Philadelphia Agrees to Police Reforms

Philadelphia settled a federal lawsuit filed by the NAACP and the ACLU in the wake of a police corruption scandal, agreeing to sweeping reforms to make the department more vigilant and increase its accountability. The settlement, hammered out in eight months of negotiations, sets into motion “by far the most ambitious anti-corruption program ever undertaken by this police department in its history,” Mayor Edward Rendell said. It includes the creation of a watchdog officer charged with monitoring most aspects of the internal affairs and ethics accountability divisions, increased supervision of narcotics squads, increased training for officers to report corruption and the appointment of a 15-member police corruption task force. Since last year, 10 current and former officers were charged with corruption.