tag:theconversation.com,2011:/nz/topics/police-1165/articlesPolice – The Conversation2024-03-01T02:56:27Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2246332024-03-01T02:56:27Z2024-03-01T02:56:27ZThe policing of LGBTQ+ people casts a long, dark shadow. Marching at Mardi Gras must be backed up with real change<p>Public trust and confidence in NSW Police has been sorely tested in the past two weeks. The charging of a police officer with the murders of a Sydney gay couple, Jesse Baird and Luke Davies, has seen shock turn to grief <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/27/a-lot-of-hurt-and-anger-how-the-queer-community-feels-let-down-by-nsw-police">and then anger</a>. </p>
<p>NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb’s framing of the case as a “crime of passion” downplayed the alleged culpability of the accused, and overlooked the murders as possible <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/police-face-backlash-for-using-the-term-crime-of-passion-heres-why-its-irresponsible/b81xl9k0g">domestic violence</a>. The commissioner’s gratitude to the accused for leading police to the location of the remains of the deceased drew further ire. </p>
<p>Yet the most heated debate has been about the appropriateness of the police force’s presence in the 2024 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade. This focus has brought to the surface a spectrum of viewpoints on diversity and inclusion. Much of this focus has ignored the reasons why there is growing dissatisfaction with NSW police among many LGBTQ+ people. This is amid <a href="https://www.pc.gov.au/ongoing/report-on-government-services/2024/justice/rogs-2024-partc-overview-and-sections.pdf">ten-year lows</a> of public perceptions of police integrity nationally. Emotions have been running high. </p>
<p>But these recent events are part of a long and complicated history of the policing of LGBTQ+ people, and of Mardi Gras in particular.</p>
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<h2>The ongoing stigma of criminalisation</h2>
<p>The first Mardi Gras in 1978 was a protest that <a href="https://www.mardigras.org.au/history-of-sydney-mardi-gras/">ended with violence</a> between the police and protesters, and the beating of many of the 53 arrestees while in police custody. The damage was exacerbated by the publication in The Sydney Morning Herald of the names, addresses and professions of those arrested. </p>
<p>The first Mardi Gras was held six years before the decriminalisation of homosexuality in NSW in 1984. That was a time when public attitudes were becoming more accepting of homosexuality. But coming out could still lead to you losing your job, and <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/karen-says-she-was-fired-by-a-christian-school-due-to-her-sexuality-shes-not-alone/155fd7f8v">still can</a>. Acting on your same-sex desire could also get you <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/departments-and-agencies/the-cabinet-office/resources/special-commissions-of-inquiry/lgbtiq-hate-crimes">killed</a>. </p>
<p>The deeper background to the policing of homosexuality in the 1970s was the expansion of laws and penalties against homosexuality amid increased vilification and discrimination against gays and lesbians after the second world war. The legacy of criminalisation continues through stigma that targets gay men, drag queens and <a href="https://theconversation.com/our-hybrid-media-system-has-emboldened-anti-lgbtq-hate-what-can-we-do-about-it-205028">transgender women</a> as “child groomers”. </p>
<p>It continues through so-called “conversion” therapies that seek to “correct” same-sex desire, often with <a href="https://ilga.org/Conversion-therapy-report-ILGA-World-Curbing-Deception">catastrophic consequences</a>. </p>
<h2>Community responses to the policing of Mardi Gras</h2>
<p>A viral video of police’s excessive force at the 2013 Mardi Gras parade resulted in <a href="https://www.acon.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Policing-Advocacy-document.pdf">LGBTQ+ community action</a>, and a 2014 <a href="https://www.starobserver.com.au/news/mardi-gras-police-premier-sign-new-mardi-gras-festival-accord/118358">memorandum of understanding</a> between Mardi Gras and NSW Police. </p>
<p>Central to that agreement was that Mardi Gras should be policed in a way that is safe and welcoming for all participants and spectators. </p>
<p>The issues with drug detection dogs were documented <a href="https://www.ombo.nsw.gov.au/Find-a-publication/publications/reports-to-parliament/police/review-of-the-police-powers-drug-detection-dogs-act-2001">comprehensively</a> by the NSW Ombudsman in 2006, yet NSW Police continues to use them at Mardi Gras and other festivals. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/theres-a-growing-gap-between-countries-advancing-lgbtq-rights-and-those-going-backwards-203329">There's a growing gap between countries advancing LGBTQ+ rights, and those going backwards</a>
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<p>This is despite the NSW coroner in 2019 recommending <a href="https://coroners.nsw.gov.au/documents/findings/2019/Music_Festival_Redacted_findings_in_the_joint_inquest_into_deaths_arising_at_music_festivals_.pdf">stopping the use</a> of drug detection dogs at music festivals in NSW. This is because, among other things, the presence of the dogs can cause panic ingestion of drugs by party-goers. </p>
<p>NSW Law Enforcement Conduct Commission investigations into strip searches conducted by NSW police officers found that many of the searches <a href="https://www.lecc.nsw.gov.au/news-and-publications/publications/final-report-an-inquiry-into-nsw-police-force-strip-search-practices-15-december-2020.pdf">were unlawful</a>. </p>
<h2>Apologies only go so far</h2>
<p>There have been apologies to the LGBTQ+ community over the years from politicians, police and the media, mainly about the treatment of the “78ers” who marched in the first Mardi Gras. </p>
<p>The most recent apology has come from the NSW police commissioner. The commissioner has apologised to the families of gay hate crime victims whose deaths were not properly investigated by NSW police over four decades from 1970 to 2010. </p>
<p>That apology was foregrounded by Justice John Sackar, who led the NSW Special Commission of Inquiry into LGBTIQ+ hate crimes in NSW. It handed down its findings in late 2023. </p>
<p>The police commissioner has come under fire for the time and placement of the apology, which was issued as an exclusive to The Sunday Telegraph as the search for Baird and Davies continued. Further, NSW police has <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/police-yet-to-accept-gay-hate-crime-inquiry-recommendations-despite-apology-20240225-p5f7n1.html">not officially responded</a> to the special commission’s recommendations. </p>
<p>Justice Sackar’s <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/departments-and-agencies/the-cabinet-office/resources/special-commissions-of-inquiry/lgbtiq-hate-crimes">overall impression</a> was that “in significant respects”, NSW Police’s engagement with the inquiry was “adversarial or unnecessarily defensive”. The judge noted that police strike forces Macnamir (2013), Parrabell (2015) and Neiwand (2015) failed in their assessment of hate as a motivator in historical homicides of gay men.</p>
<p>Two of these inquiries occurred after the Mardi Gras and NSW Police Force memorandum was established. In 2023, about two-thirds of the Mardi Gras membership voted to withdraw from it.</p>
<h2>Community taking back ownership</h2>
<p>Mardi Gras is a member-based organisation that champions LGBTQ+ social issues through leveraging the power of arts, culture, partnerships and celebration. </p>
<p>NSW police-branded pride paraphernalia at the festival sits in stark contrast with its invasive and harmful drug detection dog operations, aggressive policing, and ambivalence about addressing historic wrongs. </p>
<p>For many viewers of the Mardi Gras parade, the presence of the police in uniform may suggest the relationship between the LGBTQ+ community and NSW Police is a positive one. This is partly true.</p>
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<p>The force’s negative reaction to Mardi Gras’ request not to march in the 2024 parade illustrates the symbolic significance to police of marching in the parade, and its public relations value. </p>
<p>Mardi Gras members, and the Mardi Gras board, have decided that police force participation in the event is <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-02-26/sydney-mardi-gras-request-nsw-police-not-march-parade/103514440">conditional</a>. Police will now march, but out of uniform. </p>
<p>It remains to be seen whether NSW Police will deliver on greater transparency and accountability. If it decides to do so, the benefits will be realised well beyond LGBTQ+ communities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224633/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole L. Asquith is the Convener of the Australian Hate Crime Network, and in that role was contracted by the Special Commission of Inquiry into LGBTIQ Hate Crimes to provide paid, expert testimony.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Justin Ellis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s easy to assume the latest opposition to NSW police taking part in the annual festival is a response to recent events. Really, it’s the result of a long, painful history.Justin Ellis, Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Newcastle, University of NewcastleNicole L. Asquith, Director, Tasmanian Institute of Law Enforcement Studies, University of TasmaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2179892024-02-22T13:43:49Z2024-02-22T13:43:49ZPhilly mayor might consider these lessons from NYC before expanding stop-and-frisk<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/572924/original/file-20240201-27-r8f6fh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">New York City's use of stop-and-frisk was found to be unconstitutional in 2013.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-walk-past-a-police-car-in-the-in-the-brownsville-news-photo/1188492384">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.inquirer.com/crime/alexander-spencer-philadelphia-police-shooting-fairhill-20240128.html">police killing of 28-year-old Alexander Spencer</a> in a North Philadelphia corner store in January 2024 reignited debate about whether expanding stop-and-frisk in Philly can reduce violence in the city.</p>
<p>As part of her promise to reduce crime, Philadelphia’s newly elected mayor, Cherelle Parker, has <a href="https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/stop-and-frisk-philly-mayors-race-2023-20230419.html">indicated her support</a> for the expansion of <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-road-map-for-the-lawful-use-of-stop-and-frisk-in-philadelphia-and-elsewhere-217878">stop-and-frisk policies</a>.</p>
<p>Parker’s approach is not surprising. Historically, when crime increases, American society assumes that lax or lenient crime-control strategies <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Cycle_of_Juvenile_Justice.html?id=8IE8DwAAQBAJ">are to blame</a>. </p>
<p>Yet, since the mid-1990s, data repeatedly shows that tough-on-crime approaches – such as <a href="https://umbc.edu/stories/just-what-are-zero-tolerance-policies-and-are-they-still-common-in-americas-schools">zero-tolerance policies</a>, <a href="https://famm.org/wp-content/uploads/FS-MMs-in-a-Nutshell.pdf">mandatory sentencing</a> and <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/history-mass-incarceration">mass incarceration</a> – cost taxpayers large sums of money, are inefficient and can even <a href="https://www.iirp.edu/news/stop-and-frisk-policies-increase-youth-crime-study-shows">make crime worse</a>, specifically among youth.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yQqgnOUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">professor of sociology, criminology and public policy</a>, I believe that Mayor Parker and the Philadelphia Police Department should heed the lessons learned from other jurisdictions regarding the dangers of stop-and-frisk – most notably New York City. </p>
