The Louisiana State Police for years engaged in a statewide pattern of excessive force during arrests and pursuits, including the unjustified use of stun guns, according to a Justice Department report released on Thursday.
The department’s civil rights division issued the report days after federal prosecutors said they would not bring charges in one of the cases that prompted the investigation — the May 2019 death of Ronald Greene, a Black driver who was pulled over and beaten by white officers.
The investigation concluded that the encounter with Mr. Greene “demonstrated serious failures at L.S.P. — excessive force, improper supervision, ineffective training and breakdowns in accountability.” It was part of a larger pattern of behavior, the report said, that violated the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Mr. Greene’s family was initially told that he died from injuries he sustained in a crash after a high-speed chase stemming from a traffic violation. The Union Parish coroner ruled his death accidental from cardiac arrest.
Body camera footage obtained by The Associated Press and released two years after Mr. Greene’s death showed that the officers pulled him out of his S.U.V. and wrestled him to the ground.
They continued to beat him and shock him with a stun gun as he repeatedly said, “I’m sorry” and “I’m scared.” At one point, an officer dragged Mr. Greene by his ankles while he was face down and handcuffed behind his back.
His family filed a wrongful-death lawsuit, claiming he died as a result of a struggle with the officers. The lawsuit is still pending.
State criminal charges were filed against five officers in 2022, but the charges against three of them were later dismissed. Two pleaded no contest to misdemeanors.
On Wednesday, Christopher Harpin, a Union Parish sheriff’s deputy who arrived at the scene as troopers were struggling with Mr. Greene, pleaded no contest to one count of simple battery, the television station WBRZ reported.
Last year, a state trooper, Kory York, pleaded no contest to eight counts of simple battery, WBRZ reported.
Neither is expected to face significant prison time. A sixth officer involved in the arrest, Master Trooper Chris Hollingsworth, was killed in a highway crash in 2020.
After a yearslong investigation, the Justice Department announced on Tuesday that it had insufficient evidence to bring federal charges against the officers.
The 32-page civil rights division report — which is separate from the federal criminal investigation — recommended remedial measures, including strengthening policies around accountability and the use of force.
The investigation also sought to determine whether the State Police engaged “in racially discriminatory policing.”
“At this time,” the report said, “we make findings only as to excessive force.”
A spokesman for the Louisiana State Police did not address the findings of the report but said in a statement that the department would “continue to work diligently on improving our relationship with our citizens, law enforcement partners, political leaders and agency personnel.”
Gov. Jeff Landry of Louisiana, a Republican, said in a statement that the Justice Department’s report “seeks to diminish the service and exceptionality” of the Louisiana State Police.
“The reputation of our men and women in blue is one of respect, admiration and appreciation, and we will always have their back,” Mr. Landry said.
Mona Hardin, Mr. Greene’s mother, said on Friday that there has been no justice for her son and the Justice Department report was insufficient.
“It’s been six years of this so-called investigation to get nothing in the end. My son should be alive,” Ms. Hardin said. She added, “I even say, maybe I didn’t pray hard enough.”
The inquiry was among the final so-called pattern-or-practice investigations to be concluded under the Biden administration.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland has expanded the use of such inquiries, which aim to determine if state or local law enforcement agencies are using “excessive force, biased policing and other unconstitutional practices.”
The other episode that prompted the federal civil rights report involved a white Louisiana state trooper who attacked a Black motorist, Aaron Larry Bowman, after a traffic stop in Monroe, La., where Mr. Greene lived, three weeks after Mr. Greene’s death.
The trooper repeatedly struck Mr. Bowman with a heavy flashlight. That trooper, Jacob Brown, was arrested and charged with second-degree battery, and later quit the force.
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