Bill setting stricter standard for deadly police force heads to California governor
California lawmakers have sent Gov. Gavin Newsom a measure setting new standards for when police can use deadly force. It would allow police to use deadly force only when it is "necessary" to defend against an imminent threat of death or serious injury to officers or bystanders.
The current standard lets officers open fire if they have "reasonable" fear they or others are in imminent danger, a threshold that makes it rare for officers to be charged following a shooting and rarer still for them to be convicted.
Senators approved the measure Monday on a 34-3 vote. It previously cleared the Assembly 67-0.
The legislation was prompted by public anger over killings by police, including the shooting of unarmed vandalism suspect Stephon Clark. Two Sacramento officers were cleared in the March 2018 death of the 22-year-old Clark, who was killed in his grandparents' backyard when police mistook a cellphone he was holding for a gun.
Supporters say the legislation, if signed, will impose some of the nation's most sweeping rules when combined with a related measure on officer training. The Democratic governor, who said in May the bill would "help restore community trust in our criminal justice system," is expected to sign the measure, reports the Sacramento Bee.
Families of those killed by police hailed the lawmakers' approval. Ciara Hamilton, whose cousin Diante Yarber was shot and killed by Barstow police, said she believes having such a law on the books could have saved Yarber's life.
The 26-year-old Yarber was killed when officers fired 30 rounds into the car he was driving in April 2018, sparking protests. San Bernardino County prosecutors last year declined to charge four officers who opened fire, saying they reasonably believed Yarber posed a potential deadly threat when he struck patrol cars and clipped one of the officers with the vehicle, reports the Los Angeles Times.
"Police officers should always do everything in their power to preserve life," Hamilton said in a statement released by the ACLU of Northern California. "I shouldn't have to fear for my life because police officers mistake my phone for a gun or shoot into a vehicle that I'm in because of the color of my skin."
Major state and local law enforcement organizations dropped their opposition to the bill following amendments in May. An amended version of the bill rolled back a provision to hold officers criminally liable if they did not meet the standard, reports the Sacramento Bee.
Amendments also strip out a specific requirement that officers try to de-escalate confrontations before using deadly force but allow the courts to consider officers' actions leading up to fatal shootings, said Peter Bibring, police practices director for the American Civil Liberties Union of California, which proposed the bill and negotiated the changes.
"The courts can still consider whether officers needlessly escalated a situation or failed to use de-escalation tactics that could have avoided a shooting," Bibring told the Associated Press in May.
Law enforcement organizations are backing a related Senate measure that would require that every officer be trained in ways to avoid opening fire.