Author: scott prell

Old Saybrook Releases Damning Outside Investigation of Police Chief Michael Spera, Workplace Practices – CT Examiner

A long-anticipated study by the Police Executive Research Forum concluded that the high rate of turnover in the Old Saybrook Police Department was the result of a toxic and “unpleasant” workplace characterized by mandatory overtime, fear of retaliation, unfair promotions and an overall poor organizational climate. 

“In interview after interview, employees described an unhealthy work environment filled with stress and paranoia,” the report read. 

The study was prompted by persistently high levels of turnover in the department. In July 2023, with a staffing level of only 17 officers, Police Chief Michael Spera requested that the town increase officer pay and benefits to incentivize more officers to stay. But First Selectman Carl Fortuna said he wanted to be sure that increasing benefits would reduce the turnover, and asked for an organizational study of the department. 

Residents overwhelmingly voted in January 2024 to approve the study. 
— Read on ctexaminer.com/2025/01/08/old-saybrook-releases-damning-outside-investigation-of-police-chief-michael-spera-workplace-practices/

Get a copy of the report HERE

Catalog of Core Child Welfare Case Management Reports for Courts

This resource provides descriptions and general specifications of more than 40 Case Management Summary Reports, Case Listings, and Quality Assurance Reports, with special attention to their role in a court’s continuous quality improvement efforts for child welfare cases.
— Read on www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/catalog-core-child-welfare-case-management-reports-courts

The legacy of lynching in school policing

#AssaultAtSpringValley: The legacy of lynching in school policing analyzes 460 school policing assaults to assess the extent to which school policing places students at risk of physical and sexual assault. Additionally, the report utilizes two lynching datasets to explore the relationship between lynching in the U.S. and current school police violence, demonstrating that school policing assaults are acts of state sanctioned violence that extend the legacies of lynching into the modern classroom.

We also explore the importance of Ida B. Wells’ protest journalism that challenged lynching in the south.  Just as Wells told the truth about lynching, we must tell the truth about school policing and the false pretense of safety and public order. School policing does not prevent violence, it is a harbinger of it. It is the reason why many Black students do not feel safe at school and the means through which they are criminalized and denied the benefits of public education.
— Read on policefreeschools.org/resources/legacyoflynching/

Fixing ‘Broken Windows’ theory: Smart — not harsh — policing is the key to a safe and orderly city

If you’re familiar with the Broken Windows theory of policing, you may have learned of it, perhaps indirectly, from Malcolm Gladwell’s bestseller “The Tipping Point,” published 25 years ago.
— Read on nypost.com/2025/01/05/opinion/fixing-broken-windows-theory-smart-not-harsh-policing-is-the-key-to-a-safe-and-orderly-city/

Broken Windows Policing Is Still the Best Way to Fight Crime

If you’re familiar with the Broken Windows theory of policing, you may have learned of it, perhaps indirectly, from Malcolm Gladwell’s bestseller The Tipping Point, published 25 years ago. In the book’s most-discussed chapter, Gladwell sought to explain why New York City, in the 1990s, suddenly experienced the greatest drop in violent crime ever recorded. True, other cities saw crime declines in this period, but nowhere else did crime plunge so significantly and so swiftly. In just a few years, New York went from being one of the most dangerous and frightening big cities in America to one of the safest. Why?

Gladwell surveyed various possibilities having to do with the economy, changing demographics, and the waning of the deadly crack trade, but found them unpersuasive. The real difference-maker, he said, was the NYPD’s commitment to Broken Windows policing—the disarmingly simple idea that serious crimes are more likely to occur in disorderly environments than orderly ones. By upgrading people’s surroundings, the theory says, you can improve their behavior.
— Read on www.city-journal.org/article/broken-windows-policing-crime-malcolm-gladwell

How Michigan Stopped Saddling Children with Millions in Court Debt | Bolts

By the time Arrianna Jentink-Bristol paid off the $800 she owed in court debt, it was six months before her 18th birthday, and she had spent nearly the entirety of her teenage years on probation. Jentink-Bristol first entered Michigan’s juvenile justice system when she was 13 after getting into a physical fight with her mother, who she said was intoxicated and punching her three-year-old sister in the face. She remembered being subsequently detained and assigned a public defender who didn’t show up for one of her hearings. Following the arrest, Jentink-Bristol picked up another charge. She cycled through the juvenile justice system for two years and was detained in juvenile facilities, a mental hospital, and put on house arrest and probation, all while her bills continued to stack up. 
— Read on boltsmag.org/michigan-juvenile-justice-reform-ending-court-debt/

RIPA Board Report 2025

The Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory Board (Board), supported by CRES and OGC, released its eighth annual report on January 1, 2025. The 2025 report contains an analysis of more than 4.7 million police and pedestrian stops conducted in 2023 under the Racial and Identity Profiling Act (RIPA). The report focuses on the policing of youth and examines available research that illustrates police stops and their associated actions have harmful repercussions for youth that reverberate beyond the initial stop itself. Studies show that direct contact with law enforcement is associated with poor educational outcomes, including reduced test scores and lower grade point averages, in addition to other downstream effects like disparities in the criminal legal system as well as in health and economic wellbeing.
— Read on oag.ca.gov/ab953/board/reports

Audit of the Municipal Police Training Committee

Executive Summary
In accordance with Section 12 of Chapter 11 of the Massachusetts General Laws, the Office of the State Auditor has conducted a performance audit of the Municipal Police Training Committee (MPTC) for the period January 1, 2021 through December 31, 2022.

The purpose of our audit was to determine the following:

whether MPTC developed and implemented the trainings required by Chapter 69 of the Acts of 2018 (also known as the Criminal Justice Reform Act) and Chapter 253 of the Acts of 2020 (also known as the Police Reform Law), which are codified in Sections 116 A–D and G–K of Chapter 6 of the General Laws;
whether MPTC ensured that all MPTC-operated and MPTC-authorized training academies delivered a standardized training curriculum as required by Section 4(f)(1) of Chapter 6E of the General Laws; and
whether MPTC processed permanent exemptions to, and temporary waivers of, training requirements in accordance with Section 3.03 of Title 550 of the Code of Massachusetts Regulations.
— Read on www.mass.gov/audit/audit-of-the-municipal-police-training-committee