New Orleans, US Justice Department move to end police department’s consent decree

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — New Orleans and the U.S. Department of Justice filed a motion Friday in federal court to take steps to end long-standing federal oversight of the city’s police department.

The city and the federal government had agreed to a reform pact for the New Orleans Police Department known as a consent decree in 2013, two years after a Department of Justice investigation found evidence of racial bias and misconduct from the city’s police.

If U.S. District Judge Susie Morgan of the Eastern District of Louisiana approves the motion, the city and its police department will have two more years under federal oversight to show they are complying with reform measures enacted during the consent decree before it is lifted.

“Today’s filing recognizes the significant progress the City of New Orleans and the New Orleans Police Department have made to ensure constitutional and fair policing,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division in a statement.

Morgan said in a statement that she plans to hold a public hearing within the next 45 days to allow members of the community to weigh in on whether they think the city and its police department should be allowed to wind down federal oversight.

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