Proposed House Bill Would Mandate Federal Database of Settlements Over Alleged Officer Misconduct

Proposed legislation in the House of Representatives from Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) would require that law enforcement agencies report the cost of settlements over alleged "police misconduct," list the officer or officers involved, and detail any disciplinary action taken.

The "Cost of Police Misconduct Act" mandates that the information would be maintained on a federal online database managed by the Attorney General's office.

“The whole notion is you can’t manage what you don’t measure,” Beyer told Vox . “So we thought, let’s measure this. And by simply measuring it, we will probably change it a great deal.”

State and local governments that fail to comply would face a penalty: Losing up to 10% of their federal policing funding. That money would be redistributed to state and local governments that did cooperate to use for criminal justice related work.

The bill is unlikely to move forward anytime soon. Presently, it has not even been assigned a legislation number.