Some Milwaukee alders want fire and police commission to investigate off-duty officer homicides

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Milwaukee Alderwoman Milele Coggs says, given Joel Acevedo’s death at the hands of an off-duty Milwaukee police officer earlier this year.

She thinks the Fire and Police Commission should investigate off duty officer homicides, as oppesed to the Milwaukee Police Department.

“For there to be trust with the public, we can’t have mpd investigating themselves in these officer-involved homicides,” Coggs said.

In addition to the measure asking FPC to investigate all officer homicides, originally sponsored by Alderwoman Nikiya Dodd, Council President Cavalier Johnson wants to add culteral competency and emotional intelligence training to the police force.

“Cultural competency is a skill that can be measured trained and improved upon," Johnson said. "In several cities across the country, especially the larger ones, it’s not uncommon for cultural competency and emotional intelligence to be added to training regimen.”

The council also wants to adopt 8 measures known as “8 can’t wait,” which generally promote exhausting all de-escalation before using force.

Aldermen Scott Spiker said, while he supports all these moves in theory, he worries if the city's Fire and Police Commission has the staffing and resources to pull them off.

“The idea that we’re just going to dump everything on fpc, not saying that’s the intent...that’s the concern," Spiker said. "If they have one investigator, if we give them a bunch of cases, not that this would, it’s just on homicides, that’s that we give them a bunch of cases we’re going to overrun their capacity.”

All these policies now move to the full common council for a vote. If they do pass, it would still be up to the Fire and Police Commission to adopt them.