By Lars Trautman

As defined by convictions, sentence lengths, and the relentless enforcement of the law, for decades, conservatives have prized “toughness” above all other attributes in assessing a prosecutor’s worth. Indeed, until recently, this same mindset permeated conservatives’ approach to nearly every other aspect of the criminal justice system. But then something interesting happened. Starting in Texas and quickly spreading to other “red” states and beyond, conservatives began to realize that mentality actually undermined the very goals they were pursuing. From public safety to fiscal probity, individual liberty to human dignity, a “smart on crime” approach that addressed underlying causes of crime proved better able to deliver than the old status quo that all too often relied on incarceration as the antidote to societal ills. Reform has followed in nearly every state2 and even managed to pass a notoriously divided Congress. The legislative focus of these conservative efforts to date, however, belies the intrinsically local nature of criminal justice. The fates of the overwhelming majority of individuals who come into contact with the criminal justice system are determined by a collection of county, town and city officials. Perhaps foremost among these is the local district attorney. After all, while a judge may act as the king in his court, only the district attorney has the ability to influence criminal proceedings in every single courtroom across her jurisdiction. The district attorney’s office is thus a natural channel for new criminal justice ideas. This realization has helped to propel a growing movement on the political left to elect “progressive prosecutors” who wield the broad powers of the office to further liberal criminal justice goals relating to decarceration and racial justice, among others.5 Plaudits have come from all corners for many of these efforts6 and the result is a coherent narrative around what it means to be a liberal-minded prosecutor in the twenty-first century. Of course, plenty of reasonable and just prosecutors have no aspirations to ever wear the “progressive” label, nor would their constituents want them to. This raises two related questions for prosecutors who reject this progressive mold, yet nevertheless yearn to be smarter and more even-handed than their predecessors: can the disruption of traditional prosecutorial practices align with a more conservative worldview and what does the center-right path toward more fair and effective prosecution look like? The answer is that a conservative prosecutor can and should challenge current prosecutorial practices by striving to become a more productive prosecutor in the broader sense of the term. This means ensuring that every prosecutorial decision is productive insofar as it produces an outcome that actually improves community wellbeing. It requires a subtle understanding that a charge, conviction or sentence is not itself the outcome, merely a factor building toward one that includes a safer community and rehabilitated defendant. Ultimately, trading a penchant for tough prosecutors for those who are productive in this manner will allow conservatives to forge a more constructive prosecutorial identity that does a better job of efficiently pursuing justice and keeping their communities secure and whole

R STREET POLICY STUDY NO. 193 January 2020

Washington, DC: R Street, 2020. 6p.

By Lars Trautman and Jonathan Haggerty

Handcuffs close about a person’s wrists and the few, simple words “you are under arrest” are spoken as the individual is placed in the back of a police car. It is a scene that plays out once every three seconds in the United States and sets into motion a criminal process that exhibits at times all of the control and potential for damage of a runaway locomotive. Indeed, regardless of whether a murder indictment or an ordinance violation spurred the arrest, the immediate aftermath is the same. The individual loses their freedom and gains a new entry in their criminal history, while the officer must spend hours transporting and processing the individual with the specter of additional court time hanging over the future. And, while arrest is warranted for many of the more serious transgressions, it is an ill-fitting and disproportionate response to myriad other situations. Yet, traditionally, the only other option officially available to officers is to do nothing.

The shortcomings of this approach have not been lost on many law enforcement leaders and other crisis first responders, and in recent years, police departments from Seattle, Washington to Gloucester, Massachusetts have instituted new strategies and initiatives meant to break this old paradigm and present their officers with options beyond the binary choice to arrest or take no action. Operating under a variety of labels that usually reference ‘diversion’ in some form, these efforts have ranged from actively searching out vulnerable members of the community and connecting them with services to de-escalating potentially criminal encounters through citations or treatment opportunities. Often, it has meant law enforcement officers working in concert with other first responders; in some instances, non-law enforcement personnel may direct a response themselves—indeed, for crises without a criminal justice component, this can represent the optimal response. It has also involved turning to a set of independent crisis response procedures, such as protective custody or citations in lieu of arrest, that entail a noncriminal or deescalated enforcement response and can operate as part—or instead—of a more comprehensive diversion program. Although these strategies are often locally designed and implemented, they do not operate in a legal or political vacuum. Instead, localities are subject to a web of state laws and regulations that directly bear on their ability to institute pre-arrest diversion and other crisis response strategies effectively. Laws that grant local officials noncriminal responses to crises can propel diversion efforts or provide alternative, supplemental crisis responses. Laws that require criminal responses or otherwise circumscribe when and how non-law enforcement responders are able to intervene can impede them. In light of this, the present study dives into these problems by reviewing and analyzing the primary statewide barriers to and accelerants of pre-arrest diversion and crisis response strategies. It begins by providing an overview of pre-arrest diversion strategies. It then delves into five categories of law or regulation that most directly affect these strategies and often serve as the basis of fully-fledged crisis responses in their own right: emergency mental health hold laws, protective custody statutes, citation authority, substance abuse Good Samaritan laws and ambulance transport destination rules.

