald Trump appears to loosen ropes on police accountability and potentially attempt to intervene in local law enforcement policy – but the order is so vague, it’s leaving those in police circles unsure what it really means.
In Spokane, which has undergone waves of police reform after the murder of George Floyd and the death of a mentally disabled local man in 2006, it feels crucial the city stays on track with the progress it has made based on the specific needs of its own law enforcement and community members, said Bart Logue, Spokane’s police ombudsman. The policies Spokane has adopted through the years are meant to keep not only residents safe, but also officers, whose safety benefits from the use of de-escalation policies, mental health training and best practices of treating people “with empathy and dignity,” Logue said.
“Does the federal government get to say what’s best for Spokane?” Logue said. “The president has no idea what’s going on in Spokane. That’s why it’s important for our officials to get out and talk. … Our voices have to go out to the government, instead of waiting for them to come in.”
Trump’s April 28 order titled “Strengthening and Unleashing America’s Law Enforcement to Pursue Criminals and Protect Innocent Citizens” has multiple sections meant to address different areas of law enforcement. Notably, it seeks to review, alter or end police consent decrees, court-ordered agreements meant to reform a police department that has engaged in misconduct; intervene within local police jurisdictions to provide them new, government-determined “best practices” for enforcement; increase militarization of local police force equipment; provide legal resources to officers accused of a crime or other misconduct; prosecute local leaders who impede law enforcement from carrying out duties; expand training and pay for officers; and seek enhanced sentences for those who commit crimes against an officer.
“When local leaders demonize law enforcement and impose legal and political handcuffs that make aggressively enforcing the law impossible, crime thrives and innocent citizens and small business owners suffer,” Trump’s order says before outlining goals of the the action. “… The result will be a law-abiding society in which tenacious law enforcement officers protect the innocent, violations of law are not tolerated, and American communities are safely enjoyed by all their citizens again.”
But Trump doesn’t define how or what – just that he wants law enforcement to “aggressively” police communities and would direct the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to help enforce it.
“It’s vague enough that you have to wonder what it means, what is the intent,” said Spokane County Sheriff John Nowels. “I don’t know how you would discern that.”
In the order, Trump demands to “conclude such measures that unduly impede the performance of law enforcement functions.” It’s important to define what that means, Nowels said. If the order was meant to bring in a military professional to better train law enforcement, that doesn’t raise concerns, he said. But if the administration defines body-worn cameras as impeding law enforcement, that would be a different story – and the same would be true, he said, with local immigration law.
Current Washington state law bars local law enforcement from working with federal agents in immigration investigations under the “Keep Washington Working Act.” It’s a troubling law for Trump, who takes issue with states that don’t actively assist federal agents.
The president published another order on the same day, titled “Protecting American Communities from Criminal Aliens,” which threatens prosecution for local leaders who “obstruct” and “defy” federal immigration enforcement.
Because the “unleashing law enforcement” order assigns the Department of Homeland Security to enforce intervening with police practices, that could likely be barred under Washington law, too. Spokane Police Chief Kevin Hall said police will follow local laws, but the language in the order is too “ambiguous” and it is “difficult to respond intelligently” until parts of the order are clarified, he wrote in an email.
Some of the goals in the order, like automatic legal representation for law enforcement and high penalties for crimes against an officer, also already exist.
And while the order also seeks to let federal officials intervene in local police jurisdictions to re-issue “best practice” standards, Spokane’s ombudsman office and other accountability experts have already spent years working with police to do just that, Logue said.
A need for oversight
Much of the concern about the order lies in its tone, police oversight experts say – when Trump wrote he wants to end “measures” that impede law enforcement, it appears to raise the threshold for what actions police can take to enforce the law and blur lines for long-standing police oversight practices.
It also would attempt to terminate court orders or out-of-court agreements related to police reform, the order says.
“If supervision gets off, the lines get blurry. Then folks step over the lines. In Spokane, we don’t have a system like that … Everyone has a strong sentiment towards strong accountability systems internally,” Logue said. “Some of this seems like the president is saying lines can be blurred, but I will do my best to make sure lines don’t get blurred. And while some of the tone seems to point to ‘enforcement at all costs,’ I have not seen an indication of that in Spokane.”
Spokane Police Department and city leaders faced intense scrutiny and loss of trust following the death of Otto Zehm, a 36-year-old man with a mental disability. In 2006, Zehm was inside a convenience store at a North Side gas station where he’d frequented to eat his dinners when he was confronted by Spokane Police Officer Karl Thompson Jr., who was responding to an erroneous report that Zehm stole money from the ATM where he cashed his checks. Zehm was beaten with a police baton, shocked with a stun gun and “hog-tied” with a medical mask strapped over his nose and mouth. He stopped breathing and died two days later. Thompson was found guilty in 2011 in federal court of excessive force and lying to investigators and sentenced to a stint in prison.
The city of Spokane agreed to modify police policies when the U.S. Department of Justice examined the department’s culture and other use of force incidents.
