For decades, we’ve known that our criminal justice system hasn’t been fair or just for Black, Brown, and Indigenous people. On top of interactions with law enforcement never having been in our favor, the U.S. Government has significantly undercounted the number of people who die in law enforcement custody each year. Deaths resulting from interactions with the U.S. criminal legal system are a public health emergency, but the scope of this issue is intentionally ignored by the very systems that are supposed to be tracking these fatalities.

Understanding how many people die in custody, why, and where is an important data set to fully understand the police reform needed at all levels. The Deaths in Custody Reporting Act (DCRA) requires reporting of death of any person detained, arrested, en route to incarceration, incarcerated in the federal, state, or local facilities, or a boot camp prison. The DCRA also requires the U.S. Attorney General to study the information and report to Congress how to reduce deaths in custody.