Every New York City police officer will be retrained in the use of force after the death of a Staten Island man when an officer subdued him with an apparent chokehold, the Wall Street Journal reports. The “top-to-bottom” retraining of nation’s largest police force, with 35,000 officers, is an undertaking that could take years, said Commissioner William Bratton. The retraining will largely be modeled after that of the Los Angeles Police Department, which changed its practices after police-brutality incidents.
Thursday’s death of Eric Garner, 43, raised new questions from elected officials and civil-rights leaders about police brutality. The NYPD prohibits the use of chokeholds. “As I have reviewed that incident and reviewed the training of the department, it is my belief that we are going to have to do more than just a review of Staten Island,” Bratton said. Patrick Lynch, president of the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, said the police union is “always in favor of training that make us better at our job. But what we really need training for is what we aren’t allowed to do and what will get us in trouble. We need training in how to deal with someone who won’t comply.”