Hate Crimes
Biden’s Challenge: Can He Curb Rising Tide of Hate Crimes?
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Hate-crime killings set a record in 2019. President-elect Joe Biden has vowed to try stemming the trend, but does he need new legislation to succeed?
Reforming the System
Illinois Police Reform Bill Labeled ‘Wrong, Disastrous, Dangerous’
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Illinois lawmakers have introduced a major criminal justice reform bill that includes ending cash bail and qualified immunity for police officers, and allows anonymous complaints against officers. Law enforcement critics say it will eliminate “policing as we know it.”
Reforming the System
Virginia Crime Commission Recommends Scrapping Mandatory Minimums
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Members of the Virginia State Crime Commission have voted overwhelmingly in favor of legislation stripping all mandatory minimum sentences from the state’s criminal code. Lawmakers will decide this week on the recommendation, which affects about 4,000 inmates.
Reforming the System
New York’s Criminal Justice Knowledge Bank Backs Reform With Evidence
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The New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services uses data and research to facilitate connections and foster promising practices in law enforcement.
Transnational Crime
The Latin American Drug Cartel You Haven’t Heard of
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While the attention of organized crime specialists and the international media has focused on the notorious drug cartels of Mexico and Colombia, Brazil’s little-known Primeiro Comando da Capital is emerging as the Western hemisphere’s most potent crime threat. A new report calls the trafficking group South America’s “most powerful prison gang” ― and warns its operations are quietly expanding.
Terrorism
Experts Predict New Era of Extremist Violence After Assault on Capitol
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The deadly insurrection at the Capitol should serve as a wake-up call to those who have ignored the warnings, says one expert on right-wing violence, who called it “the beginning of a new movement, not the end of an old one.” At least 120 individuals have been arrested so far, many of them members of groups following conspiracy theorists.
Officials Feared ‘Optics’ of Deploying National Guard at Capitol Before Riot
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Steven Sund, outgoing chief of the U.S. Capitol Police, says his repeated requests to put the D.C. National Guard on standby on the eve of the assault on Congress were rejected by House and Senate security chiefs as well as the Pentagon. Sund’s remarks came as officials traded barbs over who was to blame for leaving Congress unprepared, and the death of a second capitol police officer — by suicide — was reported.
Policing
Do Disgraced Corrupt Cops Deserve 454 Years in Prison?
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Two notorious former Baltimore Police officers serving hundreds of years in federal prison for shaking down drug dealers are seeking to be released, arguing their sentences wouldn’t hold up today.
Policing
California Board Calls for Bias Reviews of Police Social Media
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A state advisory board in California has recommended that police agencies routinely review the cell phones, computers and social media pages of police officers for racist and otherwise offensive content in an effort to weed out officers who are prone to racial profiling.
Policy & Politics
Garland Pledges Justice Department Shielded from ‘Partisan’ Politics
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Attorney-General designate Merrick Garland promised Thursday to restore the political independence of the Department of Justice and reaffirm Watergate-era principles ensuring justice will be shielded from “partisan” aims.