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 An independent monitor will oversee changes in the Cleveland police department after a federal investigation found a pattern of “unreasonable and in some cases unnecessary force.” 
 
 The agreement, announced Thursday by outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, follows a civil rights investigation launched last year, well before the police shooting death two weeks ago of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who was carrying a pellet gun. In another incident from November 2012, the report said, "over 100 Cleveland police officers engaged in a high speed chase, in violation of [Cleveland Division of Police] policies, and fatally shot two unarmed civilians. [Cleveland Division of Police] officers ultimately fired 137 shots at the car, killing both its occupants." The unreasonable practices the Justice Department found included the following: 
 
 Unnecessary and excessive use of deadly force, including shootings and head strikes with impact weapons 
 
 Unnecessary, excessive or retaliatory use of less lethal force including Tasers, chemical spray and fists 
 
 Excessive force against persons who are mentally ill or in crisis, including in cases where the officers were called exclusively for a welfare check 
 
 Employment of poor and dangerous tactics that places officers in situations where avoidable force becomes inevitable 
 
 Justice Department investigators also said the division doesn't adequately review and investigate the use of force by its officers or fully investigate misconduct allegations or identify and respond to patterns of at-risk behavior. The Justice Department and Cleveland Police Department so far have only agreed to come to an agreement about how to address this problem.
– Cleveland police use unnecessary force so often that the department must let an independent monitor make sure reforms are put into place, reports NBC News. That's one result of a Justice Department investigation of 600 incidents between 2010 and 2013 that faults the department for poor training and a "pattern and practice of using excessive force." The investigation began well before the recent police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice at a city recreation center, and it's the same kind of federal investigation now underway in Ferguson, Missouri, notes CBS News. "We saw too many incidents in which officers accidentally shot someone either because they fired their guns accidentally or because they shot the wrong person," says the report. In one incident, officers fired 137 shots at a car with two unarmed civilians inside who were fleeing police. Both were killed. In another, officers kicked and punched a man who was restrained and on his stomach, reports AP. He was hospitalized for a broken bone near his eye. (The officer in the Eric Garner case maintains that his chokehold was a wrestling move learned at the police academy.)