![]() ![]() But the overall ban on task-force members wearing body cams remains, as do issues of local oversight and control. The Justice Department “continues to have discussions with task force partners and representatives from local law enforcement organizations about best practices, including the use of body cameras and other issues, to ensure that law enforcement activity and task force operations are conducted lawfully and with the utmost professionalism,” a department spokeswoman, Nicole Navas Oxman, said in an email.įederal officials announced Monday that they are starting a pilot program that will allow a handful of cities to have their officers wear body cameras while working on a task force. Attorney for New Jersey, serving under both President Obama and President Trump. ![]() “If you want your cops to observe only your standards, you can’t assign them to the task force,” said Paul Fishman, who spent nine year as the U.S. “They become virtual James Bonds in our society,” he said in an interview.Īs a practical matter, federal officials say that task forces need one set of rules for all members to follow-and that the Constitution gives the feds the right to set those rules. Howard, the district attorney in Fulton County, which includes Atlanta. “Because of the way that this system has been created, is there a group of law enforcement officials who can essentially do whatever they want?” asked Paul L. California recently adopted a law stating that deadly force may be used only when “necessary.” Task-force members are also immune to civilian lawsuits in a way that regular officers are not. Marshals allow the use of deadly force if a person poses an “imminent danger,” using a definition that is less strict than that of many police departments. The problem, police officials say, is that local cops assigned to joint task forces are not bound by department rules, such as wearing body cameras, which the feds have prohibited. (Lynsey Weatherspoon for The Marshall Project)Īt least five cities, including Atlanta, have pulled out of task forces since 2017 and Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest, has threatened to follow. Jamarion, at left in red in a family photo the townhouse in suburban Atlanta where he died. Clockwise from top left: Monteria Robinson, Jamarion’s mother, filed a federal lawsuit against the law enforcement agencies involved in her son’s death. Their officers are deputized as federal agents, which among other things means that the Justice Department can shield them from litigation and local oversight. Local law enforcement agencies provide much of the manpower. Washington provides money, expertise and weaponry. The matter is now before a federal judge.Ĭlashes are erupting between local and federal officials over the hundreds of joint task forces that operate around the country, specializing in missions such as finding fugitives, fighting drug dealers or tracking potential terrorists. The Justice Department maintains it has jurisdiction over the incident and doesn’t have to give him most of the information he seeks. says, the federal government is blocking his investigation. But the local district attorney had questions: Why didn’t they take his schizophrenia into consideration when planning his arrest? Why didn’t they try to get him to surrender? Did Robinson shoot at the officers? Was his killing justified? Attorney’s office in Atlanta cleared the task force of wrongdoing. ![]() They shot Robinson 59 times, killing him. Armed with submachine guns and flash-bang grenades, task force members broke down the door to a friend’s duplex he was visiting. The task force treated him as a major threat. The Atlanta Police Department asked a special fugitive task force-staffed mostly by local cops but led by the U.S. The cops shot at him, missed, and hit a purple Nissan nearby.Ī few days later, abandoned clothes and papers in a vacant apartment pointed to a likely suspect: Jamarion Robinson, a 26-year-old former college football star with a recent history of psychotic episodes but no felony record. When officers responded that morning in July 2016, a “black man in a white T-shirt ” pulled a gun on them and fled, they reported. The police call was routine: a “suspicious person” was lurking at an apartment complex north of downtown. ![]()
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