R STREET POLICY STUDY NO. 187 November 2019

Washington, DC: R Street, 2019. 34p.

By SteVon Felton

The 1991 beating of Rodney King and the subsequent acquittal of the Los Angeles police officers responsible for the attack sparked massive riots and protests across the nation. Following an investigation by the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Civil Rights Division, Congress granted the attorney general the power to investigate “a pattern or practice of conduct by law enforcement officers that violates Constitutional or federal rights.” In cases of a proven pattern or practice of police misconduct, the court may use a federal, court-enforced order, known as a consent decree, as a mechanism to force police departments to address institutional failures. Under such orders, a law enforcement agency and the Justice Department, overseen by an independent monitor, negotiate and establish concrete benchmarks to determine which reforms will constitute the successful end of the decree. Since the first consent decree in 1994, the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department has conducted over 65 investigations and entered into 40 reform agreements with police departments across the country. According to the Division, these negotiations are most effective when they can “ensure accountability, transparency and the flexibility to accomplish complex institutional reforms.” Indeed, a number of studies have now confirmed that consent decrees helped resolve management and oversight issues in cities such as Pittsburgh, Los Angeles and Cincinnati.4 However, while federal consent decrees have their place in promoting systemic policy change, they consistently fail to effect local and cultural change within departments. Several factors contribute to this phenomenon. For starters, as is often the case, centralized models like federal consent decrees cannot adequately adjust to localized systems of knowledge and regional distinctions between departments. Because they target local governments rather than individuals, the reform agreements reached by the DOJ and local law enforcement agencies often fail to sustain cultural change.5 Moreover, within some police departments, consent decrees lack the very thing that is perhaps most important to their success—the support of officers. Without buy-in from individual officers, police departments often disregard best practices that they view as externally forced upon them. And because policing is a profession that allows substantial discretion, in some departments officers openly ignore state and federal policies.6 Given the localized nature of police-citizen interactions, a top-down approach to police reform is virtually guaranteed to be unsuccessful. In light of these failures, the New Orleans Police Department’s Ethical Policing is Courageous (EPIC) program provides an alternative structure that begins with officers’ localized knowledge level and ends with systemic change. By allowing officers to police themselves, EPIC utilizes them and their experiences as resources to promote meaningful change

R STREET SHORTS NO. 70 April 2019

Washington, DC: R Street, 2019. 5p.

By The New Jersey Office of the State Comptroller (OSC)

The New Jersey Office of the State Comptroller (OSC) examined over 500 motor vehicle stops conducted by New Jersey State Police (NJSP) that ended with no enforcement. OSC looked at body-worn camera footage of stops that are rarely, if ever, watched—stops where tickets were not given, arrests were not made, and no one was even ordered to exit their vehicle. Most of the traffic stops OSC reviewed started with the trooper briefly explaining the reason for the stop and requesting a driver’s license, registration, and insurance. But in more than one out of four stops reviewed, the motorist presented a courtesy card, asserted a personal relationship with a law enforcement officer, or even flashed a law enforcement badge. When that happened, the side-of-the-road interactions between the motorists and the stopping troopers shifted, and in some cases, shifted dramatically.

Sometimes, the motorist boldly handed over a courtesy card, occasionally in lieu of driving credentials, and the stop resolved relatively quickly with the trooper offering some version of “you’re good.” Other times, a driver volunteered “my dad is a lieutenant” or “my best friend works at [insert name of any law enforcement agency]” and received remarkably solicitous treatment from the trooper. This was the case even when the drivers were stopped for dangerous traffic infractions, such as driving more than 100 miles per hour or suspected drunk driving. The most serious consequence the troopers imposed in these stops was advising the motorists that they left a voicemail message for the law enforcement officer named on the courtesy card or invoked as a friend or relative. In one instance of suspected drunk driving, the trooper also warned the driver to “stay off my highway,” after reminding him how bad things would be if he crashed under the circumstances.

OSC’s Police Accountability Project initiated this investigation in response to multiple reports that New Jersey law enforcement officers’ exercise of discretion in motor vehicle stops is often influenced by improper factors, such as courtesy cards given to or purchased by motorists. OSC reviewed more than 3,000 minutes of body-worn camera footage, which included 501 traffic stops conducted by a sample of NJSP troopers over a ten-day period in late 2022. In doing so, OSC found evidence of a two-tiered system in which motorists with ties to law enforcement—no matter how tenuous—were given preferential treatment.

Among the findings:

Courtesy cards—which are given out by police labor associations and sold by private companies online—appear to be in wide usage and function as accepted currency. Of the 501 stops OSC reviewed, 87 motorists presented courtesy cards which came from municipal police departments, county and state agencies, as well as inter-state and out-of-state law enforcement agencies. They all appeared to be equally effective at getting motorists released without enforcement.

