All about Policing with a sprinkle of Criminal Justice – written by a Secret Contrarian
On February 2, 2024, the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and the City of Minneapolis (City) announced that Effective Law Enforcement for Allwas selected as the monitoring team for the state court enforceable agreement.
The monitoring team plays an important role in supporting and holding the City and Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) accountable to address race-based policing by strengthening public safety.
— Read on mn.gov/mdhr/mpd/monitor/
Read the inaugural report HERE
Report on Stop & Frisk.
See the report here:
www.nypdmonitor.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/2025.02.03-Floyd-Dkt.-952-1-Monitors-23rd-Report.pdf
Parsing 18 years of data on underground violence
— Read on www.vitalcitynyc.org/articles/just-the-facts-on-new-york-city-subway-crime
This would be useful for CPTED.
We learned about changing pedestrian habits by analyzing iconic Holly Whyte films using sophisticated new tools. What can cities do next?
— Read on www.vitalcitynyc.org/articles/training-ai-to-make-cities-more-humane
Overview
In the United States, the federal government and every state enforces sentencing laws that incarcerate people for lengths that will exceed, or likely exceed, the span of a person’s natural life. In 2024, almost 200,000 people, or one in six people in prison, were serving life sentences.1 The criminal legal system’s dependence on life sentences disregards research showing that extreme sentences are not an effective public safety solution.
This report represents The Sentencing Project’s sixth national census of people serving life sentences, which includes life with the possibility of parole; life without the possibility of parole; and virtual life sentences (sentences reaching 50 years or longer). The report finds more people were serving life without parole (LWOP) in 2024 than ever before: 56,245 people were serving this “death by incarceration” sentence, a 68% increase since 2003. While the total number of people serving life sentences decreased 4% from 2020 to 2024, this decline trails the 13% downsizing of the total prison population. Moreover, nearly half the states had more people serving a life sentence in 2024 than in 2020.
— Read on www.sentencingproject.org/reports/a-matter-of-life-the-scope-and-impact-of-life-and-long-term-imprisonment-in-the-united-states/
Juvenile Injuries and Deaths From Shootings by Police in the United States, 2015–2020 – Journal of Adolescent Health
— Read on www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(24)00508-1/fulltext
This is an interesting podcast interview of Peter Moskos by Glenn Loury. A lot of the interview is based on the research of Moskos’ book which will be released early 2025. Moskos is a pro-policing academic.
A new report released by the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in part questions whether the school could have pursued alternative responses to a heavy police presence during campus protests of the war in Gaza last year.
— Read on www.wbur.org/news/2025/01/17/massachusetts-college-encampment-protest-gaza
Get the report HERE
Key Takeaways
This study updates and supplements previous U.S. crime trends reports by the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) with data through December 2024. It examines yearly and monthly rates of reported crime for 13 violent, property, and drug offenses in 40 American cities that have consistently reported monthly data over the past six years. The 40 cities are not necessarily representative of all jurisdictions in the United States. Not all cities published data for each offense (see the Appendix for which cities reported which offenses); trends in offenses with fewer reporting cities should be viewed with caution. Not all crimes are reported to law enforcement. In addition, the data collected for this report are subject to revision by local jurisdictions.
Reported levels of 12 of the 13 offenses covered in this report were lower in 2024 than in 2023; shoplifting was the only offense higher in 2024 compared to 2023.
— Read on counciloncj.org/crime-trends-in-u-s-cities-year-end-2024-update/
After the Senate failed in 2021 to pass a bipartisan package of law enforcement reforms — the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act — the Biden administration sought to implement as much of the legislation as possible through executive order. Signed May 2022 on the second anniversary of George Floyd’s murder, the action aimed “to promote safe and accountable policing” in myriad ways.
— Read on www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/trump-reverses-biden-directive-policing-reforms
All about Policing with a sprinkle of Criminal Justice - written by a Secret Contrarian
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