<p>The greater use of stop-and-frisk in Philadelphia could lead to a myriad of unwanted consequences, such as lawsuits against the city, greater racial disparities in the criminal justice system, citizen unrest and distrust of the police. Meanwhile, there is little evidence that an expanded stop-and-frisk policy will actually reduce crime. </p>
<h2>What is stop-and-frisk?</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/constitutional-amendments-amendment-4-right-privacy">Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution</a> ensures an individual’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. But who determines what is reasonable? </p>
<p>A 1968 U.S. Supreme Court decision took up that question. In <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/392/1/">Terry v. Ohio</a>, the court ruled that a police officer can stop, question and frisk a person as long as the officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person has committed, is committing or is about to commit a crime. Frisking was allowed to protect the police officers only if the individual was suspected to be armed or if during questioning the level of suspicion rose to probable cause. Probable cause, most simply, is a higher standard of evidence that an individual may have committed a crime and is required for a judge to issue a warrant for an arrest or a search.</p>
<p>However, in the decades following Terry v. Ohio, police departments across the country have used stop-and-frisk in ways that stretch the limits of the decision and potentially violate Fourth Amendment rights.</p>
<p>New York City is perhaps the most notorious example.</p>
<h2>A tough-on-crime policy</h2>
<p>In 1993, Rudy Giuliani famously ran his New York City mayoral campaign on a tough-on-crime platform. Upon election, he hired Bill Bratton as police commissioner. Bratton had previously served as Boston’s police commissioner and also as the chief of the NYC Transit Police.</p>
<p>Under this new administration, police began aggressively pursuing minor offenses such as marijuana possession, alcohol use, motor vehicle violations and vagrancy. In addition, officers were encouraged to stop and frisk individuals <a href="https://nyupress.org/9781479835881/stop-and-frisk/">who merely looked suspicious</a> based on location, dress, demeanor or other characteristics of the individual.</p>
<p>When Michael Bloomberg replaced Giuliani as mayor in 2002, he expanded on these practices with “<a href="https://www.nyc.gov/html/unccp/gprb/downloads/pdf/NYC_Safety%20and%20Security_Operation%20Impact.pdf">Operation Impact</a>.” </p>
<p>Operation Impact flooded officers into areas that were designated as “impact zones” because of high levels of existing crime. Unsurprisingly, most of these neighborhoods had high poverty rates, high rates of renters compared with homeowners and were communities of color – the three factors that <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/2151797">suggest a community will have high levels of crime</a>.</p>
<p>With police officers disproportionately placed in such communities, and encouraged to stop and frisk with low levels of suspicion, it is not surprising that research finds high levels of racial disparity in the decisions to stop and frisk. Minorities were over <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep27210.4">3.5 times more likely</a> than whites to be subject to these policies. Law professor Jeffrey Bellin detailed how the minor impact that stop-and-frisk may have had on illegal gun carrying in New York was <a href="https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/facpubs/1706">tied to its unconstitutionality</a>.</p>
<h2>Lessons from NYC</h2>
<p>New York City’s experience with stop-and-frisk policies provides, I believe, important lessons for Philadelphia’s mayor to consider. </p>
<p>First and foremost, <a href="https://casetext.com/case/floyd-v-city-of-ny-2">multiple</a> <a href="https://casetext.com/case/davis-v-city-of-new-york-5">lawsuits</a> <a href="https://casetext.com/case/ligon-v-city-of-ny-8">related to stop-and-frisk</a> were filed against the NYPD and the city government during Bloomberg’s third term as mayor. In each of these cases, the city was found liable for unconstitutional practices.</p>
<p>The NYPD and the city itself were rebuked by the courts for the discriminatory nature of stop-and-frisk searches. Perhaps not surprisingly, stop-and-frisk became a central issue in NYC’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/28/nyregion/bill-de-blasio-kicks-off-campaign-for-mayor.html">2013 mayoral race</a>. In 2013, a federal district court judge found that stop-and-frisk, as implemented in New York City, was <a href="https://casetext.com/case/floyd-v-city-of-ny-2">unconstitutional because of its reliance on racial profiling</a>, and the practice was eventually curtailed.</p>
<p>While some touted stop-and-frisk policies as the cause for the reduction in crime in the city during the early 2000s, the same decreases were happening across the U.S. and Canada – in many areas that did not invoke these policies. This suggests that the drop in crime was part of a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-4469.2010.01192.x">broader trend</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, much research has indicated that the vast majority of incidents of stop-and-frisk, <a href="https://www.aila.org/files/o-files/view-file/89318407-E4E7-42CD-80F6-A9DDB3E34C33">particularly with individuals of color</a>, do not result in officers finding drugs or guns, or making an arrest. Thus, they waste valuable police time and money. In addition, a report from New York’s state attorney general found that only <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/14/stop-and-frisk-new-york-conviction-rate#:%7E:text=New%20York%27s%20controversial%20stop%2Dand,attorney%20general%20released%20on%20Thursday">about 3% of stop-and-frisks</a> in New York City from 2009 to 2012 led to a conviction.</p>
<p>Even when it does not lead to a formal conviction, stop-and-frisk can be <a href="https://beforetheblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Walking-While-Black.pdf">humiliating and traumatic</a> for the individual. They can also lead to further <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1098611117708791">police brutality</a> and <a href="https://www.vera.org/downloads/publications/stop-and-frisk-summary-report-v2.pdf">greater mistrust of the police</a>.</p>
<p>Finally, I would like to point out that as stop-and-frisk policies drew to a close in 2014, the murder rate within the city fell while the number of stops declined. In fact, the biggest drop occurred precisely when the number of stops also <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/fact-sheet-stop-and-frisks-effect-crime-new-york-city">fell dramatically</a>, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.</p>
<h2>Community policing and other alternatives</h2>
<p>Given stop-and-frisk’s controversial nature and questionable results, Parker may want to prioritize other policing policies that have more evidence of success and foster better relationships with communities. These include <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0011128793039004009">community policing</a>, “hot spot” policing where officers also receive <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2118780119">intensive training in procedural justice</a>, and expanded use of specialty courts such as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2013.06.005">drug courts</a>, veterans courts and <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16619410/">mental health courts</a>. </p>
<p>This is far from a complete list of alternatives. Many crime-reduction strategies are less controversial than stop-and-frisk, put the city at lower risk of lawsuits, lead to better police-citizen interactions and save taxpayer dollars that can be spent on crime prevention and other programs that improve the quality of life of Philadelphians.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217989/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Megan Kurlychek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Evidence from NYC shows that stop-and-frisk policing leads to greater mistrust of police and more racial disparities in the criminal justice system.Megan Kurlychek, Professor of Sociology, Criminology, and Public Policy, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2231302024-02-12T21:19:30Z2024-02-12T21:19:30ZThe use of technology in policing should be regulated to protect people from wrongful convictions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574851/original/file-20240212-28-7lu7es.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4288%2C2848&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In 2010, police at the G20 summit in Toronto filmed protestors.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The proliferation of technology for everyday living can be seen through <a href="https://mashable.com/article/chatgpt-ai-essays-classroom-materials-teachers-react">ChatGPT writing term papers</a> or <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/robot-cat-gatineau-restaurant-1.6224125">robots serving meals at a restaurant</a>. </p>
<p>Technology can also be used towards less utilitarian ends. Unfortunately, deepfakes — digitally altered images of people — <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jan/13/what-are-deepfakes-and-how-can-you-spot-them">can be used to spread misinformation</a>.</p>
<p>A new edited volume, which I co-edited, considers the use of everyday technologies in the criminal justice system, <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003323112">ranging from detecting deception to web sleuthing to help law enforcement solve crime</a>. </p>
<h2>Technology and policing</h2>
<p>Consider the use of body-worn cameras by police, as in the fatal shooting of Ontario Provincial Police Const. Greg Pierzchala in December 2022. Footage from his body camera will provide evidence during <a href="https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/slain-officer-was-wearing-body-camera-that-could-provide-key-evidence-experts">the trial of his accused killers</a>.</p>
<p>Police investigations have also been aided by private citizen sleuths via technology, who gather evidence to help police identify criminals. This was the case with <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/luka-magnotta-guilty-of-1st-degree-murder-in-jun-lin-s-slaying-1.2875989">convicted murderer Luka Magnotta</a>, where an online network <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/luka-rocco-magnotta-online-sleuths">identified him in cat torture videos</a> and provided the information to law enforcement agencies. </p>
<p>Another use of technology can be for public surveillance for crime prevention through the application of facial recognition software.</p>
<p>Security cameras are now a ubiquitous feature in public places. In 2021, it was estimated that <a href="https://geographical.co.uk/science-environment/whos-watching-the-cities-with-the-most-cctv-cameras">one billion security cameras were being used around the world</a>. China is listed as having about <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/cities/articles/2020-08-14/the-top-10-most-surveilled-cities-in-the-world">54 per cent of all surveillance cameras</a>. </p>
<p>In 2020, Toronto had approximately <a href="https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/toronto-becoming-a-camera-city-but-still-pales-in-comparison-to-london-england">2,000 cameras at city-owned facilities</a>. </p>
<p>Security cameras may or may not be used in conjunction with facial recognition software.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a close-up of a security camera with a city at night in the background" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574850/original/file-20240212-22-v0paoz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Security cameras are becoming regular features of outdoor public spaces.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<h2>Finding faces</h2>
<p>Facial recognition uses software to identify or confirm someone’s identity using an image of their face. Captured faces are compared to a database, often for the purposes of <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/how-does-facial-recognition-work">crime prevention</a>. </p>
<p>Some retailers have used facial recognition to help reduce theft. In 2022, Josh Soika, an Indigenous man, was confronted by a security guard due to being “flagged” as having <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/first-nation-apology-store-accused-1.6620457">stolen previously from the store</a>. Later, it was determined that <a href="https://retail-insider.com/bulletin/2022/11/facial-recognition-in-stores-in-canada-may-pose-problems-amid-ai-based-misidentification-potential/">Soika was misidentified by the artificial intelligence (AI)</a> used by Canadian Tire for facial recognition. </p>
<p>In 2023, Canadian Tire Corporation and its dealers have since agreed to <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/canadian-tire-bc-facial-id-technology-privacy-commissioner-1.6817039">no longer use facial recognition technology</a>.</p>
<p>In the United States recently, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) banned the pharmacy chain Rite Aid for five years from using facial recognition software to identify customers who have stolen merchandise or <a href="https://www.supermarketnews.com/retail-financial/rite-aid-now-banned-using-facial-recognition-ftc-next-five-years">displayed other problematic behaviours</a>. In some instances, Rite Aid workers would follow “identified” customers around, accuse them of stealing and call police. People of colour were falsely identified at a greater rate than white customers.</p>
<p>It is important to note that someone who has shoplifted in the past isn’t <a href="https://theconversation.com/policing-is-not-the-answer-to-shoplifting-feeding-people-is-217046">necessarily planning to shoplift again</a>. </p>
<p>The use of facial recognition software in Canada is controversial. In 2021, it was reported that Toronto police used Clearview AI, a facial recognition software, in 84 investigations, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-police-report-clearview-ai-1.6295295">with at least two cases proceeding to prosecution</a>. Once it was discovered by the police chief however, the practice was stopped.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-technologies-like-police-facial-recognition-discriminate-against-people-of-colour-143227">AI technologies — like police facial recognition — discriminate against people of colour</a>
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</em>
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<h2>Discrimination and AI</h2>
<p>Accuracy rates with facial recognition software <a href="https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2020/racial-discrimination-in-face-recognition-technology/">are above 90 per cent</a>, but <a href="https://ucalgary.ca/news/law-professor-explores-racial-bias-implications-facial-recognition-technology">that number is greatly reduced within certain demographics</a>. Facial recognition software is documented to misidentify women, racialized people and those between the ages of 18-30 years, <a href="https://news.mit.edu/2018/study-finds-gender-skin-type-bias-artificial-intelligence-systems-0212">with accuracy reduced to 35 per cent</a>.</p>
<p>In February 2023, Porcha Woodruff, a 32-year-old pregnant Black woman from Detroit, was arrested for robbery and carjacking based on a facial recognition match. Police used AI that had run an image of a carjacker caught on video through a mugshot database that contained Woodruff’s photo, and incorrectly matched it. </p>
<p>Woodruff was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/08/07/michigan-porcha-woodruff-arrest-facial-recognition/">jailed for 11 hours and went into labour</a>. The charges were dropped, and Woodruff is currently suing the <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/detroit/news/detroit-woman-at-center-of-facial-recognition-lawsuit-responds-to-police-chiefs-claims/">city of Detroit and the Detroit Police Department</a>.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">CBS Detroit interviews researcher Dorothy Roberts about Porcha Woodruff’s misidentification due to facial recognition technology.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Consequences of misidentification</h2>
<p>According to the U.S.-based Innocence Project, over 70 per cent of known wrongful convictions are due to <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/eyewitness-misidentification/">mistaken identification by people as a contributing factor</a>. The Canadian Registry of Wrongful Convictions finds approximately <a href="https://www.wrongfulconvictions.ca/issues/eyewitness-identification">a third of their cases involved false identification</a>.</p>
<p>People can show what is known as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00208">own-race bias</a>” when identifying faces; people are more accurate when <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00208">identifying faces of their own race than other races</a>. </p>
<p>The misidentification of a perpetrator — whether by a human or an AI program — can lead to the same consequences: being charged, prosecuted or wrongfully convicted. Technology, as with humans, isn’t always accurate and may succumb to similar biases.</p>
<p>Legislation must keep up to protect people’s rights and privacy. As technology evolves, adequate information and full transparency needs to be provided to the public on how, when and where a technology is in use. It also is clear that much more research is needed to <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003323112">better understand the impact of technology</a> on the criminal justice system.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223130/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joanna Pozzulo receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>Police use of surveillance technologies — like security cameras and artificial intelligence — is becoming more widespread. Measures are needed to protect people’s privacy and avoid misidentification.Joanna Pozzulo, Chancellor's Professor, Psychology, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2216772024-02-12T13:24:56Z2024-02-12T13:24:56ZCan anyone make a citizen’s arrest? The history and legalities of catching criminals yourself<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574490/original/file-20240208-28-q5mmu6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C6%2C4600%2C2452&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Can you detain someone you just saw break the law?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/man-mugging-woman-in-street-royalty-free-image/BC3542-001">Alan Thornton/The Image Bank via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/curious-kids-us-74795">Curious Kids</a> is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">curiouskidsus@theconversation.com</a>.</em></p>
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<blockquote>
<p><strong>Can anyone make a citizen’s arrest, even me? – Henry, age 12, Winter Hill, Massachusetts</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>What does Spider-Man do when he sees someone commit a crime and there are no police officers around to help? He swings in, wraps the wrongdoer in his web and leaves them hanging from a telephone pole until the cops take over. </p>
<p>But is he allowed to do that? Are you?</p>
<h2>Seizing criminals</h2>
<p>Until about 200 years ago, uniformed police officers and police departments as we know them today <a href="https://time.com/4779112/police-history-origins/">didn’t exist in the United States</a>. It was up to the citizens to arrest criminals.</p>
<p>In 1285, England introduced what we now know as “citizen’s arrests” in a law called <a href="https://study.sagepub.com/rowe3e/student-resources/chapter-3/the-statute-of-winchester">the Statute of Winchester</a>. It allowed any person to arrest – in other words, capture – lawbreakers. This concept spread throughout the English colonies, which ultimately became their own countries, including Australia, Canada and the United States. Other <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen%27s_arrest">countries have adopted similar rules</a>.</p>
<p>In the United States, citizen’s arrests have a pretty dark history. Originally, <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90528764/the-troubling-history-of-citizens-arrests-from-slave-patrols-to-ahmaud-arbery-to-ice">only white men could make citizen’s arrests</a>. By the mid-1600s, many militias and city watchmen, especially in the South, used that power to <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90528764/the-troubling-history-of-citizens-arrests-from-slave-patrols-to-ahmaud-arbery-to-ice">intimidate and terrorize enslaved and free Black communities</a>.</p>
<p>This practice continued <a href="https://racism.org/articles/law-and-justice/criminal-justice-and-racism/134-police-brutality-and-lynchings/9617-a-legacy">through the Civil War</a>, <a href="https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/175619">the Jim Crow era and even into the 1900s</a>, with vigilantes – people who appoint themselves to catch and punish others – engaging in heinous abuses, <a href="https://theconversation.com/lynching-memorial-shows-women-were-victims-too-95029">including lynchings</a>. Just recently, in 2020, Ahmaud Arbery, a Black man who was jogging around his Georgia neighborhood, <a href="https://theconversation.com/jury-finds-3-georgia-men-guilty-of-ahmaud-arbery-murder-3-essential-reads-172493">was shot and killed</a> by a group of white men who accosted him because they wrongly thought he had committed a crime.</p>
<p>Despite this history, most states still have citizen’s arrest <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/11/05/ahmaud-arbery-citizens-arrest-vigilante/">laws on the books</a>.</p>
<h2>Making a legal citizen’s arrest</h2>
<p>Arrest literally means “to stop.” If someone wants to leave, you usually can’t stop them – that could be considered false imprisonment or even kidnapping. Citizen’s arrest laws are an exception to that general rule; they allow everyday people to make an arrest.</p>
<p>When the police make an arrest, they typically handcuff the subject and take them in a secure transport vehicle to a booking facility, such as the county jail. When Spidey webs a wrongdoer, he can’t just take them back to Aunt May’s apartment. Making a citizen’s arrest means holding the lawbreaker in place until the police arrive and take over.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A blurry, dark black-and-white picture of a figure holding what could be a knife, or something else entirely" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574491/original/file-20240208-24-qtcx1d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">You’d better be sure about what you think you saw.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/man-holding-knife-in-kitchen-rear-view-silhouette-royalty-free-image/588312130">Glasshouse Images/The Image Bank via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>When can someone make a citizen’s arrest? The rules are a bit different in every state, which can make things confusing. You can ask a librarian to help you find information about the law in your state, but here are some common requirements to get you started:</p>
