After two years of high profile officer-involved shootings, the Anchorage Police Department has made their use-of-force policy public. Police Chief Mark Mew made the announcement last night, (Thursday 2/13) during a community forum at Clark Middle School in the Mountain View Neighborhood.
"The more we dug into it, the more we worked with community groups, the more we started asking ourselves, instead of always trying to explain a policy that we don't show people, why don't we just show people the policy."
In 2013, Mayor Dan Sullivan directed the Anchorage Community Police Relations Task Force to review APD's use of force policy after an increasing number of officer involved shootings. Reverend, Doctor William Green is the chair of the task force. He says releasing the policy is a step in the right direction.
"That's good. I mean the public should know about what's going on in the police department. It's not top secret."
The task force made seven recommendations, including making the policy public. There have been ten officer-involved shootings in Anchorage over past two years.The use of force policy, along with the entire 600-page APD policy manual is now available on the department's web site.