Sacramento council members want to align police use-of-force policy with new state law
Two Sacramento City Council members are proposing the Sacramento Police Department immediately update its use-of-force policy to align with a new statewide standard ahead of the January deadline.
Councilman Larry Carr and Councilwoman Angelique Ashby want the council on Tuesday to vote to update the department policy to change the deadly force standard from “reasonable” to “necessary” based on the totality of circumstances a police officer faces in certain situations.
That language will reflect the new state law passed last year, Assembly Bill 392, often touted as the “Stephon Clark law,” in reference to the 22-year-old man killed by Sacramento police in 2018 when officers mistook his cellphone for a gun.
The department’s current policy reads: “An officer shall only use the amount of force that the officer reasonably believes is necessary under the totality of the circumstances.”
It’s unclear exactly what language in the use-of-force policy will be changed. The 17-page policy includes the word “reasonably” or “reasonable” 57 times.
State law requires local law enforcement agencies to rewrite their rules by Jan. 1.
Amid national protests against police brutality sparked by the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, activists have been asking for the council to update the use-of-force policy.
While addressing a crowd of peaceful protesters in downtown June 1, Stevante Clark, Stephon Clark’s brother, blasted the city for not yet updating its policy to reflect state law.
“Stephon Clark Law is implemented, but Sacramento hasn’t even put it in its department,” Stevante Clark said to the crowd. “How sad is that? The city that killed my brother does not have the policy that changes the force (standard) from reasonable to necessary implemented within their own department.”
In March 2019, the Sacramento Community Police Review Commission recommended the council update its use-of-force policy to only allow deadly force as a last resort, modeled after San Francisco, among other recommendations. That would have gone further than the new statewide standard, which the law allows cities to do.
Carr said he and Ashby’s proposal did not go that far because he believes all departments across the state should have uniform language.
“Everyone in California should have the same standard,” Carr said during a virtual news conference Thursday. “It eliminates a whole bunch of confusion by having just one standard.”
The proposal from Carr and Ashby also includes a city ordinance banning the carotid neck restraint. The carotid was removed from the department’s use-of-force policy earlier this month after Gov. Gavin Newsom removed the technique from statewide police training and endorsed a bill that would ban it statewide. A city-level change would prevent future chiefs from restoring it as an acceptable use-of-force tactic, Carr said. The department is investigating an officer who placed a teen in a neck restraint that could have been the carotid early on June 1.
The proposal going to council would also ban no-knock warrants for drugs, like the one used when police killed Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky. Sacramento police rarely use that tactic, as it requires a judge’s approval, but the proposal would ban it entirely, Ashby said.
“No-knock raid warrants for drugs often have collateral damage and collateral damage is a woman or a woman with children,” Ashby said.
In addition, the proposal would require officers to undergo increased training, including “do no harm” and deescalation training, which Police Chief Daniel Hahn and other Black police chiefs called for last week.
Black community leaders and activists are urging the City Council to “defund the police” by removing a portion from the police department’s all-time-high $157 million budget immediately and shifting it to youth and services that uplift disadvantaged communities.
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg has proposed the city hire a city inspector general position for police oversight and also overhaul the 911 system so non-police trained professionals would respond to non-criminal calls. The 911 overhaul would result in at least $10 million being shifted away from the police department over the course of two years, Steinberg has said.
The council plans to discuss those proposals at a meeting July 1, his office has said.
Other proposals could be discussed at that date too, including a proposal from City Councilman Allen Warren that would require officers to hand out “how’s my policing” cards to gather feedback and increase transparency.
“This approach offers residents an opportunity to provide positive or negative feedback about a police officer’s performance,” Warren said in a news release last week. “This kind of feedback could be useful in determining who should or who should not stay on the force as well as who should or should not be promoted.”
This story was originally published June 25, 2020 at 2:10 PM.
