Policing Posts

Michele Bratcher Goodwin on Who Killed George Floyd

Michele Bratcher Goodwin of UC Irvine School of Law has published a three-part series on what we can learn from officer-involved killings. The articles look at police violence as symptomatic of broader social and cultural injustice, racism, and anti-Blackness, including in one of America’s most liberal communities.

U.S. Supreme Court Adds Two Cases on Native American Law and Issues Two Opinions Granting Police Officers Qualified Immunity

The Supreme Court on Monday morning added two new cases, both involving Native Americans, to its docket for this term. The justices also issued two unsigned decisions holding, without oral argument, that police officers are entitled to qualified immunity from lawsuits accusing them of using excessive force. The justices, however, did not act on several of the high-profile petitions that they considered at their private conference last week.

Washington Law Will Require Juveniles Speak to Attorneys First

Washington State law, House Bill 1140, requires that juveniles being questioned in connection to a crime must confer with an attorney before they can speak with, or are interviewed by, police. A column in the Yakima Herald delves into the topic and the countering viewpoints.

Actions Taken at the 2021 Annual Meeting (May Session)

The first segment of this year’s virtual Annual Meeting adjourned last week. Below is a summary of the actions taken on May 17 and 18. All approvals by the membership at the Annual Meeting are subject to the discussion at the Meeting and the usual editorial prerogative.

Supreme Court of New Mexico Cites Principles of the Law, Policing

In State v. Martinez, 478 P.3d 880 (N.M. 2020), the Supreme Court of New Mexico cited the Principles of the Law, Policing (T.D. No. 2, 2019), in abandoning the prevailing federal rule governing the admission of eyewitness-identification evidence, as articulated in Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98 (1977), in favor of adopting a new per se exclusionary rule for unnecessarily suggestive pretrial identification procedures, based on its determination that the New Mexico Constitution provided broader due-process protection in the context of eyewitness-identification evidence than the U.S. Constitution.