Cleveland’s police disciplinary process is “effective,” in line with department guidelines, and gives members a chance to be heard, according to a new report from the team that monitors the city’s law enforcement on behalf of a federal judge.
The report, released this week, shows improvement over a 2020 review of the city’s disciplinary decisions. Six years ago, the monitoring team wrote that the then-safety director gave out lighter punishments without sufficient justification.
But 92.8% of decisions from 2025 that the monitoring team examined were within Cleveland’s disciplinary guidelines, known as a matrix, the report said. The monitors reviewed 176 cases handled by the police chief, safety director or their designees in 2025.
“Overall, the evidence reflects a mature disciplinary process with some disconnected compliance gaps rather than broad or systemic failure,” the monitoring team wrote.
In a news release, Mayor Justin Bibb’s administration called the findings an “important milestone” in Cleveland’s police reform efforts.
City police have operated under a consent decree — an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice to reform policies and practices — since 2015. Prior to the decree, a Justice Department investigation found that police used excessive force too often and that accountability was lacking.
Signal Cleveland reached out for comment on the report from the Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association and the Fraternal Order of Police, the unions that represent most officers, dispatchers, supervisors and of other police department staff. If we get a response, we’ll update this story.
No widespread disparities by rank
When police brass dismissed a disciplinary charge, they insufficiently explained that decision in 18.8% of cases, the report found. The monitoring team wrote that its concern was not that police leaders improperly dismissed charges, but that they didn’t document their reasoning in some cases.
The report did not find widespread disparities in disciplinary decisions by rank. However, dispatchers and other communication staff tended to receive tougher punishments than did sworn officers — a finding the monitoring team said warranted more examination.
The assessment looked only at the disciplinary decision-making process rather than the overall system for holding Cleveland’s police force accountable, the monitoring team noted. Several other boards and officials are part of the broader accountability system, including the Community Police Commission, Civilian Police Review Board and public safety inspector general. It also did not independently assess investigative quality, the accuracy of findings or how allegations were initially classified.
Earlier this year, U.S. District Judge Solomon Oliver denied a request by the city and federal government to end the consent decree. The Justice Department is appealing that decision. Oliver recently ordered the decree extended for another two years.
Here are some other findings from the monitoring team’s review:
- Members of the Cleveland Division of Police — officers or staff — received suspensions in 59.9% of cases
- Members were fired in only 1.8% of cases
- Members received letters of reinstruction in 40.7% of cases and written reprimand 19.2% of cases
- Unprofessional behavior toward the public made up 13.8% of upheld disciplinary allegations
- Unnecessary, unreasonable or disproportionate force made up 1.7% of upheld disciplinary allegations, and other use-of-force violations made up 6.2%
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Community Police Commission takes its own look at discipline cases
The Cleveland Community Police Commission’s staff recently found inconsistencies in the details included in discipline disposition letters, which document charges against officers and the outcome of the disciplinary process.
Claire Foley, the commission’s senior policy research analyst, reviewed 139 disposition letters issued between October 2025 and August 2026. At the commission’s September meeting, she described the ways in which these letters often differed, “making it difficult to determine whether the same criteria were being used across disciplinary cases.”
For example, Foley found that about two-thirds of the letters mentioned that another active discipline case involving the officer was an aggravating factor (a circumstance that suggests the strongest punishment is warranted), or stated that the lack of an active case was a mitigating factor (warranting leniency). About one-third of the letters did not mention active cases at all.
Of the 58 letters that cited more than one violation, only about half stated that multiple violations were considered as an aggravating factor.
These examples don’t mean that any of the discipline decisions were improper, Foley said. But consistent documentation matters.
“Outside of compliance [with the consent decree] the practical concern is that without that information about aggravating and mitigating factors, it is difficult to understand how these corrective action decisions were made,” she said. “This matters when similar cases result in different corrective actions.
The commission is in the process of updating the discipline policy and has made a push to take a more active, real-time role in the process. Unions representing officers have said that would violate the current collective bargaining agreement.
