Feds require upgrade of Richland school resource officer program

The U.S. Justice Department will require the Richland County Sheriff’s Department to upgrade training and workplace skills of the department’s 87 school resource officers, according to an agreement announced late Wednesday by Justice officials.

The goals of the sweeping upgrade are to reduce the use of police force on school property and “to ensure civil rights protections for students,” according to a Justice Department news release.

The agreement comes 10 months after a video of Richland County school resource officer Ben Fields pulling a female Spring Valley High School student out her chair and tossing her became an object of national attention. Fields was fired for the action, which was triggered by the student’s refusal to leave the classroom. However, Justice’s review of Sheriff Leon Lott’s school resource officers began in May 2015, before the Fields incident.

Over the next three years, Justice officials and the sheriff’s department will work together to overhaul the department’s program with an emphasis on making sure officers don’t get involved in “classroom management or school discipline matters that should be appropriately handled by school staff,” according to a public statement by the Justice Department.

As part of the agreement, Richland school resource officers will be required to limit their use of force and handcuffs on school grounds unless absolutely necessary. Detailed information will be collected on every student-deputy encounter that involves force. A citizens’ group will be appointed to make recommendations about school resource officers.

Under the agreement announced Wednesday, called a “voluntary resolution agreement,” Lott’s department will have to hire “one or more qualified external consultants” with expertise in policing in a school context or police interactions with youth,” the Justice Department said. Consultants will be approved by Justice officials.

With 87 school resource officers at some 60 schools, Lott’s program to provide security to public schools is believed to be the largest such county-wide initiative in South Carolina. Richland’s officers are stationed at schools in Richland 1, Richland 2 and Lexington-Richland 5.

The Justice Department has authority over the Richland school resource program because Lott’s department accepts federal grants to help run the program.

Lott said in an interview Wednesday he welcomes the agreement. “It is something we are looking forward to because we know it’s going to make us better than what we are,” Lott said.

“It’s not that we have done anything wrong,” Lott said. “This has to do with us looking at our overall program and seeing how we can make it better.”

Stephen Gilchrist, leader of a parent group called Richland 2 Black Parents’ Association, said Wednesday that Justice Department officials have been talking to parents with complaints “over the last few years.”

“I haven’t seen the report, but this is certainly something we would comment on once we’ve had a chance to review it,” Gilchrist said.

Gilchrist said Lott deserves credit for working with the Justice Department and added that, now that the sheriff’s department is upgrading its school resource officers, school officials need to address discipline on their end.

“Lott deserves a tremendous amount of credit. The sheriff has made a commitment to work with parents and children in these schools to try to come up with remedies,” Gilchrist said.

However, Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Richland, who represents two Spring Valley High School female students who he says were treated in an overly aggressive manner by Fields, said Wednesday after reading the Justice agreement that more facts are needed about what prompted federal authorities to order upgrades.

“I call on the sheriff to tell the public what it was the Justice Department found that necessitated this agreement,” Rutherford said. “If the Justice Department had found no deficiencies, it would not have requested an agreement. Agencies that are doing it right don’t have this sort of agreement. If these were things that could have been fixed with a phone call, they would have done so.”

In its news release, the Justice Department said its review of Richland’s program was triggered by an initial review of school-based arrests and “concerns about the school resource program voiced by Richland County community members to the Department of Justice,” a Justice letter to Lott said.

The letter did not give specifics of any allegations, findings or concerns that led to Justice’s mandate to the sheriff’s department to upgrade its school resource officer program.

The review was initiated by the Justice Department’s Office for Civil Rights, which focuses on civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination based on race, color, national origin and disability.

The reason behind Justice’s focus on school behavior is what is called the “school-to-prison pipeline,” a phrase that underscores practices by law enforcement and school officials that push students out of schools and into a lifetime of incarceration, according to the letter to Lott.

Richland officers will have to adhere to is using the “least coercive” measures in a situation. School resource officers also will receive intensive training on “de-escalation, bias-free policing, adolescent development, and other topics designed to ... reduce racial and ethnic disparities in seizure and arrest rates,” according to the news release.

Although the Fields student-flipping video went viral, his action brought attention to a larger issue – the role of pistol- and Taser-equipped officers in school settings. All too often, critics have said, Richland County school officials have summoned a school resource officer to intervene in disciplinary situations.

“We are trying to separate discipline from criminal activities,” said Lott in an interview, something he emphasized after he fired Fields.

The FBI recently completed an investigation into the Oct. 26 Spring Valley incident, according to attorneys involved. It has not been made public, and no charges have been filed. The State Law Enforcement Division also is investigating.

Lott made the following statement to The State in an email received Wednesday night:

"If the (Justice) investigation had found us at fault then it would have been a statement from DOJ saying that and we would have been forced to meet their requirements. As the cover letter stated, they never finished their audit and the agreement meets both of our needs. This is a positive proactive action taken by RCSD and DOJ. I do realize that there will be those who will try to make this very negative. However, most of us want our schools safe and our SRO program the best it can be."

“It’s not that we have done anything wrong,” Lott said. “This has to do with us looking at our overall program and seeing how we can make it better.”

This story was originally published August 10, 2016 at 4:36 PM with the headline "Feds require upgrade of Richland school resource officer program."