Today we will be discussing Sentinel Event Reviews in policing. Sentinel events are incidents with undesirable outcomes that may signify underlying systemic weaknesses, likely the result of multiple contributing factors and may identify ways to strengthen the system or process and prevent future negative outcomes. A sentinel event review is an examination involving all stakeholders of the system in which the error occurred. It aims to prevent similar errors in the future rather than assigning blame and punishing those making the error.

Sentinel event reviews have their roots in the manufacturing environment and have become widely used in other high-risk fields like aviation and health care. Over the past 10 years the police have begun to utilize the sentinel event review process. Although not widespread, police departments in Seattle, Tucson, Madison, Milwaukee, New York, and Tempe have conducted sentinel event reviews.

We are pleased to have Michael Scott with us today. He is a Clinical Professor and Director of the Center for Problem-Oriented Policing, School of Criminology & Criminal Justice (CCJ) at Arizona State University. Mike began his career in policing as a police officer with the Madison, WI police department. His career in policing has been both as a practitioner serving as a policer chief and special advisor to the chief in St. Louis and the NYPD Commissioner. He was a Senior Researcher at PERF and clinical professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Law. He is a 1987 graduate of Harvard Law School where he received his Juris Doctorate.

Mike is also involved with a project at Arizona State University to explore the development of a statewide system for conducting sentinel event reviews of police use of force, particularly among vulnerable populations.