Motorists who asserted personal relationships with law enforcement have similarly strong social capital that often has the same effect as a courtesy card. In ten percent of the stops, the motorist did not present a courtesy card but cited a relationship to a law enforcement officer and was able to evade any consequences, even for serious motor vehicle violations. In one stop, a driver was speeding 103 miles per hour. The trooper released her after she said her father was a lieutenant. Another motorist, stopped for tailgating, speeding, and driving over the median in a tunnel, was released promptly after he cited a friendship with a law enforcement officer.

Many active duty law enforcement officers were observed using their official government position to get out of a ticket. Some volunteered that they were law enforcement, some flashed badges, and in one instance, a trooper sitting in the back seat of a car offered up his badge number.

Troopers’ decisions to grant preferential treatment to motorists who have courtesy cards or asserted close personal relationships with law enforcement seem to be having a discriminatory impact. White motorists were more likely to hold a courtesy card or assert a relationship to law enforcement. Of the 87 courtesy cards observed in the sample, for instance, 69 were presented by White drivers, while Black, Hispanic/LatinX, Asian, and other drivers presented a combined 18 courtesy cards.

NJSP policy requires troopers to request and review driving credentials (driver’s license, vehicle registration, and proof of insurance) for all stopped drivers. Yet, drivers without courtesy cards or a close relationship with law enforcement were more likely to have all three driving credentials requested and verified by the trooper, more likely to have the trooper take the extra step of conducting a full motor vehicle lookup in the computer, and more likely to be given some form of a warning.

An overall analysis of the full sample revealed racial disparities that went beyond courtesy cards. White and Asian drivers were less likely to have all three of their credentials requested and verified when compared to Black and Hispanic/LatinX drivers. And Hispanic/LatinX drivers who were stopped were generally subjected to a more thorough computerized lookup. Most striking, troopers conducted computerized lookups of Hispanic/LatinX drivers 65 percent of the time, while looking up White drivers only 34 percent of the time.

Out of the 501 stops that resulted in no enforcement, 232 related to speeding. At least 80 of those stops were for 20 or more miles per hour over the speed limit. Speeding is one of the common causes of traffic fatalities.

In short, this two-tiered system of justice that provides differing treatment for those with law enforcement connections and those without is unethical, discriminatory, and fundamentally unfair. It also contributes to making New Jersey roads less safe. Traffic fatalities on New Jersey roads continue to rise, with fatal crashes at the end of November 2024 already well surpassing the number of fatal crashes from the prior year. Impaired driving and speeding are some of the leading causes of accidents. Millions of public dollars are allocated to law enforcement agencies throughout the state to prioritize safety initiatives and adherence to traffic laws. Yet for some drivers, these priorities do not seem to apply.

For these reasons, and those set forth in more detail below, OSC makes 11 recommendations and has also made appropriate referrals. OSC’s findings also make clear that regular review of no enforcement stops could provide valuable insight into officer discretion and also could reveal why particular data trends persist, highlight the need for training or retraining and updates to policies, and ensure that the motor vehicle laws are being enforced fairly and equitably. While some of the drivers in this sample had courtesy cards or asserted relationships to law enforcement, many did not, and yet still avoided any consequences for often serious violations.

Trenton: New Jersey Office of the State Comptroller, 2024. 38p.

By Susan Olzak

Though it has had a long history, the recent social movement aimed at stopping police violence against minorities has consistently endorsed policies designed to make police conduct more accountable. This paper analyzes the effects of protest in cities on the establishment of Citizen Review Boards (CRBs) in recent decades. It also examines whether or not the presence of a CRB influences subsequent rates of police-involved fatalities in cities.

Preprint, 2020.

By Sophia Hunt, Claudia Nmai, and Matthew Clair

This report summarizes perceptions of policing among a racially and socio-economically diverse sample of 37 people who faced criminal charges in the Hall of Justice, a courthouse in San Jose, California, between August 2021 and March 2022. A majority of criminal defendants we interviewed reported negative perceptions of personal police treatment, but a considerable minority reported positive perceptions. Among those who reported negative perceptions, two criticisms were common: (1) individual police officers’ violence, abuse, and fabrication of evidence; and (2) systemic policing practices that are overly intrusive and estrange certain disfavored groups in the Bay Area, such as the unhoused. Among those who reported positive perceptions, some believe that, despite their personal experiences of positive treatment, police do not treat everyone fairly and policing quality varies by context and the race of the policed person. Alongside these perceptions, a handful of defendants in the sample offered visions for changing policing. Two notable visions were: (1) reallocating resources from police departments toward other city services or under-resourced groups; and (2) reforming police departments in ways that reduce discrimination and abuse. While we discuss variation along demographic characteristics in our sample, we foreground how the range of experiences and visions of policing in San Jose have implications for policymakers and future research.

Court Listening Project, Report no. 1. Court Listening Project ((c/o Matthew Clair, Stanford University) 2022, 15p.

