The Senate Judiciary Committee gave unanimous approval Friday to a package of police reform legislation that includes a mandate for Vermont State Police to wear body cameras, along with measures aimed at banning the techniques used by a Minneapolis law enforcement officer to kill George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, last month.
The panel, consisting of four Democrats and one Republican, voted 5-0 in favor of two bills — S.219 and S.119 — that take up different pieces of the Senate’s legislative response to the killing of Floyd, and historical police violence against Black people.
“This is a continuation and not the end of the discussion in Vermont,” Committee Chair Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington, said Friday of the initial reform package.
The heftier bill, S.219, ties state grant funding for law enforcement agencies to compliance with race data collection, mandates body cameras be used by all police officers, defines and prohibits certain restraint techniques and creates a new crime for law enforcement who use restraint that results in death or serious bodily injury.
The other piece of legislation, S.119, now deals specifically with the state’s use of force policy, setting guidelines police officers must follow, stressing that law enforcement should use “proportional force,” if necessary and outlining when police are justified in the use of deadly force.
Sears said the decision to split the package into two pieces of legislation was made after speaking with Rep. Maxine Grad, D-Moretown, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee and wanted to ensure that the lower chamber is able to take swift action to ban specific police restraints, and then take more testimony on the general use-of-force policy proposal.
Sears added that it is his understanding that the House plans to work to pass S.219 by next Friday, before taking up S.119. “I believe that the leadership in the House and the Senate have agreed that they will work on that as the first priority,” he said.
The bodycam mandate in S.219, the priority bill, would require all law enforcement officers reporting to the Department of Public Safety to wear body cameras starting on Aug. 1. That includes the Vermont State Police, as well as “every Department law enforcement officer who exercises law enforcement powers.”
Sears said he had received assurance from Public Safety Commissioner Michael Schirling and State Police Director Col. Matthew Birmingham that purchases were underway, and he expected the Q1 budget bill to include spending on the devices. He said the ongoing cost of storing the video data would be discussed “as soon as possible.”
The judiciary chair added that he was hoping Vermont’s congressional delegation could help direct federal funding for local police departments to follow suit. Burlington, which has the state’s largest local force, is among the localities that already equip their officers with body cameras.
Birmingham had previously warned the Legislature that the ongoing cost of storing the videos could be high — pointing to a consultant’s report found storage costs could run from $1.2 million to $2.5 million annually. Sears said that Schirling and Birmingham informed him that those costs have gone down significantly due to increased demand and market competition.
Michael O’Neil, executive director of the Vermont Troopers’ Association, told VTDigger earlier this week that the union, which represents sergeants and troopers who work for the Vermont State Police, supported the body camera mandate.
The legislation package comes as protests around the country and in Vermont continue over the killing of Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer who pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds. Three other officers at the scene did not intervene.
The Senate had originally looked to explicitly ban police from using chokeholds, but decided to broaden the parameters of the prohibition to the use of “any maneuver” that applies pressure to “the neck, throat, windpipe, or carotid artery that may prevent or hinder breathing, reduce intake of air, or impede the flow of blood or oxygen to the brain.”
The proposal, which the full Senate is expected to approve Monday, also mandates that a police officer must intervene if they witness a fellow officer use an improper restraining technique. The bill also levels a penalty of up to 20 years of incarceration and a $50,000 fine for officers who use a prohibited restraint that causes death or serious bodily harm to an individual.
A provision was also added in response to testimony earlier this week from law enforcement, as well as concerns raised by Sen. Joe Benning, R-Caledonia, about the fine line between allowing police to use force to defend themselves, but not so that it allows for misconduct. The addition clarifies that the legislation does not restrict the current “justifiable homicide” statute, which ensures an individual can kill or wound a person legally under certain circumstances — including self defense.
Under the statute, civil officers, members of the military and “private soldiers” who lawfully are called on to suppress “riot or rebellion” are protected from homicide charges. All five committee members agreed that the justifiable homicide statute must be looked at but agreed that longer discussion is needed before any changes are made.
“To deal with that law, we need to update the language obviously,” Sears said. “One of the things we should look at in the future is that particular law regarding justifiable homicide and at least update it and also look at that piece regarding riots.”
Benning, the lone Republican on the committee, said he was happy with the compromise language and that the committee needs much more time if they are going to work on changing a law that has more than “40 years of jurisprudence” in Vermont.
“The statute does need to be updated, but if we hold up this bill to update that statute, I’m concerned that a) you’re not going to have a bill come out at all and on the other side of that we may possibly do something wrong because we don’t have the time to properly flesh that out,” Benning said.
On Thursday, the Senate passed its first law enforcement reform measure as an amendment to the first quarter budget for fiscal year 2021. The provision requires the state to develop feasibility plans for placing mental health experts in every police barrack.
Senate President Pro Tem Tim Ashe, D/P-Chittenden, has repeatedly said he wants the Senate to move quickly with a legislative response to the killing of Floyd and other Black and brown people by police.
However, in the past week stakeholders and advocates have appeared to be split over whether the upper chamber was moving too swiftly and not hearing from all the people it should.
Police unions have challenged aspects of the legislation, while the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont has said the proposal does not go far enough to address the need for body cameras or use of force. Several people of color who have testified have said they would prefer to see the judiciary committee take more time in order to accomplish more.
Wilda White, a Black woman who chairs the Vermont Mental Health Crisis Response Commission, said she understands the urgency behind moving a bill as a quick response to Floyd’s murder, but said the judiciary panel should continue to hear from community members as it crafts the legislation.
“I do not believe that this committee has engaged in the deep reflection, the careful thought and the broad public engagement that effective legislation in this domain requires,” White said.
Despite the opposition, Ashe has said he would like to see the House pass S.219 by Friday, June 26 — before the Legislature adjourns for a July recess.
