DOJ Halts Ongoing Review of Milwaukee Police Department

A federal review of the Milwaukee Police Department has been halted with the retooling of a program once focused on improving trust between police and communities. The program's focus has been shifted to providing training.

A federal review of the Milwaukee Police Department has been halted with the retooling of a program once focused on improving trust between police and communities, reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The move effectively ends the U.S. Department of Justice's collaborative reform initiative as it has existed since 2011. The program's focus has been shifted to providing training on active shooters, dismantling gangs and other criminal investigations.

Cities such as Milwaukee, which are currently under review, will be moved into the new version of the program, a department spokeswoman said Saturday.

As a result, those agencies will not get federal help to boost accountability or to implement reforms, as they would have under the old version of the program.

Instead, they will receive assistance with policing tactics to reduce crime.

As the collaborative reform process — requested by Chief Edward Flynn in the wake of a fatal police shooting — lingered in limbo with the change of the presidential administration, Milwaukee officials expected as much. They made that clear Thursday while discussing a draft of the federal review obtained and published by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in August.

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