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  • #EndSARS: Inside Nigeria's Fight to End Police Brutality

    October 29, 2020 |

    Yes! Magazine |

    Text |

    1500-3000 Words

    Response Location: Nigeria, Lagos

    Modeled in part on America's Black Lives Matter protest movement, Nigerian protests against brutality and extortion committed by the police have in a brief time attracted uncommon levels of support across ethnic and religious lines. The government responded by disbanding the primary focus of the protests, its notorious Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), and made other concessions. Protesters say these steps, while welcomed, might easily be undercut by government intransigence. So they have vowed to continue pressing for reform of the Nigeria Police Force.

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  • Philly police rebuffed offers from crisis response center to work together, director says

    October 29, 2020 |

    Billy Penn |

    Text |

    Under 800 Words

    Response Location: United States, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

    Since early 2019, a mental-health crisis response center, the West Philadelphia Consortium, has worked to get the police to call in the consortium's mobile crisis team to de-escalate crises and get people into treatment. In more than 1,200 cases in 2019, police made only six arrests and no one died. After police shot and killed Walter Wallace, Jr., during a mental-health crisis, the consortium revealed that it had worked with Wallace but wasn't called for help when police were summoned to his home. The consortium seeks to formalize its relationship with the police department to prevent more violence.

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  • Joe Biden Should Stop Bragging About the Violence Against Women Act

    October 29, 2020 |

    Reason |

    Text |

    Over 3000 Words

    Response Location: United States

    The Violence Against Women Act was billed as a way to make a patriarchal society, and policing profession in particular, take domestic violence more seriously. It encouraged policies making arrest of alleged abusers mandatory, even to the point of punishing victims who refused to cooperate in prosecutions. This has backfired on many victims, especially women of color who distrust police and their punitive approaches to solving family problems. The law also prioritizes punitive approaches in its awarding of federal grants, thus denying victim aid to women who do not wish to cooperate with arrests.

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  • Decades of Data Suggest Racial Profiling is Getting Worse, Not Better

    October 28, 2020 |

    Flatland |

    Text |

    1500-3000 Words

    Response Location: United States, Missouri

    In 2000, Missouri passed one of the nation's first and most comprehensive laws aimed at ending racial profiling by police in traffic stops. But racial disparities have grown worse since then, with Black drivers far more likely than white drivers to be stopped and searched. The law relies on data collection to air the problem, which in turn was supposed to spur more reforms. But the state's lackluster efforts to enforce the law and lack of follow through on other reforms has turned the annual data gathering into "little more than exercises in futility."

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  • Police de-escalation training gaining renewed clout as law enforcement seeks to reduce killings

    October 27, 2020 |

    The Washington Post |

    Text |

    1500-3000 Words

    Response Location: United States, Louisville, Kentucky

    A de-escalation training program from the Police Executive Research Forum, used by 85 police agencies already, was shown in Louisville to reduce police officers' use of force by 28%. The training resulted in 26% fewer injuries to residents, and an even larger drop in injured officers. The training focuses on incidents where the person is not armed with a gun but often is in a mental-health crisis. Contrary to traditional training that emphasizes command-and-control tactics with escalating shows of force, PERF's approach teaches officers to slow and calm the situation in ways that can avoid a shooting.

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  • Booking homeless Portlanders into jail is endless, expensive cycle that arrests don't curb, but housing does

    October 25, 2020 |

    The Oregonian |

    Text |

    Over 3000 Words

    Response Location: United States, Portland, Oregon

    Temporary housing providing drug treatment and other services to people experiencing homelessness appears to cut the chances that people arrested in Portland on minor charges will cycle repeatedly through the criminal justice system. In 2019, 250 people living in transitional housing were booked into jail, versus nearly 3,700 people still living on the streets. The rearrest rate for people living on the street is 87%, but 30 points lower for people with housing. Portland officials have been slow to provide alternatives to arrests and jail since a report in 2017 that most arrestees in Portland are homeless.

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  • Nigerians don't trust the government to respond to emergency calls. So they created apps instead.

    October 24, 2020 |

    Rest of World |

    Text |

    800-1500 Words

    Response Location: Nigeria

    Fearful and distrustful of corrupt and abusive police forces, Nigerians by the thousands have downloaded locally developed mobile apps like Sety and Aabo to call friends for help during abductions or other emergencies. These first-responder apps feature panic buttons that alert contacts or people nearby during an emergency. The app makers do not share usage data, but users say they feel safer by having such apps available if they are harassed by the police or in need of protection from an attack.

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  • These groups try to hack the vote – so that real criminals can't

    October 21, 2020 |

    The Christian Science Monitor |

    Text |

    800-1500 Words

    Response Location: United States

    Cyber security simulations are taking place across the country to help everyone, from government officials to journalists, to identify election-related cyber threats and coordinated disinformation campaigns and make plans to strengthen defenses against them. One company, Cybereason, holds simulation events, sometimes bringing together law enforcement officers from agencies including the Secret Service and FBI, to think through potential security threats and come up with corresponding solutions. Running through security breach simulations helps plan for a quick response to deal with the challenges.

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  • Unlike Vermont, New Hampshire state police don't collect racial data for arrests

    October 18, 2020 |

    Concord Monitor |

    Text |

    1500-3000 Words

    Response Location: United States, New Hampshire

    New Hampshire's official response to nationwide protests of racial bias in policing lacks a critical element: a statewide database showing the race of drivers and passengers in police stops and arrests. Unlike neighboring Vermont, which since 2014 has kept a data-informed eye on racial disparities in policing, New Hampshire officials say they cannot afford to integrate such data from local agencies. Instead, those local agencies are now under a legislative mandate to report what they track to their communities. Advocates say statewide analysis would better inform police training and policies.

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  • This police officer has made it her mission to end domestic violence

    October 14, 2020 |

    NBC News |

    Broadcast TV News |

    3-5 Minutes

    Response Location: United States, Thibodaux, Louisiana

    In southern Louisiana's Lafourche Parish, sheriff's deputy Valerie Martinez Jordan used her history as a domestic violence victim to create a countywide program to legally seize the guns of people convicted of domestic violence or whose gun rights are suspended under a protective order. The program, since expanded statewide by legislation she inspired, took more than 200 guns out of circulation in her parish alone since last year and is credited with preventing any domestic homicides by people disarmed through her program's efforts.

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