Is the FBI’s Use-of-Force Database About to Shut Down?

According to the Government Accountability Office, the failure of police and federal agencies to send their data to the FBI’s National Use-of-Force Data Collection program has put it in jeopardy of being shut down next year without ever releasing a single statistic, reports the Washington Post. The program was required to obtain data representing 60 percent of law enforcement officers, to meet a standard of quality set by the Office of Management and Budget, or else stop the effort by the end of 2022. So far this year, the data represents 57 percent of all officers. The Justice Department said in its response to the report that “the FBI believes the agreed-upon thresholds will be met to allow the data collection to continue, and is taking steps to increase participation in data collection efforts.”

Bill Brooks, chief of the Norwood, MA police and a member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police board of directors, said a key problem is that many agencies that have no force incidents are failing to input “zero reports” each month, so the agency is counted as not participating. As of Sept. 30, 2021, 81 percent of federal officers were represented in the data, even though only 43 of 114 federal agencies, or about 38 percent, had participated by then, according to the FBI’s website. Two of the largest federal agencies, the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have been sending in data this year, but the Justice Department’s largest agency, the Bureau of Prisons, had not.