Month: October 2024

Myths and Realities: Prosecutors and Criminal Justice Reform | Brennan Center for Justice

Prosecutors play a vital role in the criminal justice system, determining not just which cases to pursue but also what charges to file and penalties to seek. Over the past decade, some prosecutors have developed approaches that aim to reduce racial and economic disparities and unjust outcomes in the legal system — such as excessive sentences or the criminalization of poverty through cash bail — while preserving public safety.

Far from a unified group, these prosecutors bring many different approaches to their work. They span the political spectrum and are found in urban and rural jurisdictions alike. They are often grouped under the label “progressive prosecutors” or “reform-minded prosecutors.” For the purposes of this analysis, we use the term “pro-reform prosecutors” to indicate chief district attorneys, county attorneys, commonwealth attorneys, and state attorneys who campaigned on or promised to reimagine the role of their office to broadly reduce unjust disparities in the justice system and decrease unnecessary incarceration.
— Read on www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/myths-and-realities-prosecutors-and-criminal-justice-reform

Declines in victims calling the police in 21st-century America: how the trends vary by race/ethnicity and racial-immigration contexts | Crime Science | Full Text

Abstract
Victims’ willingness to call the police facilitates access to the justice system and potential resources. Research shows a decline in police notification in the United States in recent decades, but the research has not assessed variation in trends across different racial/ethnic groups and different racial-immigration contexts. This study uses the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) data from 52 metropolitan areas in the United States from 2000 to 2015 to investigate how victims across racial/ethnic groups vary in the likelihood of crime reporting based on geographic context. The results show that Black, Latino, and Asian victims’ crime-reporting behavior is influenced by the racial/ethnic and immigrant composition of the metropolitan areas. While the likelihood of police notification between racial/ethnic minorities and Whites is often similar when averaged across areas, minority victims in areas with higher percentages of Black or immigrant residents show a lower likelihood of crime reporting than their White counterparts. The higher percentage of immigrants is also associated with a steeper decline in the reporting of property crimes. These findings demonstrate the context-dependent nature of crime reporting. They help explain mixed evidence on the associations of race/ethnicity with police notification. To understand the crime-reporting behavior of victims, especially those who are racially marginalized, more attention to racial-immigration contexts is needed.
— Read on crimesciencejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40163-024-00233-7

Harris/Biden deconstructing America: the Ferguson effect – American Thinker

The Ferguson Effect. It’s a term that entered common American usage after the August 09, 2014 death of Michael Brown, according to the Democrat/socialist/communist  (D/s/c) narrative, an unarmed black man, an 18 year old recent high school graduate with a bright future, murdered by a racist cop in Ferguson, Missouri, a racist town in a racist country.

But Brown, minutes before coming into contact with Ferguson Officer Darren Wilson, committed a strong-arm robbery. Brown, a 6’4”, nearly 300 pound, daily pot smoker and thug-in-training—his social media presence was full of thug themes–when approached by Wilson who asked him to stop walking down the middle of a busy street, viciously attacked Wilson, trapping him behind the steering wheel of his vehicle, badly beat him and tried to take his handgun. Wilson barely managed to retain it and in the struggle it discharged, slightly wounding Brown’s hand. Brown ran, but after a short distance, turned and lowering his head like a football lineman, made a berserker charge on Wilson who was forced to shoot Brown, stopping him essentially at his feet. 
— Read on www.americanthinker.com/blog/2024/10/harris_biden_deconstructing_america_the_ferguson_effect.html

For too many police officers, suspects don’t count as human. We all suffer the consequences. | | themercury.com

My junior high school world history teacher once explained to us how our government prepared the American public for the grotesqueries of war. First, he said, the government had to
— Read on themercury.com/for-too-many-police-officers-suspects-don-t-count-as-human-we-all-suffer-the/article_0d459b24-92dd-11ef-8dd1-9b362323c440.html

Police Oversight Report 2023 – City of Boulder

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

For the past five years, the City of Boulder embraced civilian oversight of the Boulder Police Department to ensure that the Boulder community participated in oversight of the Boulder Police Department (BPD). Similar to other municipalities and counties, oversight of BPD brought challenges to the community. One year ago, the City Council updated Boulder’s police oversight system when it passed Ordinance 8609.

Boulder City Council authorized the assembly of the Police Oversight Task Force in Spring of 2019 to investigate appropriate oversight of policing in Boulder. In response to recommendations made by the Task Force, Ordinance 8361 was passed in October of 2019, which created the Police Oversight Panel (Panel) and the predecessor to the Independent Police Monitor (Monitor).

Since its inception, the Panel was intended to overrepresent populations that historically experienced underrepresentation while also being more at risk for over-policing. Police oversight in Boulder experienced a tumultuous year in 2023 and continued growth in 2024. In late 2022, the inaugural Monitor resigned and the OIR Group was hired to act as interim Monitor while a replacement Monitor was recruited. At the same time, in early 2023 the City of Boulder also retained consultant Farah Muscadin to work with members of the Panel, community, BPD and legal staff to update the oversight ordinance. The City Council granted the Panel a moratorium to pause core functions to focus on the ordinance update. In August 2023, Sherry Daun began work as the Monitor and in October 2023, Ordinance 8609 passed City Council unanimously.

s3.documentcloud.org/documents/25246266/item_2_-_police_oversight_update.pdf

Why public safety is the key to functioning NYC subways — crime hot spots for over 50 years

New York has suffered 40 subway homicides since 2020, a five-fold increase compared to the post-millennial norm. New York went through a similarly abrupt change in public safety underground before, in the mid-1960s — but took 25 years to fix it. The fable of how New York achieved its miracle crime decline begins in 1990, with the stabbing death of 22-year-old Utah tourist Brian Watkins in a Midtown subway station, as he defended his parents from…
— Read on www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/why-public-safety-is-the-key-to-functioning-nyc-subways-crime-hot-spots-for-over-50-years/ar-AA1syvhz

US DoJ Weighs in for Advocates in Lawsuit against NYC’s Discriminatory Use of Police to Respond to Mental Health Crises – Legal Reader

DoJ supports advocates in suit to end discrimination against people with mental disabilities by sending police as first responders to mental health crises.
— Read on www.legalreader.com/us-doj-weighs-in-for-advocates-in-lawsuit-against-nycs-discriminatory-use-of-police-to-respond-to-mental-health-crises/

Access the court case here:

Baerga v. City of New York et al, No. 1:2021cv05762 – Document 193 (S.D.N.Y. 2024)