Black and Blue on Bourbon Street: A Mid-Consent Decree Analysis of New Orleans Residents’ Confidence and Trust in The New Orleans Police Department

Abstract

In July, 2012, the City of New Orleans, the New Orleans Police Department, and the United States Department of Justice entered into the nation’s most expansive consent decree settlement with the objective of ensuring that police services were delivered to the people of New Orleans in a manner that complies with the constitution and the laws of the United States. Yet eight years later, the NOPD remains under strict monitoring of the federal government, continuously pushing off its original 2016 completion deadline. The New Orleans community has been and remains a vital stakeholder in the implementation and success of the NOPD consent decree. Therefore, through an evaluation of how current attitudes towards the NOPD range, specifically across residents of color, this Senior Thesis explored the impact that the consent decree has had on the dynamics between the NOPD and New Orleans residential community, and whether that impact forecasts success regarding the current direction of the consent decree’s reforms. Through a multi-regression analysis, this study explored whether the differences between how residents of color and White residents currently perceive the community’s relationship with the NOPD are statistically significant or due to chance. This study’s findings determined that among New Orleans residents of color, more often than not, individuals trust the police at an equivalent if not comparable level to that of White residents. However, when residents of color did significantly express differences in trust in the NOPD, issues of reliability, faith in the NOPD’s honesty, and concerns over the NOPD’s use of force arose especially among Latino/Hispanic and Black residents. This study therefore concluded that even if the New Orleans consent decree is successful in reforming and improving the patterns and practices of the NOPD, the lack of trust the community has in its NOPD will determine just how effective those methods of improvement will be. Therefore, any future permutation of initiatives, policies, or reformation efforts instilled by the consent decree will need to focus on rebuilding trust between our nation’s law enforcement and the citizens they have been tasked to protect and serve.