Why are police neck restraints being banned in so many jurisdictions? And what are the consequences when agencies remove them from the force continuum?
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That debate has intensified in the years following George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis. In response, lawmakers in many states moved quickly to ban so-called chokeholds or restrict neck restraints to deadly-force situations only. But while the political momentum behind those bans is recent, the debate itself is not new.
More than four decades ago, the Los Angeles Police Department eliminated the carotid control hold — a tactic similar to the lateral vascular neck restraint (LVNR) — after years of public controversy surrounding police “chokeholds.” At the time, many street officers considered the carotid control hold one of the most effective ways to control violently resisting suspects without escalating to higher levels of force.
The question policymakers should ask today is the same one that should have been asked then: What happens when officers lose an intermediate-force option that many considered effective and relatively safe?
The LAPD experience
The LAPD’s 1982 ban on the carotid control hold significantly changed how officers were trained to respond to resistance. According to department training materials at the time, officers were instructed: “Don’t tie up with the suspect, use your baton.” A later training video advised officers to “push away and use your baton and/or kicks to control the situation.”
Critics argued the policy change created a gap in the force continuum by removing a hands-on restraint option without replacing it with an equally effective alternative.
Eighteen months after the ban, then-LAPD Chief Daryl F. Gates reported that injuries to suspects had increased by 661%, while injuries to officers rose by 521% in the year following the policy change. Those numbers became a central argument for critics who believed the department’s revised tactics resulted in more violent physical encounters and increased reliance on impact weapons.
Years later, during the punitive damages phase of the Rodney King federal civil trial, my expert testimony focused in part on those policy and training changes. My testimony argued that officers were increasingly forced to move from lower-level controls directly to more forceful intermediate tactics because the department had removed an effective restraint option from its toolbox. The jury awarded zero punitive damages. Some officers believed that if a neck restraint option had still been available, Rodney King likely would have been restrained and handcuffed before the infamous video ever began.
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The ongoing medical debate
Neck restraints remain controversial because they are occasionally associated with arrest-related deaths. Medical experts continue to debate the risks of vascular neck restraints, positional asphyxia and other restraint-related tactics. As with many use-of-force issues, correlation does not necessarily establish causation.
However, several studies have raised questions about whether properly applied vascular neck restraints are as inherently dangerous as many modern policies suggest.
A national study published by the Canadian Police Research Centre concluded: “… while no restraint methodology is completely risk free, there is no medical reason to routinely expect grievous bodily harm or death following the correct application of the vascular neck restraint in the general population by professional police officers with standardized training and technique.”
In 2022, the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine published a study examining vascular neck restraints used by three law enforcement agencies. Researchers reviewed 944 field applications against resisting subjects and more than 85,000 training applications. The study reported no deaths, rare minor injuries and an effectiveness rate estimated at more than 90%.
Importantly, many advocates of vascular neck restraints draw a distinction between legitimate vascular restraints and true chokeholds. Chokeholds obstruct the airway. Vascular neck restraints are designed to temporarily restrict blood flow without compressing the trachea.
That distinction has started to influence policy in some states.
In 2024, Indiana updated its use-of-force policy to prohibit only true chokeholds except in deadly-force situations. The state defined chokeholds as “applying pressure to the throat or neck of another person in a manner intended to obstruct the airway.” Vascular neck restraints remain permitted below the level of deadly force, and Indiana officers are required to receive training on them.
The unintended consequences question
Supporters of neck restraint bans argue the restrictions reduce the risk of catastrophic injury or death. Critics counter that removing these tactics may unintentionally increase injuries by forcing officers to rely on strikes, impact weapons or deadly force sooner in violent encounters.
That concern surfaced in a 2022 case in which I served as an expert witness for an officer involved in a fatal shooting. According to testimony, the officer initially considered using an LVNR during a ground fight but hesitated because agency policy had recently prohibited all neck restraints following George Floyd’s death. During the struggle, the suspect disengaged and produced a handgun the officer had not previously seen. The officer then fatally shot the suspect.
Supporters of vascular neck restraints would argue that properly trained officers using properly applied restraints may, in some cases, prevent encounters from escalating to deadly force.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with that conclusion, the broader policy question deserves more serious examination than it often receives in political debates.
What policymakers should study next
What is still largely missing from this national conversation is comprehensive data comparing injury rates before and after neck restraint bans.
The LAPD statistics from the early 1980s remain one of the most frequently cited examples, but policymakers would benefit from broader modern studies examining:
- Injuries to officers
- Injuries to suspects
- Changes in use-of-force patterns
- Increased reliance on batons, strikes or TASERs
- Changes in deadly-force incidents
Those are measurable outcomes that should guide policy decisions.
Police officers will continue to encounter violent resistance. The question is not whether force will sometimes be necessary, but which force options produce the safest outcomes for officers, suspects and the public alike.
As lawmakers and agency leaders continue to revisit these policies, the focus should remain on evidence, training and real-world outcomes — not simply political reaction.
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