By John Bansemer, Greg Rattray and Franklin Lee

The R Street Institute has conducted a study of the challenges associated with improving state and municipal responses to cyber attacks. This study leverages existing reports, interviews with defenders at the state and municipal level, experts studying these challenges, as well as workshops conducted in conjunction with the New York Cyber Task Force. It describes the shape of the challenges and offers recommendations for action to improve state and municipal cyber response capabilities. Further, understanding the associated challenges and extending the work on the recommendations within this report requires significant follow-on efforts. This report seeks to engage and assist those on the front line—governors, mayors, personnel, and state and local governmental organizations. While the federal government and the private sector play key roles, they were not the specific focus of this study

R STREET POLICY STUDY NO. 229 May 2021, 13p.

By Lars Trautman and Camille Infantolino

As with so many facets of American life, the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic hit the criminal justice system like a tsunami, upending existing practices and forcing leaders to rapidly consider new approaches. The fast-spreading, deadly contagion added new urgency to long-festering issues, especially the problems associated with the sheer number of individuals contained within and processed through the system. To protect those working within jails and prisons or those facing the prospect of becoming confined, jurisdictions adopted new policies to reduce the number of individuals entering the system altogether, or at least its correctional facilities. One of the primary ways in which jurisdictions grappled with that priority was by instituting new alternatives to arrest. Across the country, jurisdictions expanded citations in lieu of arrest, deprioritized police stops for minor transgressions, and changed how they received and responded to certain civilian complaints. In each of these instances, the policy shifts suited the COVID-19 situation especially well because of their propensity to reduce unnecessary human contact, particularly in close quarters. Of course, whether jurisdictions retain and even expand these measures, or whether additional jurisdictions follow suit, will depend on more than simply their immediate health benefits. In addition to considering how well the policies lived up to their promises of saving resources, avoiding unproductive police encounters and reducing government interference in individuals’ lives, local authorities will have to weigh the political and public reaction to their introduction. Indeed, one obstacle to alternatives to arrest that has existed since long before the pandemic is fear about how the public will respond to their adoption. Accordingly, the present brief addresses some of these concerns by delving into COVID-19- inspired shifts in alternatives-to-arrest policy and examines how these changes were received in the popular press.

R STREET SHORTS NO. 98 December 2020, 4p.

By Matthew B. Ross

 1. Introduction In November 2021, the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (NJOPIA) engaged the author of this study for the purpose of conducting an independent analysis of traffic stops made by the New Jersey State Police (NJ-SP). Based on the author’s extensive experience working with state and local policymakers to develop early warning systems for identifying police disparities, the NJ OPIA requested that the analysis focus on the central question of whether there was disparate treatment on the part of NJ-SP towards racial and ethnic minorities.2 After cleaning and linking all of the raw data provided by the New Jersey Office of Law Enforcement Professional Standards (NJ-OLEPS), the analytical sample used in this analysis consisted of 6,177,109 traffic stops made by NJ-SP from 2009 to 2021. In the full analytical sample, 60.52 percent of traffic stops were made of White non-Hispanic motorists while 18.8 percent were Black/African-American and 13.44 percent were Hispanic/Latinx. The overall volume of minority motorists stopped by NJ-SP increased from 35.34 percent in 2009 to 46.28 percent in 2021. The overarching finding from the analysis of the NJ-SP data from 2009-21 is that there was extremely strong evidence of a large and persistent disparity both is the decision to stop as well as the decision to engage in post-stop enforcement like search, vehicular exits, use of force, and arrest. In general, the results were estimated with a very high degree of statistical confidence, survived multiple robustness tests, and were found across most years and troops/stations. In the opinion of this study’s author, these disparities represent strong empirical evidence that NJ-SP is engaged in enforcement practices that result in adverse treatment towards minority motorists. Following best practices, this study applies an ensemble of the most reliable statistical tests available in the scientific literature. The intuition of this approach is that the shortcomings of any individual test are overcome by the totality of the evidence produced by a multitude of tests examining a broad set of enforcement outcomes.

Boston: Northeastern University, 2023. 44p.

By Matthew B. Ross, Jesse J. Kalinowski, Kenneth Barone

Connecticut’s novel approach to collecting and analyz-ing traffic stop data for evidence of disparate treatment is widely considered to be a model of best practice. Here,we provide an overview of Connecticut’s framework,detail solutions to the canonical empirical challenges of analyzing traffic stops, and describe a data-driven approach to early intervention. Unlike most juris-dictions that simply produce an annual traffic stop report, Connecticut has developed an ongoing system for identifying and mitigating disparity. Connecticut's Framework for identifying significant disparities on an annual basis relies on the so-called “preponderance ofevidence” approach. Drawing from the cutting-edge of the empirical social science literature, this approach applies several, as opposed to a single, rigorous empiri-cal test of disparity. For departments identified as having a disparity, Connecticut has developed a process for intervening on an annual basis. In that process, police administrators engage with researchers to conduct an empirical exploration into possible contributing factors and enforcement policies. In Connecticut, this approach has transformed what had once been a war of anecdotes into a constructive data-driven conversation about policy. Variants of the Connecticut Model have recently been adopted by the State of Rhode Island, Oregon, and California. Connecticut’s approach provides a useful model and policy framework for states and localities conducting disparity studies of police traffic stops

Criminology & Public Policy. 2020;19 pages:1289–1303.

