A day after the U.S. Justice Department announced plans to launch an investigation into whether Chicago police violated the law or the U.S. Constitution in its policing, Professor Steven Rushin discussed on WBEZ 91.5 Chicago what happens when the Department of Justice investigates a police department for misconduct.
The federal probe comes after police released the October 2014 video of Officer Jason Van Dyke fatally shooting Laquan McDonald.
“Typically, what happens is the Justice Department will spend anywhere from a few months to over a year investigating the police department,” Rushin said. “They will likely do interviews with officers. They will do interviews with community groups. They’ll scour CPD records and data. They will do everything possible to figure out whether or not in their professional judgment the CPD is involved in a pattern or practice of unconstitutional misconduct of any type,” he said.
For more, listen to WBEZ’s Morning Shift.
For more, read “Expert: Justice Department Reforms Could Be Expensive for CPD, but Worth the Cost.“