A coalition of African American, Native American, and Latino families who have lost loved ones to police violence has filed an initiative with the State of Washington to change the state law on deadly force and make it easier to prosecute police officers who kill.
State law currently requires prosecutors to make a two-pronged argument if they are going to prosecute cops for killing someone: They must show that the officer acted “with malice and without a good faith belief.” The law, passed in 1986, is one of the most restrictive in the nation.
The initiative would strike this so-called “state of mind language” from the statute, language that makes the justness of a killing hinge on how a police officer thinks and feels at the time. The remaining language in the law centers on whether a police homicide can objectively be considered “reasonable” in light of threats to the safety of the officer or the public…