By Madison, Wisconsin Police Department

  In August 2023, Madison City Council passed a resolution authorizing the Implementation of the Body-Worn Camera Experiment Program. The resolution included multiple attachments that provide a history of the body worn cameras (BWC), feasibility reports, example policy, public comments, Alder amendments, legal review, and Chief Barnes’ memo requesting approval to conduct the experiment. The resolution represents a culmination of several years of effort by city residents, staff and alders. The experiment program consisted of technology, research and cost estimates. The technology portion began April 1, 2024, and was completed July 14. The BWC units were worn by officers in the North District. The first two weeks consisted of setting up and assigning units to officers, testing, and training. The use of body worn cameras began in the field on April 15. The BWC units were loaned by MPD’s existing dash camera vendor for the duration of experiment. The research was conducted by an outside researcher; Dr. Broderick Turner at Virginia Tech. Police Director Eleazer Hunt and members of the BWC Committee met with Dr. Turner multiple times to identify needed data and survey questions. This report includes Dr. Turner’s findings (Appendix A) and a budget estimate for implementation (Appendix B). Estimates are based on full deployment of BWC across MPD, the acquisition of hardware, operations/storage needs, peripherals, personnel, and support several years of operation. During the experiment, an interim Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) guided the use of BWC (Appendix C). This SOP is informed by the Police Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee, MPD’s current SOP for dash cameras and audio microphones , and a review of model policies developed by the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the U.S. Department of Justice. Findings from the experiment: 1- Officers did not change behavior while wearing a BWC 2- Charges were not added when officers reviewed video 3- Technical issues related to battery life and uploading video were evident in the first half of the experiment and resolved 4- Specific situational use of BWC required clarification of the SOP 5- The limitations of the experiment included a short duration, a small number of officers participated, there was limited time for analysis (interviews), and no post-experiment analysis 6- BWC may help with trust building, legitimacy, and transparency  7- Public Records requests impacted staff time to research, redact, and provide videos to requestors  

Madison, WI: City Police Department, 2024. 47p.

By Holly Bird, Jodie Bradshaw, Roger Grimshaw, Habib Kadiri and Helen Mills

The Labour government came into office earlier this year, with an ambitious ‘aim to halve knife crime in a decade’. Early moves have included, in September, the launch of a ‘Coalition to Tackle Knife Crime’, aiming, as the press release put it, to ‘bring together campaign groups, families of people who have tragically lost their lives to knife crime, young people who have been impacted and community leaders, united in their mission to save lives and make Britain a safer place for the next generation’. This was followed, in November, with proposals to fine senior executives of online companies if they market illegal weapons, along with moves to ban the sale of so-called ninja swords. The government is also proposing both ‘rapid intervention and tough consequences’ for those caught in possession of a knife and a network of ‘Young Futures hubs’, to improve access to support for young people at risk of criminalisation. The second of these proposals, which prioritise prevention and support for young people at risk, has a strong evidence-based underpinning it. ‘Decades of research and evidence gathering’, this briefing points out, ‘has shown that the drivers of serious violence are insecure employment prospects, poverty, substance misuse, mental health issues, volatile drug markets, experience of violence’. The same cannot be said of the ‘rapid intervention and tough consequences’ proposals, which tend to prioritise often short-term enforcement over longer-term prevention. One recent example of such action, the subject of this briefing, is the Serious Violence Reduction Order (SVRO), currently being piloted in four police areas in England. At its simplest, the imposition of an SVRO on an individual in effect gives the police carte blanche to stop and search them, at any time and in any place, and without the police having to demonstrate ‘reasonable suspicion’. Previous research on so-called suspicion-less stops and searches, cited in this briefing, found no evidence that they had any impact on the levels of violent crime. Indeed, there is scant evidence that stop and search in general has much of an impact on underlying crime levels (Bradford and Tiratelli, 2019). This is not an argument for no police enforcement. The police clearly perform important public order functions. But it is an argument for the importance of effective, evidenced-based policing. The roll-out of the SVRO pilots are shrouded in secrecy, with information hard to come by. While they are subject of an evaluation, there are some questions over whether it will provide the rigorous evidence of impact (or not) required, or, indeed, whether it will ever be published.

London: Centre for Crime and Justice Studies , 2024. 18p.

