Community Justice and Change: Residents’ Perceptions of Baltimore Police Reforms

• In Event: Responses to Human Rights Abuses: Democracies, Marginalized Groups, and Justice

Abstract

In 2017, following the death of Freddie Gray and the U.S. Department of Justice report on unconstitutional policing within the Baltimore Police Department (BPD), the City of Baltimore entered into a Consent Decree - a court enforceable agreement that establishes an actionable plan for sustainable reform. One aspect of the Consent Decree lays out requirements for improving relationships between the community and the BPD. In order to identify necessary police reforms, the National Police Foundation partnered with Loyola University Maryland and No Boundaries Coalition to conduct a series of formal and informal focus groups with some of the most vulnerable and marginalized residents in Baltimore to ask them what a community policing and engagement strategy from BPD should include. Information from these focus groups was used to develop a report for the BPD. The BPD will use the report to inform its new community policing and engagement strategy it submits to the court. This paper is presented by one of the lead investigators on this project. The paper will examine theories of institutional reform and the extent to which they can help us to understand local justice processes that are dictated by the parameters of a consent decree on police reform.

Author

• Moira K. Lynch, University of Wisconsin - River Falls