<p><strong>Who can make a citizen’s arrest?</strong> Although some state laws use the word “<a href="https://www.scstatehouse.gov/code/t17c013.php">citizen</a>,” most states allow any “<a href="https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/CR/htm/CR.14.htm">person</a>” or any “<a href="https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/cite/629.37">private person</a>” – as opposed to a public employee such as a police officer – to make a citizen’s arrest. Despite the name, you usually don’t have to be a citizen. And most states don’t require any minimum age, so it looks like high school student Peter Parker, Spider-Man’s alter ego, is good to go.</p>
<p><strong>Did you see it, and how serious is it?</strong> Most states allow you to make a citizen’s arrest for a minor crime – those <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/crime-law/Classification-of-crimes">categorized as a misdemeanor</a> – only if you actually saw the person commit the crime. Some states allow a citizen’s arrest for a minor crime only if it is considered a “breach of peace,” meaning the crime is likely to disturb other people, such as fighting in public. For felonies, a more serious category of crime, the law usually allows you to make a citizen’s arrest even if you didn’t see the person commit the crime.</p>
<p><strong>You’d better be sure!</strong> In most states, citizen’s arrest laws apply only if the person actually committed a crime. If you make a mistake by making a citizen’s arrest of someone who didn’t actually commit a crime, the <a href="https://www.findlaw.com/injury/torts-and-personal-injuries/false-imprisonment.html">person you arrested can sue you</a>. You might even get <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/false_imprisonment">arrested</a> yourself!</p>
<p>This is different from when police arrest someone. Law enforcement officers need “<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/probable_cause">probable cause</a>,” which is the legal standard for how sure you need to be that a person committed a crime before arresting them. As long as an officer meets the probable cause standard, they won’t get in trouble, even if they’re ultimately mistaken about the person committing a crime.</p>
<p><strong>Try not to rough anyone up.</strong> Someone making a citizen’s arrest is usually allowed to use a reasonable amount of physical force to ensure that the lawbreaker stops committing the crime and can’t leave. But that doesn’t mean you can do anything you want. The type and amount of force you use must be <a href="https://nyupress.org/9781479814657/evaluating-police-uses-of-force/">closely related</a> to whether the other person is trying to get away and, if so, what they’re doing.</p>
<p><strong>Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.</strong> Making a citizen’s arrest is no joke. There’s the danger of making a mistake about what the person did and whether it was a crime. After all, most people don’t know exactly what the law allows or prohibits, so it’s easy to get something wrong.</p>
<p>And there’s the danger of getting hurt. Most people aren’t trained or equipped to arrest someone safely, and they rarely have backup available like the police do. If you see a crime occur, it’s better to call the police and be a good witness than it is to try to make a citizen’s arrest yourself. </p>
<p>So, what do you think: Is Spider-Man allowed to make a citizen’s arrest? And if he is, does that make him a hero or a vigilante?</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com</a>. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.</em></p>
<p><em>And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221677/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Stopping someone against their will can be false imprisonment or even kidnapping. There are laws that determine who is acting as a hero and who is acting as a vigilante.Seth W. Stoughton, Professor of Law, University of South CarolinaCaroline McAtee, Law Student at the University of South Carolina School of Law, Research Assistant for the Excellence in Policing and Public Safety Program, University of South CarolinaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2220462024-01-31T20:12:59Z2024-01-31T20:12:59ZSammy Yatim inquest: Speaking for the dead, or a Toronto police marketing campaign?<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/sammy-yatim-inquest-speaking-for-the-dead-or-a-toronto-police-marketing-campaign" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Coroner’s inquests into deaths that involved police often focus on the police force’s perspective and experiences. The inquest into the death of Toronto teenager <a href="https://www.cp24.com/news/sammy-yatim-s-mother-continues-fight-for-justice-10-years-after-son-s-death-1.6496869?cache=%2F7.336614">Sammy Yatim, who was fatally shot by Toronto police Const. James Forcillo in July 2013</a>, is no exception.</p>
<p>Because Yatim’s death involved police, the inquest was mandatory under Ontario’s <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90c37">Coroners Act</a>. It draws to a close this week.</p>
<p>Reflecting on the inquest’s focus on <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/convicted-cop-james-forcillo-is-back-and-the-sammy-yatim-inquest-is-cut-off-at/article_3f513ab0-ba48-11ee-9d87-fbb65ef8abc6.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=user-share">officer wellness</a>, it’s appropriate to revisit what coroner’s inquests do, what they don’t do, and to question why these proceedings are often dominated by police perspectives rather than the community’s or the victim’s.</p>
<h2>What is a coroner’s inquest?</h2>
<p>A coroner’s inquest is a public hearing conducted by a coroner before a jury of community members.</p>
<p>Inquests are designed, as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0964663919874111">Oxford University police researcher Ian Loader pointed out in a 2020 research paper</a>, to draw out how deaths in police custody are the result of the interaction of factors within society and the police force rather than as the singular act of an individual officer. </p>
<p>Inquests aren’t trials. They’re not designed to linger over the cause of the death. Instead, inquests concentrate on the systems that had an impact on the circumstances of death.</p>
<p>That means that by their very nature, inquests often shut down discussions about the specific acts of murder or neglect that caused the death. </p>
<p>In fact, Sherene Razack, a Canadian critical race scholar at the University of California, Los Angeles, argues in her 2015 book <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781442637375/dying-from-improvement/"><em>Dying from Improvement: Inquests and Inquiries into Indigenous Deaths in Custody</em></a> that while coroner’s inquests typically provide the opportunity to discuss police officer wellness and access to resources, it’s often at the expense of the victims of a police officer’s actions. </p>
<p>In her book, Razack contends that inquests are often a means for police forces to communicate that they have a legitimate right to use force. In the process, coroner’s inquests tend to portray their victims as the authors of their own demise, and police officers as the “victims of a hard-to-police population.”</p>
<h2>Purpose, scope of the Yatim inquest</h2>
<p>In keeping with Razack’s criticisms, the purpose of the Yatim inquest wasn’t to revisit Forcillo’s conduct on the night of the shooting, his record as a police officer or to revisit the facts. <a href="https://www.comoxvalleyrecord.com/news/toronto-cop-convicted-in-death-of-teen-seeks-to-appeal-case-to-supreme-court-1583702">Forcillo has already been convicted of attempted murder in relation to the death</a>.</p>
<p>Its purpose was simply to explore <a href="https://falconers.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Yatim-motion-decision-final-Cameron-Mar.-29-2023.pdf">“police officer recruitment, monitoring of police officers’ execution of their duties, police officer decision-making and available supports for those decision-making skills.”</a></p>
<p>This scope included “wellness, how to monitor a police officer’s job performance and what to do when relevant and material worrisome behaviour is noted.”</p>
<p>The presiding coroner, Dr. David Cameron, arrived at this scope after <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-coroners-inquest-1.6796133">rejecting Forcillo’s request to use the inquest to examine the possibility Yatim died by “suicide by cop.”</a> </p>
<p>Cameron described the inquest as a “unique opportunity to explore what to do when a police officer doesn’t follow their training” in reference <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-inquest-forcillo-1.7092406">to statements Forcillo had made to the parole board about failing to adhere to his training</a>.</p>
<p>Forcillo said he rushed his decision-making and went against his training while under the stress of the situation. He admitted he should have used communication to de-escalate the situation with Yatim, and should have waited for a higher-ranking officer who was able to use alternative methods.</p>
<p>Given these previous concessions, Cameron instructed the court that one of the inquest’s aims is to determine “how we can help officers make better decisions when under stress.”</p>
<h2>Forcillo’s testimony takes centre stage</h2>
<p>When Forcillo took the stand during the inquest, he made several statements about what might have changed the outcome the night he killed Yatim on a Toronto streetcar. </p>
<p>He suggested that access to a taser <a href="https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/forcillo-tells-coroner-s-inquest-having-a-stun-gun-would-have-changed-everything-1.6737292">“would have changed everything”</a> and that <a href="https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/mandel-would-police-martial-arts-training-have-saved-sammy-yatim">martial arts training would have empowered him to take different action</a>. He testified:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“After I was charged, I learned some jiu jitsu. I tell you if I had that kind of confidence when I was working on the road and I would have had those techniques, I would have been more apt to handle it without resorting to a use-of-force option.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Forcillo also suggested a lack of support for officer wellness was a contributing factor in Yatim’s death.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sammy-yatim-inquest-forcillo-1.7092406">It was “not the culture” to discuss mental health</a>, he said.</p>
<h2>Wellness strategies</h2>
<p>Related to this testimony, the Toronto Police Service presented its revamped officer <a href="https://falconers.ca/inquest-into-the-death-of-sammy-yatim-continues-today-next-week/">“wellness strategy”</a> to the inquest jury. </p>
<p>As former deputy chief Mike Federico explained at the hearing, <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/forcillo-pointed-his-gun-at-someone-six-times-in-15-months-before-killing-yatim-leading/article_1fcf6660-bc57-11ee-a603-8775d1a54e19.html#tncms-source=login">the police force has already changed its intervention policy to lower the threshold for when an officer’s use of a firearm is worthy of an intervention</a>.</p>
<p>The lowered threshold <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/forcillo-pointed-his-gun-at-someone-six-times-in-15-months-before-killing-yatim-leading/article_1fcf6660-bc57-11ee-a603-8775d1a54e19.html">is seemingly meant to identify officers like Forcillo, who had pointed his gun at someone six times in the 15 months leading up to Yatim’s death</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.tps.ca/files/download/1655295454/43179/">The program</a>, part of Toronto Police Services’ use-of-force reporting system, flags certain officers for a mandatory, non-disciplinary intervention through the police force’s employee wellness unit.</p>
<p>During the hearing, Supt. Lisa Crooker with Toronto police’s hiring and recruiting division was questioned by Ed Upenieks, the lawyer for some of Yatim’s family members, about whether the 2013 version of the early-intervention program was sufficient to stop problem officers.</p>
<p>“So the police were not doing a good job policing the police in July of 2013; do you agree with me?” Upenieks asked.</p>
<p>“There were certainly significant gaps and challenges in that intervention opportunity,” Crooker replied.</p>
<h2>Preventing future deaths</h2>
<p>After the jury compiles its recommendations at the conclusion of the inquest, it’s up to the police force to decide whether it will make further changes.</p>
<p>But judging by testimony, it appears as though Toronto police are already making efforts on officer wellness. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://ontca.ca/">motto of the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario</a> is: “We speak for the dead to protect the living.”</p>
<p>The question is whether the Yatim inquest has done enough to speak for the dead. Or has it just been a marketing exercise for Toronto police?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222046/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Monika Lemke receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). </span></em></p>What do coroner’s inquests do, what don’t they do, and why are they often dominated by police perspectives rather than the community’s or the victim’s?Monika Lemke, PhD Candidate, Socio-Legal Studies, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2170462023-11-28T23:49:49Z2023-11-28T23:49:49ZPolicing is not the answer to shoplifting, feeding people is<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561622/original/file-20231124-19-hilwzf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=150%2C66%2C3875%2C2752&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The social and financial costs of policing food theft are higher than the costs of addressing poverty and income inequality.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/policing-is-not-the-answer-to-shoplifting-feeding-people-is" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Big businesses like to tell us that, as consumers, <a href="https://www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/business/sylvain-charlebois-we-all-pay-for-grocery-theft-100812369/">we all pay for food theft</a>. We’ve been sold a narrative that as consumers who don’t steal, we pay for the theft of food by others on our grocery receipts. </p>
<p>Reported increases in food theft in Canada are <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/grocery-shoplifting-on-the-rise-in-canada-amid-inflation-industry-insiders-say">linked to pressures from rising inflation</a> along with <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/staffing-cuts-recreation-libraries-winnipeg-budget-1.6742002#:%7E:text=%22We%20see%20cuts%20in%20community,staff%2C%20while%20libraries%20lost%2011.">diminished investment in social supports</a> such as housing, mental health, transit and crisis and community supports. </p>
<p><a href="https://yellowheadinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/police-budgets-praire-cities.pdf">Research has shown that in Prairie cities municipalities disproportionately fund police</a> over essential services like housing and mental health support. But instead of increasing social supports, the response to food theft has been surveillance, security and policing in our grocery stores.</p>
<p>Retailers would have us believe that the cost of food theft is limited to retailers passing on their losses to consumers. However, retailer investment in surveillance, security and special duty police officers are costs that are also passed on to consumers: we pay for the surveillance systems that surround us.</p>
<p>The social cost of policing food is much higher, and deeply concerning because it produces unequal community impacts. </p>
<h2>Food theft</h2>
<p>Food theft is framed as a threat to paying customers. That furthers the divide between those who can still afford groceries, and those who cannot. Media coverage of food theft often focuses on exceptional examples of theft to emphasize that the crisis is an issue of worsening crime. But that framing ignores the broader economic conditions that perpetuate the problem. </p>
<p>In response to media coverage of grocery theft, some have tried to highlight the connection between rising theft and unaffordable food prices. <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9425322/toronto-legal-firm-pro-bono-defence-shoplifting/">A Toronto-area law firm has even offered pro bono support for those charged for stealing groceries</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man in a supermarket surreptitiously placing a product in a backpack." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/561623/original/file-20231125-20-qxiiqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Reported increases in food theft in Canada have been linked to pressures from rising inflation and diminished investment in social supports.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When food theft is disconnected from social conditions, it also collectively distracts us from the underlying issue of rising food costs.</p>
<p>Following calls from the Canadian government to stabilize prices as food inflation outpaces general inflation, <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-major-canadian-grocers-yet-to-confirm-discounts-price-freezes-federal/">grocers have submitted preliminary plans to lower food prices but have yet to implement them</a>. </p>
<h2>Policing food theft</h2>
<p>Buying into the food theft moral panic, divorced from its broader social conditions, has resulted in increased surveillance, security and policing. Retailers and police rely on these <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8604171/canada-grocery-store-shoplifting-rise/">extraordinary accounts of food theft</a> to create moral panic to be managed through securitization and policing. </p>
<p>We are emerging from a global pandemic that severely impacted unemployment rates, as cities grapple with underfunded social services and inflated police budgets. In these contexts, thinking about food theft through a lens of criminality limits interventions and responses.</p>
<p>In 2020, the Manitoba government established a <a href="https://news.gov.mb.ca/news/index.html?item=49281">Retail Crime Task Force with the goal of “reducing the number of thefts.”</a> The press release announcing the partnership was held in front of a Winnipeg grocer — sending a strong message that food theft will not be tolerated. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/retail-crime-task-force-manitoba-government-1.5733988">Project Stop Lifting</a> is another initiative between the Winnipeg Police Service and Manitoba Justice, and in a two-month period in 2020 it led to 74 arrests and 592 total charges were laid. </p>
<p>Similarly, <a href="https://vancouversun.com/news/crime/vancouver-police-arrest-258-people-in-shoplifting-crackdown">Vancouver Police have been cracking down on theft</a> and between Sept. 11-26, 258 shoplifting arrests were made. </p>
<p>These arrests and charges raise important concerns about how increased policing is being used as a purported solution to food theft.</p>
<h2>Impacts on racialized people</h2>
<p>Increased policing will disproportionately impact racialized and other marginalized people who are most vulnerable to over-policing and criminalization.</p>
<p>A charge for theft under $5,000 may not result in incarceration for some, but we know Indigenous and other racialized people are more likely to be arrested for minor offences. In Manitoba, Indigenous people are subject to overpolicing, racial profiling and over incarceration. <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/jr/gladue/p2.html">Indigenous people represent 77 per cent of the provincially incarcerated population</a>. </p>
<p>Research shows that <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/en-ca/products/178-the-end-of-policing">increased policing</a> of grocery stores and pilot programs to increase arrests will <a href="http://www.ajic.mb.ca/volumel/toc.html">disproportionately impact</a> Indigenous and racialized shoppers. This is disconcerting given the <a href="https://ehprnh2mwo3.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Calls_to_Action_English2.pdf">Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Call to Action No. 30</a> which calls upon federal, provincial, and territorial governments to eliminate the overrepresentation of Indigenous people in custody. The cost of food theft does not justify the impacts of increased incarceration for Indigenous Peoples, as well as other racialized and marginalized people.</p>
<p>Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew has argued the province’s approach to cracking down on theft <a href="https://winnipegsun.com/news/crime/province-announces-new-retail-crime-task-force">fails to address the root causes of crime</a>, and that the underlying problems that lead to theft need to be addressed. Theft cannot be divorced from the social conditions that leave individuals with no other alternatives, especially for needs as basic as food. </p>
<h2>The cost of policing food</h2>
<p>The cost consumers pay for food theft when grocers offload costs to their customers may be significant. However, the cost of policing and incarceration is far more substantial. <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=3510001301">In 2021-2022 the average cost to incarcerate someone in Canada was $119,355</a>. Beyond the cost of incarceration, <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/jr/ccc2014/system-systeme.html">we have to consider the cost of responding to food theft within the criminal justice system</a> that results in police costs, court costs, prosecution costs, legal aid costs, correctional services costs, probation costs as well as the cost of incarceration.</p>
<p>The social cost of such measures is important to consider. Going through the justice system will compound financial distress, subject individuals to police violence, and if incarcerated, will disrupt lives.</p>
<p>The costs associated with policing food, and incarcerating those who find themselves in a position of needing to steal food, should be redirected to feed people. Calls <a href="https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/yes-city-councils-can-cut-the-police-budget">to defund</a> and <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/en-ca/products/2571-a-world-without-police">abolish the police</a> have argued for the reallocation of police budgets towards life-sustaining social services and non-carceral alternatives to address crime. </p>
<p>The redistribution of public spending would address people’s struggles to afford food and reduce the high social and fiscal cost of criminalization and policing. By contrast, directing funding to surveillance, security and policing in response to food theft <a href="https://theconversation.com/defunding-the-police-is-a-move-towards-community-safety-181376">will compound harms</a>. </p>
<p>We have a serious problem if we would rather see people in prison than fed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217046/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Merissa Daborn receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>The food theft crisis is framed as a threat to paying customers. This furthers the divide between those who can still afford groceries and those who cannot.Merissa Daborn, Assistant Professor in Indigenous Studies, University of ManitobaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2034572023-11-22T10:13:21Z2023-11-22T10:13:21ZFirearms officers: new report reveals the ‘toxic culture’ keeping women and ethnic minorities out of specialist squads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523039/original/file-20230426-26-kojpoc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=40%2C5%2C3368%2C2269&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-armed-police-1154547061">Svet foto/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Hundreds of London’s Metropolitan police officers temporarily turned in their firearms in September after the Crown Prosecution Service charged an officer with the murder of unarmed 24-year-old Chris Kaba. Up to 300 of the force’s 2,500 armed officers stepped back from their duties, leading the Met to request backup support from the army. Met commissioner Mark Rowley suggested that officers were concerned about having “sufficient legal protection to enable them to do their job.”</p>
