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The draft of a new policy barring discrimination by Cleveland police officers is available for public review.
The bias-free policing policy prohibits officers from stopping or arresting people based on their race, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, among other attributes. But if police are looking for a suspect, they may still take those characteristics into account if they’re part of a credible and specific description.
Officers are also not allowed to use derogatory language.
Greg White, who oversees Cleveland’s compliance with the Justice Department police reform agreement, said the consent decree monitoring team and the city will be gathering feedback from the public and from police.
“We’re also going to get it out to the division members,” White said. “We have forwarded it to the Community Police Commission, who certainly has a large role in soliciting and providing feedback on this policy.”
He said the city plans to submit a final policy in October or the beginning of November.
Read the full policy below:
