Police are important, but not sufficient, in the crime-reduction effort. I have enormous faith in their abilities, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we need more of them.
Sydney’s Kings Cross precinct has 3AM ‘last-drinks’ laws and 1:30AM lockouts for premises that serve alcohol.
AAP/April Fonti
As Queensland considers new laws to curb alcohol-fuelled violence in response to a one-punch death, several policy experiments that have occurred in recent years can provide valuable lessons.
Demonstrators protest Laquan McDonald’s shooting in Chicago.
Andrew Nelles/Reuters
Preventing crime before it happens, while saving resources, sounds like a great use of big data. But these calculated probabilities raise big questions about civil liberties.
There’s a surprising amount of resistance to making policing a graduate profession.
Early support could save lives and allow Aboriginal people with mental and cognitive disability to live with dignity in their communities.
Yasmeen/Flickr
Aboriginal people with mental and cognitive disability are managed mostly by police, courts, prison and hospitals. It’s costing us millions, when kinder and cheaper alternatives exist.
Police often don’t recognise that someone has an intellectual disability or brain injury due to a lack of training in this area, researchers have heard.
Brian Yap (葉)/flickr
Police have become the default frontline response to Aboriginal people with mental and cognitive disabilities, setting this group up for a lifetime of ‘management’ by the criminal justice system.
The needs of Aboriginal women with disabilities are not being met by any human service system, research shows.
sidkid/flickr
Research suggests serious problems with the way Aboriginal women, particularly those with mental and cognitive disabilities, are “managed” by the criminal justice system.
Aboriginal people with mental and cognitive disability are ‘managed’ by police, courts and prisons due to a lack of appropriate community-based services.
Kate Ausburn/flickr
Australia’s high rates of imprisonment and re-imprisonment of Aboriginal people with mental and cognitive disabilities is not only shameful, it is entirely predictable and preventable.
Addressing violent extremism requires more than police simply knowing about the signs of radicalisation.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
Police brutality is an ongoing problem in South Africa. Police-worn body cameras may help reduce such incidents by improving accountability. They may also contribute to the safety of officers.
IWF moves will control only the most visible child abuse images online.
Cybercrime by hamburg_berlin/shutterstock.com
Math isn’t prejudiced, goes the argument. But these arithmetic programs can learn bias from the data fed into them by human beings, leading to unfair treatment and discrimination.
Violence erupts again in Ferguson, Missouri.
Lucas Jackson/REUTERS
Two criminologists long associated with the University of Missouri – St Louis dispel myths about Ferguson, a community that borders the campus, and explain what’s behind the violent protests there.
Sandra Bland (left) died in jail after a routine traffic stop in Texas. Freddie Gray died after suffering a spinal injury while in police custody.
Wikipedia
Groups like Letzgo Hunting claim to fill the gaps left by inefficient police work, but does their approach undermine police work and treatment?
The Northern Territory’s ‘paperless arrest’ powers are at odds with recommendations by the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.
Shutterstock/Igor Golovniov
Northern Territory police powers to make ‘paperless arrests’ are completely contrary to recommendations by the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, and now the inevitable has happened.