By Jonathan Booth

This Article places the birth and growth of the Atlanta police in context by exploring the full scope of Atlanta’s criminal legal system in the four decades after the end of slavery. To do so, it analyzes the connections Atlantans made between race and crime, the adjudication and punishment of minor offenses, and the variety of Bla protests against the criminal legal system. This Article is based in part on a variety of archival sources, including decades of arrest and prosecution data that, for the first time, allow for a quantitative assessment of the impact of the new system of policing on Atlanta’s residents. This Article breaks new ground in four ways. First, it demonstrates that Atlanta’s police force responded to the challenges of freedom: it was designed to maintain white supremacy in an urban space in which residents, theoretically, had equal rights.  Second, it shows that White citizens’ beliefs about the causes of crime and the connections between race and crime, which I call “lay criminology,” influenced policing strategies.  Third, it adds a new layer to our understanding of the history of order maintenance policing by showing that mass criminalization for minor offenses such as disorderly conduct began soon after emancipation. This type of policing caused a variety of harm to the city’s Black residents, leading thousands each year to be forced to pay fines or labor for weeks on the chain gang. Fourth, it shows th the complaints of biased and brutal policing that animate contemporary police reform activists have been present for a century and a half.  Atlanta’s Black residents, across class lines, protested the racist criminal legal system and police abuses while envisioning a more equitable city where improved social conditions would reduce crime.

University of Colorado Law Review, Forthcoming 76 Pages Posted: 22 Apr 2024

By Yvon Dandurand Abeni Steegstra Vivienne Chin

This report presents the results of a review of the crime situation and a gap analysis on crime prevention and response interventions in the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) countries. The main objective of the review is to inform discussions and decisions on the role that Canada can play to help address, at the national and regional levels, the increasing crime levels in the Caribbean. The report offers recommendations in relation to crime prevention interventions to address the risk factors associated with criminal behaviour as well as interventions to respond to criminal activities and reduce future crime through deterrence and offender rehabilitation and reintegration. The review was conducted between October 15, 2023, and March 30, 2024. It covers all CARICOM countries except Haiti. The review relied on: 1. Existing crime data to identify crime rates and crime trends in the CARICOM countries, including violent crime, youth crime, gender-based crimes, and various threats related to organized transnational crime. 2. Existing national victimization data and public perceptions of crime and public safety data. 3. Available information and data on the effectiveness of law enforcement and criminal justice responses to crime and key crime prevention initiatives in CARICOM countries. 4. Public domain information on existing mechanisms to address security governance and collaboration within the region. 5. Public domain information on the assistance provided by Canada and other donors and international agencies in the areas of public safety, criminal justice reform and capacity building, and crime prevention, and on their development plans. 6. Key informant interviews with 93 stakeholders of the region about ongoing criminal justice and crime prevention initiatives, at the national and regional levels, and perceived priorities and opportunities for further initiatives. 7. Consultations and document review concerning existing programming mechanisms in Canada and Canada’s policy engagement at the various missions. Within the scope of the project, the review team considered several specific questions related to perceived gaps in crime prevention and response interventions in CARICOM. It also considered key crime prevention and response interventions being planned or implemented in CARICOM countries. Increased violence in CARICOM countries has been attributed to several factors, including structurally weak social protection, the effects of the COVID-19 epidemic, gang competition and fragmentation, changes in the illicit drug market, the availability of firearms, and a relatively high level of impunity for violent crimes. The dramatic increase in recent years in homicidal violence in many Caribbean countries is largely due to the intense competition between gangs over drug markets. However, there is great intraregional variance in the prevalence of violent crime. Several factors contribute to the proliferation of gangs and gang violence. The lack of economic opportunities, low social cohesion, and weak community resilience are often cited as key drivers of local gang growth. So is transnational organized crime and access to profitable illicit markets. The analysis identified several gaps in three main areas: (i) measures to strengthen the criminal justice system’s responses to crime and deter or reduce it; (ii) measures to control gang violence, transnational organized crime, and emerging crimes; and (iii) measures to prevent violence and crime, including at the school and community levels and measures to prevent recidivism and reintegrate offenders. 

Vancouver, BC:  International Centre for Criminal Law Reform 2024. 197p.

By Williams Downs

An individual’s right to freedom of expression and assembly are protected by Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Together they safeguard the right to peaceful protest. However, these rights are not absolute, and the state can implement laws which restrict the right to protest to maintain public order or protect the rights and freedoms of others. In the UK several pieces of legislation provide a framework for the policing of protests. The Public Order Act 1986 provides the police with powers to restrict protests by placing conditions on them. These powers were strengthened by part 3 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. The Public Order Act 2023 established several criminal offences in relation to protest. These include offences of causing serious disruption by locking-on, being equipped to lock-on, causing serious disruption by tunnelling, obstructing major transport works, and interfering with key national infrastructure. There are also several criminal offences which are not specific to protest situations but could apply to conduct committed during a protest, such as wilful obstruction of a highway, public nuisance, and aggravated trespass. Other routes used to restrict peaceful protest There have been several examples of businesses and organisations applying for civil injunctions (court orders) against protesters to stop them from engaging in protest activity that affects their operations. The Public Order Act 2023 also provides for the Home Secretary to have the power to seek injunctions against protesters, though at the time of writing this provision has not been brought into force. Part 2 of the Public Order Act 2023 created Serious Disruption Prevention Orders (SDPOs), which are civil orders that enable courts to attach conditions or restrictions on an individual aged over 18 (such as restrictions on where they can go and when) with the view of preventing them from engaging in protest-related activity that could cause disruption. Breach of an SDPO is a criminal offence.

