The American people are paying millions and millions of dollars to settle lawsuits against police

[Cousin Dupree]

Malpractice insurance is part of the answer to fixing police misconduct. Each and every policeperson should be required to buy their own personal malpractice insurance, just like doctors and nurses do. It’s another mechanism for holding them responsible for their behavior. Why should we be paying victims and families on behalf of police?

[Effete Snob]

1. "just like doctors and nurses do"

Doctors and nurses are not required, and in many instances do not have, personal malpractice liability insurance.

Nurses, in particular, tend to be employed by companies which carry policies covering those companies and their agents. There is typically nothing to be gained by suing a $40 an hour nurse for malpractice. You sue the hospital which employed the nurse. The nurse is a party to that suit simply as agent for the hospital.

The same is true of police claims. You aren't going to find a lawyer who, on contingency, is going to sue some cop with little or no savings and maybe some equity in a house or other property. What would be the point?

Finally, in most instances, governments are already carrying liability insurance to cover the actions of their employees, whether they are police or not. But police department insurance is a normal insurance product:

https://www.travelers.com/business-insurance/general-liability/law-enforcement


Law enforcement liability insurance provides coverage for bodily injury, personal injury or property damage caused by a wrongful act committed by or on behalf of a public entity while conducting law enforcement activities or operations.

Even if you had some requirement that individual police officers carry liability insurance, they are still all working for the police department in the course of their duties and the police department, as principal, remains liable for the actions of its agents.

[Cousin Dupree]

5. Well, thanks for setting me straight. I guess there's JUST NO WAY to change the system.

PS. As a nurse, I always carried my own private liability insurance. Too bad I never consulted with you before buying it.

[Effete Snob]

6. There are lots of ways to change the system

I can't see where I said anything resembling there is "JUST NO WAY".

I also do not know what your employment circumstances may have been. As a practical matter, someone who has been injured to the tune of millions of dollars by either a police action or medical malpractice is not going to be able to recover millions of dollars from the individual agents of either the police department or a hospital. Certainly, there are contexts in which individual insurance makes sense for certain people, depending on the nature of their job.

There are many ways to change the system. I do not believe an individual insurance requirement is one of them.

[-misanthroptimist]

2. I could not agree with you more!

No insurance, no badge.

[PortTack]

3. Someone else suggested those payments come out of their pension fund

Two fold fix
1. Relieve the tax payer from this illegal cop behavior
3. Cops would soon begin policing their own..hit ‘em in the pocketbook

[Johonny]

4. I like this solution