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The Indiana Law Enforcement Academy’s new policy restricting chokeholds, instead of banning them, is a step backward but reflects an emerging consensus in law enforcement on limiting the use of chokeholds.
Following the 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Gov. Eric Holcomb commissioned a report to review state law enforcement curriculum and training. I was part of an African American organization that reached out to Indiana State Police Superintendent Doug Carter and the academy to express our concern about a statewide policy that might force a change in the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department’s ban on chokeholds in Indianapolis.
In a 2022 public interview on the potential implementation of a new statewide policy, Carter told the IndyStar, “There’s gonna be a lot of debate. There’s gonna be a lot of discussion. And we will be as transparent and as open about it as we can.”
If there was a debate, it did not happen within the Black community. If there was a discussion, I don’t know who was included. If there was any level of transparency, it is unclear to whom transparency was afforded.
The process used to determine how people are policed did not include civilians—including those who sought to engage on the issue in a constructive manner. Nevertheless, the policy reflects an emerging consensus in law enforcement even as serious concerns remain regarding implementation.
Paul Black in “Chokehold: Policing Black Men” quoted U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall in City of Los Angeles v. Lyons, a case involving a Black man who was choked by the Los Angeles Police Department in 1976. Marshall wrote that “chokeholds pose a high and unpredictable risk of serious injury or death. Chokeholds are intended to bring a subject under control by causing pain and rendering him unconscious.”
Following Floyd’s murder, The Washington Post reported that 32 of the nation’s 65 largest police departments banned or increased restrictions on the use of neck restraints.
According to the Los Angeles Times, both Democratic- and Republican-led states—including California, Illinois, Nevada, Oregon, Virginia, Washington, Iowa and Utah—have banned or restricted the use of chokeholds. Indiana was included on this list as providing restrictions.
It should be noted that the academy’s new policy, while not a ban, is similar to federal policy, which prohibits chokeholds unless deadly force is allowed by law. The compromise. IMPD’s policy was a ban.
Chokehold bans have been around for decades in large police departments across the country—and chokeholds have not stopped.
In fact, one of the most high-profile murders of a Black man by a police officer in a police department that had a ban was Eric Garner, whose last words were, “I can’t breathe,” as he was being choked by a New York City police officer.
NPR documented numerous instances in which a police department had a ban on chokeholds but had used them lethally, including on James Thompson in Chicago; Allen Simpson in Dallas; Dustin Boone in Las Vegas; Roger Owensby Jr. in Cincinnati; Carl Glen Wheat in Amarillo, Texas; Gerald Arthur in New Orleans; and Torris Harris in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
In Indiana, according to media reports, two Anderson officers were initially placed on paid leave for a choking incident two days after a ban was announced in 2020. Available media reports suggest that, while there was an effort to terminate at least one officer, an ultimate decision was delayed.
Police officers are not executioners. Chokeholds are dangerous and inconsistent with the implementation of justice, as they too often lead to death.
The academy’s policy is part of an emerging consensus on chokeholds in law enforcement but is a step backward.•
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Wolley is president and CEO of Black Onyx Management Inc. Send comments to ibjedit@ibj.com.
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