Also in the aftermath of the case, voters approved independent and investigative powers for the police ombudsman, according to previous reporting from The Spokesman-Review.
“The benefit of oversight is to be forward thinking, see the landscape and put in the safeguards to keep officers safe and free of liability, but also at the same time, protecting our community,” Logue said. “There is so much power and authority in policing, that checks and balances are important. That’s why there are levels of supervision to make sure officers are treating people appropriately.”
Cameron McEllhiney, the executive director of the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement, has worked in police oversight since 1998. Through her time, she’s seen many people who view oversight as an “us versus them” mentality. In reality, it makes for a better community as a whole when citizens are able to trust their police department because they know accountability exists – cities with high crime clearance rates also tend to have a community that is not afraid to speak to police when something concerns them, she said.
“In the world of oversight, it’s safer for law enforcement because you’re building trust in your community and the community is working with them. Better policing happens and officers are safer when they are working as one with the community, and there has to be trust for that to happen. If we take away the oversight and reforms, we are doing a disservice to the officers,” McEllhiney said. “Like how research says de-escalation practices make officers safer. When you take away those tools, officers are less safe. Spokane does have the oversight benefits of making policy recommendations, and having that type of oversight can make headway.”
At the national level, McEllhiney said the police oversight group is seeing federal workers who were involved in police oversight and consent decrees being fired or resigning. While local oversight still exists, she worries the anti-oversight sentiment will bleed to local agencies.
“The order has the possibility of cultivating a culture where misconduct can be seen as doing what’s necessary,” she said. “That is my fear.”
Overlooked details
Anne Levinson, a retired Washington judge who has spent 15 years advising local and state government on law enforcement policy, training and accountability, called the order “wrapped in a veneer of public safety but heavy on bluster.”
“It’s short on anything that will help everyday Americans that are doing their jobs in a constitutional manner,” Levinson said. “This is about performative virtue signaling and reflects lifelong disrespect for rule of law. It’s not about protecting people from harm. It’s to shield from accountability.”
A lot of the order is about messaging, Levinson said. Nothing in there feels enforceable. And because many of the subsections are directing efforts that already exist, “it’s taking away attention from real problems that could use this kind of attention,” she said.
The order intends to offer private pro bono attorneys for officers accused of misconduct. Trump has promised retaliation against law firms that don’t bow to his requests and has even issued orders against law firms he dislikes, but it’s unclear which law firms he would use to defend officers. It’s also unclear in the order how Trump would pick the accused officers his law firms would defend.
“He will pick and choose who gets the legal assistance based on his view. One can imagine he would direct the law firms that have capitulated to his demands that they must provide assistance for those who engage in excessive force,” Levinson said.
Typically, when officers are accused of misconduct, they are compensated by their employer if they are innocent. They also offered legal representation if they were acting as a police officer.
Other times, when officers face lawsuits, they are typically protected under “qualified immunity.” Qualified immunity protects an officer from litigation if it is established they believed they were acting reasonably at the time of the offense, even if it was a mistake.
Crimes against officers already are penalized significantly more than other crimes. Federal law has a wide range of punishments for those targeting law enforcement, and in some states crimes against peace officers have their own statutes.
In 2017, a Rathdrum, Idaho , man was sentenced to death for the murder of Coeur d’Alene Police Sgt. Greg Moore during a stop.
In another section, Trump directs the government to “increase the provision of excess military and national security assets in local jurisdictions to assist State and local law enforcement.”
It’s a sentence that Levinson believes may open the door down the road for martial law.
“We have seen in the past decade the militarization of police erodes public trust,” she said.
It’s part of the reason Spokane’s police department has moved to establish “dialogue officers” to facilitate protesters’ expression of their First Amendment rights to free speech – having officers in “riot gear” tends to create a barrier between protesters rather than a safe, interactive dialogue. If police communicate with people more often in an effective way, they will engage with officers as protest facilitators instead of protest suppressors. It’s why people may see officers walking around demonstrations in blue uniforms, according to previous reporting from The Spokesman-Review.
What’s addressed in Trump’s order isn’t black and white, Levinson said. Policing is subject to change, and oversight shouldn’t turn people against each other – it should make people want to work together.
“You can have terrific law enforcement and you can also have people that shouldn’t have a gun. You have to be able to address the latter while supporting the former,” Levinson said. “It doesn’t mean people working in law enforcement are bad. It means, how can we continue to do better?”
While Hall is adamant he doesn’t think the order will change policy, it’s still up in the air what federal officials will do with it. The order designates 60-90 days for its goals to be enforced. Logue says until he is presented with better information he will be sticking to his goals to better the city of Spokane.
“If there’s a new idea that makes sense where we can empower officers and also maintain the dignity of people they are interacting with, I am all about it. But if it doesn’t make sense, if it starts to infringe on people’s rights, it’s a problem. Constitutional policing protects people and protects officers,” Logue said. “But it also protects human rights. And human rights and dignity go beyond our Constitution. That’s what we care about – approaching people with dignity has to be the goal.”