Friday, July 7, 2017

Is the UCMJ a suitable model for dealing with police killings?

Prof. Ronnie Dunn
Professor Ronnie Dunn of Cleveland State University tosses out the following idea in this interview:
And my mind keeps turning to the military, for example. I'm a veteran. And the military is held to the standards of the uniform code of military justice. So my thought is, in that the police are a paramilitary institution, that we might need to -- and this is totally thinking out of the box -- move to some type of judicial system or tribunal in regards to police-involved shootings, these controversial police-involved shootings. These cases are tried in a separate court, for example. Currently, many jurisdictions have drug courts, they have special dockets for veterans and other things of that nature. So I'm just trying to think of how we might be able to move to a system that can provide a greater degree of accountability and justice.
It's not clear whether he is suggesting a system of internal criminal discipline à la the UCMJ or a separate part of the civilian courts with special jurisdiction over charges arising from police killings. Is either a good idea? Or neither?

1 comment:

  1. "a greater degree of accountability and justice"

    Meaning convictions, of course.

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