<p>Police shootings are rare, and rarer still are prosecutions. There have been only a <a href="https://www.inquest.org.uk/chris-kaba-cps-decision">handful</a> of murder and manslaughter charges for officers following deaths in police custody, and just one has led to a successful prosecution. </p>
<p>Firearms officers are a voluntary role, and in recent years, forces have been struggling to fill their ranks. In a <a href="https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/19429/">newly published report</a> for the National Police Chiefs Council, my colleagues and I found that a high number of officers felt “scrutiny following a police shooting” was the greatest barrier to them being recruited to a firearms squad. </p>
<p>But all is not well within these special squads, which have suffered from issues even before this shooting, and, as we found, are viewed as “macho” and exclusionary by their unarmed colleagues.</p>
<p>In her <a href="https://www.met.police.uk/SysSiteAssets/media/downloads/met/about-us/baroness-casey-review/update-march-2023/baroness-casey-review-march-2023a.pdf">review of the Met police</a>, Baroness Louise Casey found that some of the most toxic behaviour and misconduct was found in specialist firearms units. She described the Met’s firearms team as “well resourced, with elitist attitudes and toxic cultures of bullying, racism, sexism and ableism,” and a place where “normal rules do not seem to apply”. </p>
<p>While Casey’s evaluation was underway in London, the NPCC tasked my colleagues and I with examining the national picture. It was concerned that firearms units were struggling to recruit and retain staff, particularly women and members of minority groups.</p>
<p>“We know that there is a negative image and culture around being a firearms officer which is very male dominated”, said Simon Chesterman, the NPCC lead for armed policing. “Whilst this report makes difficult reading, it was essential for us to commission the independent research so that we can address the issues in order to … make armed policing more reflective of the communities we serve.”</p>
<h2>The ‘toxic culture’ of firearms units</h2>
<p>We surveyed more than 4,000 officers (38% of whom were current or former firearms officers and 62% of whom were not – and never had been – employed in the role), the survey revealed an “us and them” divide between armed officers and the rest of the workforce.</p>
<p>Firearms officers described a “toxic culture” and a “jerk mentality” in their departments that serve consistently to privilege the dominant group: white men.</p>
<p>Others told researchers about their departments’ sub optimal retention policies and processes that called into question the value the service places on officers. Several female ex-firearms officers who had left the units said that no efforts were made to keep them. And without a robust exit interview process in place, effectively, they were allowed to slip away without causing a ripple in the armed policing pond.</p>
<p>Casey found that those tasked with training and assessing firearms officers “further embed” a toxic and discriminatory culture by selecting officers “in their own image”, and keeping out those “whose faces don’t fit their ideal of a firearms officer”. In practice, this means women and ethnic minorities.</p>
<p>Some of our armed respondents reported a similar dynamic. They described ineffective leadership and hyper masculine cultures perpetuated by sexist, “old school”, training regimes that filtered out those who might challenge the norms established by the dominant group. </p>
<h2>Why don’t people join?</h2>
<p>Many of Casey’s respondents considered the firearms department “prestigious” and “elite”. That is unsurprising. Its officers are issued with better equipment and they are better trained and supported. Yet, for all that – maybe because of that – they do not seem to have the respect of those colleagues who aren’t on the team.</p>
<p>Some of our respondents who are part of firearms teams reported positives to the organisational culture, such as the camaraderie and teamwork. They said that the firearms culture helps officers sustain their morale and sense of mission despite the rigours and risks of the work. </p>
<p>Still, some insiders believe the culture privileges traditional forms of masculinity to such a degree that the needs of anyone outside of the dominant group are discounted. The survey showed that the needs of women officers are not always given the same priority as men – for example, female officers were often equipped with hand-me-downs of male kit that did not fit properly. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="View from behind of a female Met police officer at night, in a high vis vest that reads POLICE" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523841/original/file-20230502-14-s751g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Female officers are reluctant to join or stay on firearms teams.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/police-officer-hivisibility-jacket-policing-crowd-2247052541">Brian A Jackson/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Some unarmed respondents said the “macho” culture of firearms teams was a disincentive to taking up arms. Around half of the unarmed officers in our sample who are qualified for the role said they would not consider joining them to perform it. Some said they were unfit or were unwilling to commit to the level of fitness required to perform the role. Some simply preferred other career options. </p>
<p>A significant number of unarmed respondents said they would consider the role only because they believed it offered them an escape from the pressures of operational policing. Some were disdainful of armed officers who, they said, avoid many of the duties and responsibilities routinely associated with the day-to-day business of policing. That outlook was typified by one respondent who remarked dismissively that firearms officers could instead spend lots of time, “eating chicken at Nando’s and talking about tattoos”.</p>
<p>Taken together, this study and the Casey review present an alarming picture. They raise important questions about the armed policing demographic, its ways of working, and the true appeal of the role to those who join a service committed to the principle of policing by consent. </p>
<p>Arguably, the existing culture leads to division among the police ranks and is a significant barrier to departments’ affinity with the communities they serve. And ultimately, it is a threat to their legitimacy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203457/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adrian James receives funding from the National Police Chiefs Council - who funded the survey on which this article is based.
</span></em></p>The Casey review found the Met’s firearms teams had the worst behaviour.Adrian James, Reader in Police Studies, Liverpool John Moores UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2173442023-11-14T21:35:48Z2023-11-14T21:35:48ZCanadian cities continue to over-invest in policing<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/canadian-cities-continue-to-over-invest-in-policing" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Year-end debates about 2024 budgets have already begun across Canada, with cities <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/waterloo-regional-police-service-mark-crowell-1.7000460">like Waterloo</a> <a href="https://ottawa.citynews.ca/2023/11/08/ottawa-police-propose-13-4m-spending-increase-for-2024/">and Ottawa</a> proposing spikes in police budgets.</p>
<p>Despite <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/day6/defund-police-2023-budgets-grow-1.6741711#:%7E:text=Following%20the%20murder%20of%20George,of%20Canadians%20supported%20the%20idea.">public calls to “defund the police” in 2020</a>, the budgets of Canadian police departments have continued to rise. In fact, when it comes to public safety budgets in Canada, the last five years have seen increasing investments in policing and under-investment in the social services and programs that contribute to safer cities. </p>
<p>The continued over-investment in policing is a limited and contradictory approach to safety. For one thing, police forces don’t address the root causes of violence and other harms. </p>
<p>Research has shown the “deterrence effect” of policing <a href="https://dc.law.utah.edu/scholarship/276">to be weak</a>, while aggressive policing often impairs the social relations and institutions that <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/want-to-reduce-violence-invest-in-place/">normally keep violence and conflict in check</a>. </p>
<p>It should be obvious that preventing violence and other harms is better than punishing perpetrators after the fact. However, as <a href="https://www.interruptingcriminalization.com/s/Cops-Dont-Stop-Violence">numerous studies have shown</a>, this requires an investment in a range of non-police services and programs. It means recognizing the inherent limitations of policing and adopting a broader approach to public safety. </p>
<p>Too often, however, city leaders equate safety with policing, and throw public money at an institution that actually creates unsafety for many people while failing to prevent violence and other harms.</p>
<h2>Contradictions in policing</h2>
<p>Policing is also a contradictory approach to safety. </p>
<p>While promising safety to some, policing is a source of “unsafety” for many communities. This is evident in <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/firsthand/m_features/heres-what-you-need-to-know-about-carding">police carding</a> <a href="https://fernwoodpublishing.ca/book/policing-black-lives">and violence</a> against Black people, the brutal repression of <a href="https://yellowheadinstitute.org/2020/07/15/police-brutality-in-canada-a-symptom-of-structural-racism-and-colonial-violence/">Indigenous people</a> and especially <a href="https://indiginews.com/first-person/in-the-aftermath-of-latest-raid-wetsuweten-decry-rcmp-harassment">land defenders</a>, the harassment of <a href="https://rapsim.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/VF2_Judiciarisation-de-litine%CC%81rance-a%CC%80-Montre%CC%81al.pdf">unhoused people</a> and the <a href="https://www.homelesshub.ca/sites/default/files/attachments/Overview%20of%20Encampments%20Across%20Canada_EN_1.pdf">destruction of their property</a>, the killing of people experiencing <a href="https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/longform-custom/deadly-force/">mental health crises</a>, the criminalization of <a href="https://sexworklawreform.com/infosheets-impacts-of-c-36/">sex work</a> and much more. </p>
<p>This is nothing new. Police forces were created specifically to enforce <a href="https://trackinginjustice.ca/analysis-policing-colonialism-and-discrimination/">a particular, white and bourgeois sense of order and safety</a>, and police “reforms” like multicultural training and hiring more racialized police officers <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2020.11.003">do not alter that core mission</a>. </p>
<p>Various studies and reports since 2020 have provided further evidence of anti-Black racism in <a href="https://spvm.qc.ca/upload/Rapport_Armony-Hassaoui-Mulone.pdf">police stops</a> and <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/sites/default/files/Use%20of%20force%20by%20the%20Toronto%20Police%20Service%20Final%20report.pdf">use of force</a>, but none of this has stopped city leaders from further investing in the institution that causes these harms.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/state-of-georgia-using-extreme-legal-measures-to-quell-cop-city-dissenters-216482">State of Georgia using extreme legal measures to quell ‘Cop City’ dissenters</a>
