Forthcoming, 59 Howard Law Journal (2016).
Several highly publicized encounters between police officers and African
Americans have exposed patterns of police-initiated violence and,
often, deeply racist law enforcement. With each new encounter, citizens
and politicians are left wondering how to heal the rifts between
minority groups on the one hand, and local communities and law
enforcement on the other hand. The two most common solutions involve
awarding large sums to the victims or their families via the tort
system, or having the Department of Justice launch one of its rare
investigations into local police practices. Neither of these solutions
recognizes that racially motivated police brutality fundamentally harms
the dignity of targeted individuals and groups. I draw on existing
American and international practices of community involvement and
dignity restoration to offer new remedies that recognize the growing
legal salience of “dignity” and which can better redress harms caused by
police misconduct.
