KKK in the PD: White Supremacist Police and What to Do About It

Authors

• Vida B. Johnson, Georgetown Law

First Page

205

Abstract

There is an epidemic of white supremacists in police departments. Police officers have been identified as members of white supremacist groups in Florida, Alabama and Louisiana. There have been scandals in over 100 different police departments, in over forty different states, in which individual police officers have sent overtly racist emails, texts, or made racist comments via social media. This is a nation-wide problem. It is one that is not limited to just beat officers; some of these shocking occurrences have even involved high-ranking members of their respective police forces. Although the F.B.I. warned of white supremacists infiltrating police departments in 2006, the denial of the problem has only enabled it to continue seemingly unabated.

While there have been some moderate successes in criminal justice reform in the last decade, the existence of white supremacists in police departments hamper that success. Frequent incidents of overt police racism, and the ensuing media reports about them, make the general public, and particularly people of color, less likely to see racism at the hands of the police and criminal justice system as unconscious and more likely to view it as purposeful. These legitimate fears further diminish the criminal justice system in the eyes of the people to whom it is most harsh.

As tensions mount between communities of color and police, public opinion of police is low. A third of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of police. The number is even higher among African Americans: 60% have an unfavorable view of law enforcement. This dispiriting relationship threatens the reputation of the criminal justice system, the physical safety of certain communities and the very fabric of our country. Without swift action by state and federal law enforcement, things will only get worse. The problem cannot be overstated. So far, however, this problem has not attracted many solutions.

One tool that could be employed to address the problem is a more expansive enforcement of the Brady doctrine. Prosecutors could be required to seek out information about police officers and disclose that information to the defense when they learn that an officer holds these biases. The Supreme Court has long held that the government must disclose any information that is favorable to the defense. There is no doubt that membership in a hate group or ascribing to racist beliefs would be fodder for cross-examination of an officer and useful to the defense. The Supreme Court has established that the government cannot avoid knowing information that is favorable to the defense. And police departments are considered the government for Brady purposes.

The Supreme Court has never ruled on the issue of whether membership by a government witness in a hate group would be Brady material. Some courts have already found that evidence of racial animus should be disclosed to the defense by the government. By taking Brady seriously and searching for racist police officers, indigent criminal defendants will get fairer trials, the public will be informed of problem officers through public trials, and police and prosecutors get the opportunity to identify problematic police officers and take action to rid the force of these officers.

Recommended Citation

Vida B. Johnson, KKK in the PD: White Supremacist Police and What to Do About It, 23 Lewis & Clark L. Rev. 205 (2019).
Available at: https://lawcommons.lclark.edu/lclr/vol23/iss1/3