Community organizations condemn racist policing amidst New Orleans police efforts to exit federal oversight

New Orleans, LA – On Tuesday, October 1, New Orleans for Community Oversight of Police (NOCOP) held a press conference outside of Hale Boggs Federal Building. This is the same site where federal Judge Susie Morgan will decide if the New Orleans Police Department is fit to go into a consent decree “sustainment period,” which would mark the beginning of the end of the federal oversight for police.

NOCOP and endorsing organizations demanded an end to racist and biased policing, an end to corrupt conflicts of interest, for the involvement and implementation of public input, and for Judge Morgan to rule against NOPD sustainment.

“We are dealing with higher rates of force against Black civilians than when this decree was put in place – this disparity is due to NOPD racism, not Black criminality. Racist policing is not sustainable,” said Toni Jones, chair of NOCOP. Jones spoke on the legacy of NOPD’s relationship to the consent decree, which was put in place in 2013 when an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice found the department guilty of unconstitutional policing. Jones added, “Over a decade later, we still are plagued with police who prey on the community, corruption and extreme discrimination against Black New Orleanians.”

There are also conflicts of interest within the consent decree monitoring process. Edith Romero, a speaker from Eyes On Surveillance, mentioned said, “When taking a closer look at the officials directly involved in assuring that NOPD is in compliance with the consent decree, it is evident that there’s an extreme conflict of interest at play here. In short, the deputy federal monitor, David Douglass, is in direct violation of the consent decree by employing former NOPD leadership for his consulting company called Effective Law Enforcement For All, or ELEFA.”

Romero continued, “ELEFA is currently working with the city of Minneapolis who are now under a consent decree of their own after George Floyd’s murder. Thus, the success of the NOPD at this time is being used as a selling point for ELEFA to other cities across the country. ELEFA’s success in getting the Minneapolis contractors is directly tied to the claims that the New Orleans consent decree has been successful. How can the Consent Decree be successful when use of force is escalating and targeting our Black community?”

NOCOP intends to rally outside of the next Consent Decree hearing to demand that Judge Susie Morgan rule against the motion to enter into a sustainment period. The organization calls on the people to stand with them.

The date of the next consent decree has not been made public yet, but it will be sometime in the next 60 days. In the meantime, the public is encouraged to submit comments and questions to the court before October 25 via email to Clerk@laed.uscourts.gov or addressed to Clerk of Court, U.S. District Court, EDLA, 500 Poydras St., Room C-151, New Orleans, LA 70130.

The press conference was endorsed by local community organizations Eyes on Surveillance, New Orleans Stop Helping Israel’s Ports, Tulane and Loyola University chapters of Students for a Democratic Society, and Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

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