US: Ferguson should use list of problem cops

Associated Press

DALLAS

In the wake of Michael Brown’s death, the federal government wants to require the Ferguson Police Department to check all new hires against a database of officers who have been stripped of their law enforcement licenses for misconduct.

The mandate to consult the National Decertification Index received little notice in the government’s proposed agreement to reform the police and court systems in the St. Louis suburb. But the measure’s inclusion suggests to some observers that federal authorities could be seeking to put the index into wider use after years of resisting the idea.