When a homeless man questioned the Phoenix police authority to stop him in February 2020, an officer grabbed him and knelt on his neck while another officer surprised him with a taser. Another unnoticed man said the officers threw their belongings, saying: “You are garbage and this is garbage.” Other experimental homeless people were summoned and arrested by the city officers duration of the first hours of the morning for “conduct that is not clearly a crime.”
Those were among the abuses alleged by the Department of Justice last June, after an investigation of almost three years on the city of Phoenix and his police department. The investigation marked the first time that the Department of Justice found a pattern of violations against homeless people, including officers and other city employees, illegally threw their belongings.
In addition, DOJ researchers found that disproportionate officers cited and arrested people who experience homeless. They included 37% of all sentences of the Phoenix Police Department from 2016 to 2022, thought that homeless people represent less than 1% of the population. The researchers said that many of those stops, appointments and judgments were unconstitutional.
The extensive investigation also found that the officers used excessive force, discriminated against people of color, they retaliate against protesters and violated the rights of people with behavioral health disabilities similar to the elevators of which the interntions of the intercent are found.
But federal officials announced Wednesday that they had abandoned efforts to force the city and the police to address these problems. The Department of Justice closed its investigations and findings withdrawn of constitutional violations in Phoenix and five other jurisdictions, including Trenton, New Jersey. Beyond that, the Department of Justice said it was dismissing the demands of the Biden era against several other police departments, even in Louisville, Kentucky and Minneapolis, where the police murdered George Floyd five years ago.
The Doj Said Requireing the Cities to Enter Consent Decree, which are intended to reure reforms are enacted, Would have “Impaed Years of Microm Management or local Police Departments by federal couts and expense independent, and potentialy, Hundens of depends or dependents, Hundens of depends of depends of depends of depends of depends, hol Hundendars, Holtedialy, Holtedialy, Holtedistyly, Holtedialy, Holtedialy, Holtedisyalyy, Holdialy, Hundens of Depends or Dappers, Hundens depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends or depends on which it depends or depends or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on or depends on Do it.
The city of Phoenix said in a statement that it has focused tirelessly improving policies, training and responsibility measures to guarantee the best public security for all those who live, work and play in Phoenix. “In recent years, the city has promulgated changes in policies, including employee training and the implementation of used cameras.
Legal experts told Propublic that the Department of Justice Department discovered in Phoenix should be corrected, they even thought that city officials will be under less pressure to act.
“It is a real pity and a bad service for the residents of these communities to put an end to work, withdraw and relax the investigations and intend to retract the findings,” said Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University and former Deporeney or Justice or Justice.
The retraction of the report, together with the decision of the Supreme Court last year, allowing cities to judge and quote people to sleep outside, even when they have nowhere to go, it could be further emboldened to cities and police departments to marginalize the committee of homeless people for civil rights according to the law, a legal defense group that focuses on racial justice problems. “They will feel that they have a license to make the sweeps and to make life in public vision feel uncomfortable for people not made,” he said.
In fact, last week, the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, urged all local governments in that state to “use their authority affirmed by the United States Supreme Court” to address the camps.
After the Department of Justice began the investigation of Phoenix in August 2021, Fund For Empoderment, a Arizona defense group for homeless people, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona sued the city and the Police Department to stop what the lawyers called people. His demand accused the city of not providing homes and, instead, resorting to camp moving to eliminate sidewalks and other areas. “The city has made clear its message to the unesa people: participating in the dream and other essential life activities in the public motifs of the city will lead to the one of convention, the judgment, the displacement and the loss of the personal effects of the individual”, the fund for Empower.
Almost a month later, a judge issued a court order preventing the city from imposing its prohibition of camping against people who cannot find refuge, as well as grabbing and throwing people’s belongings. Demand is ongoing.
The DOJ report in June 2024 declared that even after the court order and the new policies of the city, city officials continued to judge people for camping and destroy the belongings of people without prior notice or the opportunity to claim them.
Propublic, as part of his research on the management of the management of the cities of the possessions of the homeless, discovered that Phoenix rarely stored seized properties of the camps. May 2023 to 2024, the city responded to 4,900 reports from the public involving camps, according to their records. The city said that the workers, trained to evaluate which items are properties and what are garbage, elements were found that could be stored in just 405 of the places it visited. Not all these belongings require storage because people may have eliminated a topic between a camp report and the arrival of the city. The city stored belongings 69 times.
In January 2024, the city issued its own report in anticipation of the accusations of the Department of Justice. The city said it found nothing to support accusations that the police “interfere with the possessions of people who experienced the lack of housing.” Phoenix officials also said in the report that Althegh’s department “welcomed additional ideas” of the Department of Justice, were not willing to be submitted to a consent decree, a binding plan in which a designated monitor supervises the implementation of reforms.
The lawyers and defenders said that the DOJ decision is not related to the demands filed by the private lawyer who alleges civil rights violations, including people who do not have a home. ACLU also launches an effort of seven states to submit records for records to hold the police departments, said.
Elizabeth Venible, main community organizer of the Empowerment Fund, who also helped the Department of Justice to connect with the community discouraged in Phoenix, said she saw federal findings as a victory for non -vegetable people. Despite the retraction of the United States attorney general, Pam Bondi said Venable, the report still has weight.
“No matter what Pam Bondi says, people will not forget, especially the people who learned about something for what they horrified,” he said.
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