In some cases, local authorities have used their powers under the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 to impose Public Space Protection Orders in areas outside of abortion clinics to prohibit protest activity. A provision in the Public Order Act 2023 to prohibit protest activity at all abortion clinics in England and Wales has not yet been brought into force. Legislative reform In recent years, the government initiated two major legislative reforms in response to concerns about peaceful but disruptive protests that have targeted major roads, transport networks, and other infrastructure. These were the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023. Both were aimed at increasing the powers of the police to intervene and stop disruptive protests and to strengthen the criminal justice response to those engaging in disruptive protest tactics. The legislation was controversial and attracted strong opposition from campaigners who questioned the compatibility of the reforms with human rights legislation. The Joint Committee on Human Rights said that the combined measures would likely “have a chilling effect on the right to protest in England and Wales” (PDF). The government stated that its legislation aimed to “protect the public and businesses from these unacceptable actions” of “a small minority of protestors”. It said that existing human rights legislation provides appropriate safeguards for the right to protest (PDF) and that the police and prosecutors will continue to be responsible for acting “compatibly with an individual’s Convention rights” when making any decisions about arrests and charges    

London: UK Parliament, House of Commons Library, 2024. 50p,]

By  Anthony Morgan, Hayley Boxall, Christopher Dowling and Rick Brown

Focused deterrence approaches to domestic violence have been developed in the US to increase offender accountability and ensure appropriately targeted responses to victims. While innovative, the model has strong theoretical and empirical foundations. It is based on a set of fundamental principles and detailed analysis of domestic violence patterns and responses. This paper uses recent Australian research to explore the feasibility of adapting this model to an Australian context. Arguments in favour of the model, and possible barriers to implementation, are described. Based on an extensive body of Australian research on patterns of domestic violence offending and reoffending, and in light of recent developments in responses to domestic violence, this paper recommends trialling focused deterrence and ‘pulling levers’ to reduce domestic violence reoffending in an Australian pilot site. 

 Trends & issues in crime and criminal justice no. 593. Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology.2020. 20p.

By Brittany Cunningham, Jessica Dockstader, Zoe Thorkildsen

Officer safety is of critical importance in an era of increased risk for law enforcement officers. Law enforcement officers (hereafter, “officers”) respond to some of the most unpredictable, traumatic, and violent encounters of any profession.1 Although much of an officer’s workday entails repetitive interactions, some calls for service or self-initiated interactions by police officers may escalate into dangerous encounters. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI’s) Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted (LEOKA) Program, between 2010 and 2018, an average of 51 officers died in a felonious killing per year. LEOKA defines a felonious killing as an “incident type in which the willful and intentional actions of an offender result in the fatal injury of an officer who is performing his or her official duties.” Regardless of how officer line-of-duty deaths, assaults, or injuries occur, the consequences are tragic and complex, affecting officers’
work and home life.2 Just as de-escalation, defusing, and crisis intervention tactics are paramount today, so is officer safety. This brief provides an accessible resource for law enforcement agencies, line officers, and their stakeholders (e.g., policy-makers, training instructors) to inform the development of targeted training, policies, and practices to promote officer safety while in the line of duty. Specifically, this brief offers the following:

•  a summary of officer safety risks related to calls for services, traffic-related encounters, ambushes, and blue-on-blue encounters;

• recommendations for promoting officer safety related to tactical preparedness; and

• real-world policing initiatives that serve as examples of practices in the field to improve officer safety.

Arlington, VA: CNA, 2021. 24p.

By Christopher M. Sun, James R. “Chip” Coldren, Jr., Keri Richardson, and Emma Wohl

Law enforcement agencies continue to develop new and innovative strategies to better support and police the communities they serve, from integrating gunshot detection technologies into dispatch systems to improve response times during shootings, to collaborating with local health and social service organizations to address issues such as homelessness or substance abuse in comprehensively ways. Over the past 10 years, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), in partnership with the CNA Institute for Public Research (IPR), has supported law enforcement agencies across the country in implementing innovative policing approaches through the Strategies for Policing Innovation Initiative (SPI, formerly the Smart Policing Initiative). SPI supports not only the development and implementation of innovative policing strategies, but also the research partnerships that result in in-depth analyses and rigorous evaluations of these strategies to advance what is known about effective and efficient policing practices. This report examines SPI’s accomplishments since its inception in 2009 and explores some of the major themes across SPI initiatives in both policing and policing research, including the following:

• Reductions in violent crime

• Improved crime analysis capabilities in police agencies

• Evolution of research partnerships with SPI sites

• Collaborative partnerships with agencies, organizations, and community stakeholders

