Shielded from Justice: APPENDIX B

Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States

APPENDIX B
Reasons Provided by Justice Department for Declining Prosecution under 18 U.S.C. §§241 and 242¹

FY 1994 - and FY 1995 Civil Rights Division Reasons for Not Prosecuting, by frequency
Declination Reasons	# of Cases in 1994	# of Cases in 1995
Weak or insufficient admissible evidence	904	778
Lack of evidence of criminal intent	480	497
No federal offense evident	426	482
Declined per instructions from DOJ	737	477
Suspect to be prosecuted by other authorities	98	121
Lack of investigative or prosecutive resources	59	80
Witness Problems	98	70
Agency Request	66	68
Civil, administrative, or other disciplinary alternatives	36	62
Minimal federal interest or no deterrent value	48	23
Statute of Limitations	105	22
Suspect being prosecuted on other charges (e.g., UFAPs)	7	22
Office policy	55	20
No known suspect	49	19
Staleness	121	19
Lack of prosecutive resources	0	15
Jurisdiction or venue problems	25	14
Department Policy	23	13
Petite policy	3	6
By government from Magistrate Court with DOJ authorization	0	6
Juvenile Suspect	1	4
Lack of investigative resources	0	2
Suspect deceased	2	2
Transfer within District	0	2
Suspect's cooperation	1	1
By government from District Court without DOJ authorization	3	1
By government from Magistrate Court without DOJ authorization	3	1
Rule 40	2	1
Plea to other charge(s) (Magistrate Court)	0	1
Suspect a fugitive	0	1
Pretrial Diversion Completed	1	0
Suspect serving sentence	2	0
Action of the Grand Jury	1	0
Proceedings suspended indefinitely by court	5	0
TOTAL	3,361	2,830

1 According to data obtained by TRAC from the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, Justice Department. Cases prosecuted or declined represent only a portion of the total number of complaints alleging federal criminal civil rights violations in each district in a given year.