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<p>If we view the police only as a source of safety, we are occupying a particular social position: a position of racial and class privilege.</p>
<h2>Policing spending: Before and after 2020</h2>
<p>In the spring of 2020, when the police killed <a href="https://justiceforbreonna.org/">Breonna Taylor</a> in Louisville, Ky., <a href="https://www.vera.org/news/what-justice-for-george-floyd-looks-like">George Floyd</a> in Minneapolis and <a href="https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2023/06/06/Three-Years-No-Justice-Chantel-Moore/">Chantel Moore</a> in Edmundston, N.B., new attention was brought to the contradictions and limitations of policing. </p>
<p>Historic protests filled the streets in the United States and around the world. <a href="https://btlbooks.com/book/disarm-defund-dismantle">The phrases “Black Lives Matter” and “Defund the Police” became synonymous</a>. </p>
<p>The rhetoric of defunding the police may have been new, but the core demand was consistent with longstanding critiques of policing and racial injustice. The core demand, as <a href="https://breachmedia.ca/toward-a-police-free-future-in-canada/">Black feminist scholar and organizer Robyn Maynard explains</a>, is to reallocate funding, power, equipment and force “away from agents of state violence and repression, and committing to invest instead in community-centred forms of safety.”</p>
<p>However, police budgets have continued to increase by an average of three per cent per year, adding to an almost 20 per cent increase over five years. Budgets for 2023 saw an especially large increase: an average of six per cent, with increases of more than eight per cent in Montréal, Vancouver and Peel Region. </p>
<p>Therefore, the 2020 protests had little impact on police budgets in Canada. In fact, police spending actually increased at a greater rate in the three years after 2020 than in the three years before it. In some cities, the change was especially significant. Montréal’s budget, for example, increased by 19 per cent after 2020.</p>
<p>As always, police spending is determined not just by what cities decide to provide, but what police forces themselves decide to spend. Police forces generally adhere to their budgets, but there are exceptions. </p>
<p>Between 2018 and 2022, Ottawa and Vancouver exceeded their budgets by $8.7 million and $12.2 million, respectively. The glaring outlier is the Montréal police, which exceeded its budget by $35.7 million per year and $178.6 million overall. </p>
<h2>Choosing safety, not policing</h2>
<p>The political message these budget choices sends is clear. Whatever <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/after-the-2020-protests-we-were-told-things-would-be-different-so-why-are-police/article_07d8c81c-ffa4-5dbb-bb67-972a0f8fe138.html">statements city leaders might have made in 2020</a>, Black lives do not matter to them in practice. </p>
<p>More broadly, cities have failed to incorporate the key argument that progressives have always made, reinforced in 2020: services and programs other than policing are required to prevent violence and other harms. </p>
<p>There have been some moves in this direction. Both <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-community-crisis-service-report-expansion-city-council-committee-1.7007108">Toronto</a> and <a href="https://reachedmonton.ca/initiatives/24-7-crisis-diversion/">Edmonton</a> have introduced crisis response teams that see health workers, rather than police, respond to calls related to mental health. <a href="https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/ottawa-will-be-getting-a-new-emergency-number-for-mental-health-crises-1.6477699">Ottawa</a> will follow suit next year. </p>
<p>The amount invested in these teams, however, is much less than the new money provided to police.</p>
<p>As the end of 2023 approaches, Canadian urban leaders need to recognize that the safety of their cities means investing in safety, not police.</p>
<p>There is no shortage of guidance for this shift, from Mariame Kaba and Andrea Ritchie’s book <a href="https://thenewpress.com/books/no-more-police"><em>No More Police</em></a> to the excellent <a href="https://www.halifax.ca/sites/default/files/documents/city-hall/boards-committees-commissions/220117bopc1021.pdf">report by Halifax Board of the Police Commissioner’s Subcommittee</a> and the <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5ee804787469504a54387fd9/t/62d9a5671916485cdc753921/1658430826746/La+vision+des+communaute%CC%81s+-+finale+%28FR%29.pdf">alternative city budget from the Montréal Defund the Police Coalition</a>. </p>
<p>The broad imperative is to significantly reduce police budgets for 2024, while reallocating funding to some of the many services and programs that give people more safety and police less work to do.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217344/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ted Rutland receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).</span></em></p>Despite public calls to defund the police in 2020, the budgets of Canadian police forces have continued to rise.Ted Rutland, Associate professor, Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2164822023-11-09T16:10:17Z2023-11-09T16:10:17ZState of Georgia using extreme legal measures to quell ‘Cop City’ dissenters<iframe height="200px" width="100%" frameborder="no" scrolling="no" seamless="" src="https://player.simplecast.com/944f8901-89d9-4868-81fd-5d165b61996d?dark=true"></iframe>
<p>Earlier this week, nearly five dozen people <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/06/atlanta-cop-city-police-protesters-charged-rico-law">appeared in a courtroom near Atlanta</a> to answer criminal racketeering and domestic terrorism charges brought against them by the state. The charges are related to what’s commonly known as “Cop City,” a $90-million paramilitary police and firefighter training facility planned for 85 acres of forest near Atlanta.</p>
<p>The Atlanta Police Association saw a need for such a facility at the start of the 2020 Black Lives Matter uprisings and started to fund raise. Many corporations have contributed to the plans for a world-class police training facility.</p>
<p>Georgia prosecutors are calling the demonstrators “militant anarchists.” But many of those charged say they were simply attending a rally or a concert in support of the <a href="https://www.stopcopcitysolidarity.org/">Stop Cop City movement</a>. </p>
<p>The protesters, their lawyers and their supporters, who rallied outside the court this week, say the government is using heavy-handed tactics to silence the movement. The <a href="https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/rico-racketeer-influenced-and-corrupt-organizations-act-statute">RICO charges</a> brought against the demonstrators essentially accuse them of being part of organized crime and carry a potential sentence of five to 20 years in prison. </p>
<p>Legal experts worry about the type of precedent this might set for our right to protest. It’s a case a lot of people are following nationally and internationally, for that reason.</p>
<p>In this week’s <a href="https://dont-call-me-resilient.simplecast.com/episodes/state-of-georgia-using-extreme-legal-measures-to-quell-cop-city-dissenters"><em>Don’t Call Me Resilient</em> episode,</a> we speak with one of the leaders of the Stop Cop City movement. Kamau Franklin is a long-time community organizer and the founder of <a href="https://communitymovementbuilders.org/">Community Movement Builders</a>. He is also a lawyer — and was an attorney for 10 years in New York with his own practice in criminal, civil rights and transactional law. He now lives in Atlanta. </p>
<p>Also joining us is Zohra Ahmed, assistant professor of law at the University of Georgia. A former public defender in New York, she, too, has been watching this case closely. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“In 2020 when people were talking about…defunding the police …the state…instead of doing any of that, decided to double down here in Atlanta and bring forth the idea…of a Cop City, a large scale militarized police base meant to learn tactics and strategies on urban warfare, crowd control, civil disbursement which was meant to move against community organizers and activists. The idea of Cop City is that it’s not only going to train the police in Atlanta, but it’s going to train police across the state and across the country and have international connections…so that different policing agencies are learning similar tactics and strategies and exchanging ideas on how to suppress.
- Kamau Franklin</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Read more in The Conversation</h2>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/arrests-of-3-members-of-an-atlanta-charitys-board-in-a-swat-team-raid-is-highly-unusual-and-could-be-unconstitutional-206984">Arrests of 3 members of an Atlanta charity's board in a SWAT-team raid is highly unusual and could be unconstitutional</a>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/students-demand-removal-of-mild-racist-from-georgia-landscape-140105">Students demand removal of 'mild racist' from Georgia landscape</a>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/fortress-usa-how-9-11-produced-a-military-industrial-juggernaut-166102">'Fortress USA': How 9/11 produced a military industrial juggernaut</a>
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<h2>Resources</h2>
<p><a href="https://btlbooks.com/book/disarm-defund-dismantle"><em>Disarm, Defund, Dismantle: Police Abolition in Canada</em></a>, edited by Shiri Pasternak, Kevin Walby and Abby Stadnyk</p>
<p><a href="https://www.akpress.org/practicing-new-worlds.html"><em>Practicing New Worlds: Abolition and Emergent Strategies</em></a>, by Andrea J. Ritchie</p>
<p><a href="https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/the-fight-against-cop-city/">"The Fight Against Cop City”</a> (<em>Dissent Magazine</em>)</p>
<p><a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/cop-city-indictment-atlanta/">“How Georgia Indicted a Movement”</a> (<em>The Nation</em> by Zohra Ahmed and Elizabeth Taxel)</p>
<p><a href="https://afsc.org/companies-and-foundations-behind-cop-city">The Companies and Foundations behind Cop City</a> (American Friends Service Committee)</p>
<p><a href="https://www.jpost.com/israeli-news/article-711682">“Georgia State police return home after two-week Israeli training”</a> <em>(The Jerusalem Post)</em> </p>
<h2>Listen and follow</h2>
<p>You can listen to or follow <em>Don’t Call Me Resilient</em> on <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/dont-call-me-resilient/id1549798876">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/37tK4zmjWvq2Sh6jLIpzp7">Spotify</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_mJBLBznANz6ID9rBCUk7gv_ZRC4Og9-">YouTube</a> or wherever you listen to your favourite podcasts. </p>
<p><a href="mailto:DCMR@theconversation.com">We’d love to hear from you</a>, including any ideas for future episodes. Join The Conversation on <a href="https://twitter.com/ConversationCA">Twitter</a>, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/dontcallmeresilientpodcast/">Instagram</a> and <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@theconversation">TikTok</a> and use #DontCallMeResilient.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216482/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Legal experts worry the “doubling down” on demonstrators who are opposed to the planned giant police training facility could undermine the right to protest.Vinita Srivastava, Host + Producer, Don't Call Me ResilientAteqah Khaki, Associate Producer, Don't Call Me ResilientLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2166712023-11-09T14:08:42Z2023-11-09T14:08:42ZGhanaians don’t trust the police. A criminologist on what needs to be done about it<p><em>The relationship between Ghanaian citizens and officers of its police service is a tenuous one. Recent <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/survey-resource/ghana-round-9-data-2023/">reports</a> by the research network Afrobarometer show a decline in trust between citizens and officers amid complaints of harassment and bribery. There have also been <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/9/22/ghana-police-arrest-49-as-high-cost-of-living-triggers-street-protests">accusations</a> of the police being used by the political hierarchy to stifle dissent by force during protests. The Conversation’s Godfred Akoto Boafo speaks to criminologist <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/justice-tankebe-579992">Justice Tankebe</a> about the reasons behind the breakdown in trust and ways to improve it.</em></p>
