MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The governor in the US state of Arizona has vetoed a bill that prohibits disclosing names of police officers involved in a fatal shooting for two months, a letter to the Arizona Senate president indicates.
"Unfortunately, I don't believe this bill in its current form best achieves the objectives we share, and I worry it could result in unforeseen problems," Gov. Doug Ducey wrote.
But the Arizona governor added he had to listen to chiefs of police who say that an arbitrary 60-day benchmark for release of names will "limit their ability to best manage these often tenuous situations and result in unintended consequences," referring to police communication with the public.
He stressed that in the era of social media rumours regularly "run wild and unfiltered," leading to wrong names being circulated in the press. A ban on the disclosure, he said, would tie up police chiefs' hand and prevent them from de-escalating tension.
The bill was inspired by the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teen in Ferguson, Missouri, by a white lawman, which triggered nationwide protests and demands for tighter police oversight.
