by Lynne Wilson

About the author: Lynne Wilson, an attorney in Seattle, writes frequently about police accountability issues.

“I had been in internal affairs investigations a couple of times, and they were very easy to breeze through. I answered a few questions. I lied through every answer, and I went back to patrol.” —Former New York City police officer Michael Dowd

On August 21, 1994, Moises DeJesus was arrested by police officers patroling Philadelphia’s largely Latino 25th District. Handcuffed in the back of a patrol car, the 30-year-old suspect had a “mental fit or seizure,” said Gerard McCabe, an attorney for Philadelphia’s newly formed Police Advisory Commission (PAC), “and started kicking out the windows to get air.” He was then allegedly beaten in the head by the...