Lamont signs ‘long overdue’ police accountability bill into law

Gov. Ned Lamont has signed into law legislation that is designed to increase police accountability.

The legislation ”“ House Bill 6004, “An Act Concerning Police Accountability” ”“ was passed by the state House of Representatives 86-58, and by the Senate 21-15.

Among its provisions, the law:

• Creates changes in the membership of the Police Officer Standards and Training Council (POST), which provides certifications and trainings to police officers in Connecticut. POST will be reconstituted to include persons impacted by the judicial system and towns of various sizes.
• Requires POST to issue an annual report on police departments’ efforts to recruit minority officers, and it will develop new crowd control policies, require implicit bias training, and ensure that police disciplinary records are subject to Freedom of Information Act requests.
• Requires uniformed police officers to have their names and badge numbers readily visible on all outer garments.
• Allows cities and towns to create civilian review boards, which will have subpoena power through their local legislative bodies (i.e. board of selectmen).
• Makes body and dashboard cameras mandatory for any officer interacting with the public.
• Bans chokeholds, strangleholds and other tactics restraining oxygen and blood flow, with officers having whistleblower protections to report excessive use of force.
• Creates a new Independent Office of the Inspector General to conduct use of force investigations.

“These reforms are focused on bringing real change to end the systemic discrimination that exists in our criminal justice and policing systems that have impacted minority communities for far too long,” Lamont said.

Saying the new policies are “focused on providing additional safeguards to protect peoples”™ lives and make our communities stronger,” Lamont added, “Our nation and our state has been having a conversation on this topic for decades, and these reforms are long overdue.”