PJLC Expands to Include Police Misconduct Project

With the addition of Ameena Qazi as the PJLC’s second staff attorney, the PJLC is expanding to add a focus on police accountability in Orange County.

Orange County has an unmet need for community lawyering focused on routine police misconduct such as unreasonably long street-corner detentions, excessive force during an arrest that does not result in serious injury, and property damage from unnecessarily aggressive home searches. Orange County’s civil rights bar lacks the capacity and tools to focus on routine police misconduct and the county’s criminal justice advocacy groups generally lack staff attorneys to leverage the courts to address this kind of police misconduct. The result is an unmet need for a police accountability program housed in a public interest law firm like the PJLC that will offer pro bono legal services to address the kinds of police misconduct that doesn’t typically result in lawsuits.

The PJLC is planning a Police Misconduct Project that will 1) partner with community-based organizations to host police accountability legal clinics and setup an in-house infrastructure for intakes, 2) support community-based Cop Watch programs and policy reform campaigns, 3) use lawsuits under the CA Public Records Act to make police practices public, and 4) file § 1983 and other claims to leverage the power of the courts to address police misconduct.

Through partnerships with community groups and by leveraging the courts, the PJLC hopes this program will reduce state violence, increase public safety, and make policing in Orange County more equitable.