• Integration of technology into policing

Arlington VA: CNA, 2019. 20p

By Benjamin Carleton, Tammy Felix, Monique Jenkins, Stephen Rickman, Chief Robert C. White (retired), Tom Woodmansee, and Michael Speer,   A. Nicole Phillips, Brian G. Remondino, and Kimberly L. Sachs

On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man died after being handcuffed and pinned to the ground by a Minneapolis police officer. Community bystanders captured the event on video, which was shared widely on social media and resulted in community outrage, an FBI investigation, a civil rights investigation, and the firing and arrests of all four involved officers. The compelling video—8 minutes and 46 seconds of Officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on the neck of George Floyd—quickly spread amongst social media, cable news stations, and major news outlets, sparking strong reactions both within the Minneapolis community and across the nation. This incident contributed to a growing public perception of biased and sometimes brutal treatment of African Americans by police officers. This incident occurred within the context of other recent shootings and deaths of African Americans at the hands of police officers. George Floyd’s cries of “I can’t breathe” harken back to 2014 and the in-custody death of Eric Garner by use of a chokehold. More recently, with the shooting deaths of Walter Scott, Alton Sterling, Breonna Taylor, and Philando Castile, many Americans reached a tipping point in their patience with systemic racism and the pace of police reforms, leading to nationwide protests. The day after the killing of Floyd, protests in the city of Minneapolis ended with a march to Minneapolis Third Precinct Headquarters. Tensions rose as protestors threw water bottles, and police responded with rubber bullets and tear gas. Protests resumed the following day. Once again, in the evening hours, protest led to confrontations with police, who responded with tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash bangs. Later that evening in nearby neighborhoods, windows of businesses were broken, some stores were looted, and two buildings were set ablaze. For the remainder of the week, Minneapolis experienced ongoing protests and damage to public buildings, looting, fires, and civil disturbances across the City. Protests and civil disturbances surfaced in other cities, beginning in earnest in Philadelphia on May 30. For the next several weeks, Philadelphia experienced peaceful protests coupled with civil unrest resulting in looting, vandalism, and burning of buildings. Police deployed tear gas, rubber bullets, and other crowd control munitions and tools, sometimes directly affecting Philadelphia residential neighborhoods. In the aftermath, Mayor James Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw announced plans “to engage an independent consultant to conduct a comprehensive examination of the City’s response to recent protests and other activities, which will include investigations of the Philadelphia Police Department’s use of force.” Police Commissioner Outlaw stated that “the Department’s commitment to reform must include an assessment of how police responded to the very protests that called for change.” She also pledged to make public a final comprehensive report. The City of Philadelphia contracted CNA (a nationally recognized, well-established, non-profit research organization with extensive experience in police assessments) along with Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads, LLP (a Philadelphia-based law firm with extensive experience in conducting government and corporate internal investigations) to conduct the after-action analysis of the City’s response to the Floyd protests. The City committed to an independently conducted analysis and openly provided the consulting team access to relevant data and personnel needed to perform the analysis. The purpose of this after-action analysis is to provide the PPD and other City officials with an enhanced understanding of what happened during the Floyd protests, and to provide guidance on improving future PPD and City responses. This report is a “forward-thinking document” that emphasizes developing recommendations and remedial actions that will strengthen PPD and the City’s future responses to demonstrations, protests, and civil unrest. Importantly, this analysis is not an investigation of wrongdoing (which will be addressed by other agencies), but rather an effort to provide a roadmap to PPD and support agencies to apply best practices and lessons learned for more effective responses in the future. The timeline for this analysis extends from the national events leading up to the Philadelphia protests beginning the afternoon of May 30, 2020, through June 15, after which there was a falloff in the number, size, and tenor of the protests. This analysis focuses on the actions taken by PPD, coupled with the nature and extent of support of other agencies in response to these protests and civil disturbances. This report does not broadly examine PPD policy, training and practices, but rather focuses on those relevant to this response.

Arlington, VA: CNA, 2020. 110p.

By Emily Owens and Bocar Ba

The efficiency of any police action depends on the relative magnitude of its crime-reducing benefits and legitimacy costs. Policing strategies that are socially efficient at the city level may be harmful at the local level, because the distribution of direct costs and benefits of police actions that reduce victimization is not the same as the distribution of indirect benefits of feeling safe. In the United States, the local misallocation of police resources is disproportionately borne by Black and Hispanic individuals. Despite the complexity of this particular problem, the incentives facing both police departments and police officers tend to be structured as if the goals of policing were simple—to reduce crime by as much as possible. Formal data collection on the crime-reducing benefits of policing, and not the legitimacy costs, produces further incentives to provide more engagement than may be efficient in any specific encounter, at both the officer and departmental level. There is currently little evidence as to what screening, training, or monitoring strategies are most effective at encouraging individual officers to balance the crime reducing benefits and legitimacy costs of their actions.

JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC PERSPECTIVES VOL. 35, NO. 4, FALL 2021 (pp. 3–28)