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The problem

Police misconduct is a persistent and corrosive problem in the United States. Officers violate communities repeatedly and with impunity. On the rare occasion officers are fired for misconduct, twenty percent are rehired by another agency in the same state within three years.^[1]   

The extent of the problem is unknown, since departments can shield access to their data, making it impossible to evaluate their current accountability mechanisms. The public is limited or prevented from accessing police disciplinary files in 36 states.^[2] Even the most serious types of misconduct, like police killings, have been shown to be underreported by over 50%.^[3] 

The Full Disclosure Project is changing this. By helping the public track misconduct from a multitude of sources, we prevent further harms in the courtroom and inject accountability to the system.

Our Solution

Build.

We build open-source technology to track police misconduct. Our products aggregate and analyze data from alternative sources - like civil rights lawsuits, news articles, and community members - to fill critical gaps in official data sets.

Empower.

We empower local actors with our technology and training to defend their community against police abuse because change happens at the local level.

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Advocate.

We advocate for police transparency and accountability in coalition with our partners - through advocacy, litigation, and policy reform - contributing expertise on police practices and the insights we glean from our data.

Our Resources

Start tracking police misconduct today

• Tools to get started finding and storing data
• Known police accountability databases

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Contact Us

• fulldisclosure@nacdl.org, General inquiries
• Julie Ciccolini, Project Director
• Margaret Ringler, Project Coordinator
• Tristan Chambers, Senior Developer
   

Footnotes 

1. Rappaport, Ben Grunwald & John. “The Wandering Officer.” 129 Yale L. J. 1676 (Apr. 2020) www.yalelawjournal.org/article/the-wandering-officer. [^^] 
2. Cox, Kallie, and William Freivogel. “Police Misconduct Records Secret, Difficult to Access.” AP News, 12 May 2021, apnews.com/article/us-news-police-reform-police-government-and-politics-fa6cbd7e017b85aa715e23465a90abbe. [^^] 
3. The Lancet, 2021. Fatal police violence by race and state in the USA, 1980–2019: a network meta-regression. 398(10307), pp.1239-1255 [^^]