<h2>Do Ghana’s police serve the interests of citizens?</h2>
<p>We can think of these interests in terms of people’s expectations of policing. My <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2012.00291.x?casa_token=INNkhWFO_ZcAAAAA:2fK2oO-IL0kjTq80ptljt3OkL6FHzWX107uJKb5n36mWULN5Qv1oZeLZ-rpssekYoWmQPT76YeabH-g">research</a> has identified four dimensions of these interests. </p>
<p>First is the effective use of police authority to protect citizens from violence and threats to their constitutional rights. Fear of crime is a reasonable indication of police effectiveness. Data from <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/countries/ghana/">Afrobarometer</a> shows that, in <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/AfropaperNo34.pdf">2002</a>, 16.8% of Ghanaians feared becoming victims of crime at their homes. This declined to 9.2% in 2012 but has now <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/survey-resource/ghana-round-9-data-2023/">risen</a> to 24.6%. </p>
<p>The second dimension is lawful police conduct. Police officers do not serve this interest when they engage in illegal practices such as robbery, unlawful killing of civilians or bribery. A recent <a href="https://www.unodc.org/documents/corruption/Publications/2022/GHANA_-_Corruption_survey_report_-_20.07.2022.pdf">survey</a> funded by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime showed that 53.2% of Ghanaians who interacted with police officers paid them a bribe. </p>
<p>Thirdly, policing serves the interests of Ghanaians when it treats people equally. Simply put, people’s social class, ethnicity, religious beliefs, or political affiliation should not influence the decisions of police officers. </p>
<p>Finally, policing must listen to citizens, explain decisions to them, treat them with respect and care for their wellbeing. Fair treatment communicates symbolic messages about a person’s social standing and inclusion; hence it matters greatly to citizens. A <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10439463.2019.1636795?casa_token=lLDS6YkQKysAAAAA%3AXkzh0nvzEzSoWaqE7EbUwgVceZH8ko9DjBZmrUw2j8DR5-WzOG9T3YNFE0K2vM7jhax0bria8B2e">survey</a> of Ghanaians shows a little over half of them think the police treat them fairly. </p>
<h2>Why are the police struggling to serve Ghanaians?</h2>
<p>The first reason is the colonial roots of the Ghanaian police, which continue to show in three ways:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>police officers expect people to accept decisions without question </p></li>
<li><p>officers are subservient to elites, who have undue influence on police work</p></li>
<li><p>the police are not sufficiently accountable to local communities. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>Some officers try to curry favour with politicians in the hope of future advantages such as promotions. This is exemplified in the leaked audio of an <a href="https://citinewsroom.com/2023/10/leaked-tape-ill-be-vindicated-after-parliamentary-committee-probe-cop-mensah/">alleged plot</a> to replace Ghana’s police chief, which is now the subject of a parliamentary investigation. </p>
<p>Beyond the colonial legacy, <a href="https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/I-have-sent-over-1-000-people-from-my-constituency-to-security-agencies-govt-companies-Kennedy-Agyapong-1086103">political interference</a> means there’s a risk of unsuitable people being recruited to the police. They may lack the appropriate motivation and ethical inclination. The adequacy of training and the quality of supervision are also doubtful. The absence of credible accountability structures also limits scrutiny of how officers behave. </p>
<p>Finally, the behaviours that supervisors model to frontline officers can affect how they interact with citizens. For example, a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1748895812469380?casa_token=hJs2udKv6gUAAAAA%3Aq5AyvRoxyV6LETdlVElSm3QorxqtSKpB1-_p5C1-xfiLdr6e_oZZvhRNrjD4ZPwg34ruqxO-bNTE&journalCode=crjb">survey</a> found that officers who felt their superiors treated them with disrespect and partiality were less committed to fair treatment of the public. </p>
<h2>What are the consequences for democracy?</h2>
<p>Police scholar David Bayley has <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3054129">argued</a> that the quality of policing is an important measure of democratic governance. A country cannot claim to be democratic if the police arbitrarily arrest people, humiliate them, suppress political dissent, and exceed their legal mandate.</p>
<p>When citizens lose faith in democracy, they become tolerant of military interventions. So efforts at democratic consolidation must pay attention to the state of the police. Indeed, some scholars argue that this may help <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=sInqr5ILPE8C&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&ots=_GhR888aCk&sig=K1cbO5_d9JgjsBbg_Cve6QBhw1Q&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=internal%20security&f=false">save democracy</a> from the threat of the military taking control. </p>
<p>This matters greatly in a sub-region of increasing political instability and terrorism threat. </p>
<h2>What reforms are required?</h2>
<p>First, there is a need for ideological re-orientation. The Ghana police <a href="https://police.gov.gh/en/index.php/mandate/">say</a> their mandate is to “prevent and detect crime, to apprehend offenders and to maintain public order and safety of persons and properties”. This is indistinguishable from their colonial mandate. Unsurprisingly, police tactics are militaristic and prioritise order over the democratic rights of citizens. </p>
<p>A democratically oriented police service would view its mandate as creating conditions for citizens to enjoy their constitutional rights. It would ask: “how can we facilitate protests and protect protesters?” rather than “what reasons can we find to prevent a protest?”.</p>
<p>The second area for reform is police accountability. Ghanaians have limited information about the internal accountability mechanisms, such as what happens to complaints filed against police officers. <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/criminology-as-a-moral-science-9781509965342/">Research evidence</a> shows the lack of appropriate signals from the Ghana Police Service deters officers from reporting unethical colleagues.</p>
<p>As I have previously <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-drives-police-violence-in-ghana-and-what-can-be-done-about-it-105813">argued</a>, the Ghana Police Service needs independent democratic oversight. </p>
<p>Thirdly, reforms are required to insulate the police from political capture. Ghana’s constitution grants the president the right to appoint the police chief. The president also effectively controls the promotion of senior officers through the police council. The same processes as those used in recruitment into civil service should be considered. Yet this is unlikely to make a difference unless police officers are fully committed to their democratic mandate. They must maintain ethical relationships with politicians and other elites who seek to capture the state for their personal interests. </p>
<p>Finally, there is a need to develop a culture of <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/670819">evidence-based policing</a>. This requires a closer relationship between the police and academics who have the methodological tools to support the police in evaluating the effects of their interventions.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216671/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Justice Tankebe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The very low public trust in the Ghanaian police suggests a crisis of legitimacy.Justice Tankebe, Associate Professor of Criminology, University of CambridgeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2166272023-10-31T23:47:13Z2023-10-31T23:47:13Z‘Unreasonable, unjust, oppressive’: how a police program targeted Indigenous kids<p>“Unreasonable, unjust, oppressive or improperly discriminatory in its effect on children and young people.” </p>
<p>That’s how the Law Enforcement Conduction Commission (LECC) described a police program that aims to target likely offenders before they commit crimes.</p>
<p>It’s a program that allowed police to make home visits at all hours, and stop and search people in the street. </p>
<p>Yesterday, the commission released its damning <a href="https://www.lecc.nsw.gov.au/news-and-publications/news/media-release-operation-tepito-final-report">final report</a> after a five-year investigation.</p>
<p>Here’s what it found.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/too-much-money-is-spent-on-jails-and-policing-what-aboriginal-communities-told-us-about-funding-justice-reinvestment-to-keep-people-out-of-prison-200531">'Too much money is spent on jails and policing': what Aboriginal communities told us about funding justice reinvestment to keep people out of prison</a>
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<h2>Report identifies unlawful practices</h2>
<p>The program in question is the Suspect Targeted Management Plan, implemented by NSW Police.</p>
<p>It’s a pre-emptive policing program that selects and then targets children and adults who police predict may commit crimes in the future. </p>
<p>The rationale behind the policy is to deter recidivists.</p>
<p>Once placed on the plan, police “disrupt” people’s everyday lives, through questioning, stop and search, and home visits – sometimes at all hours and even multiple times a week or even a day. </p>
<p>The Law Enforcement Conduct Commission found some of this conduct to be unlawful, possibly even “serious misconduct”. </p>
<p>While the plan was introduced in 2000, the then secret “black list” only came to public attention in 2017 with my <a href="https://piac.asn.au/2017/10/25/policing-young-people-in-nsw-a-study-of-the-suspect-targeting-management-plan/">research</a> (coauthored with Camilla Pandolfini), in partnership with Public Interest Advocacy Centre and the Youth Justice Coalition. </p>
<p>The commission agreed with our recommendation that there were grounds to investigate the police for potential agency maladministration. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1718839249225891957"}"></div></p>
<p>The commission’s investigation, called “Operation Tepito”, has been ongoing since 2018. </p>
<p>Its <a href="https://www.lecc.nsw.gov.au/news-and-publications/publications/operation-tepito-interim-report-january-2020.pdf">interim 2020 report</a> was scathing of police.</p>
<p>It recommended further reform of the revised management plan through new policy guidelines and training. </p>
<p>The commission urged police to engage with young people with “positive interactions” and reduce coercive ones. </p>
<p>The final report reviewed the operation of the plan for children between November 2020 and February 2022.</p>
<p>The commission concluded that police use of the management plan was an “<a href="https://legislation.nsw.gov.au/view/html/inforce/current/act-2016-061#sec.11">agency maladministration</a>” but did not make formal findings. This is because NSW Police abandoned the plan before the report was released. </p>
<h2>First Nations children disproportionately targeted</h2>
<p>Of the recommendations the commission made in 2020, NSW Police <a href="https://www.lecc.nsw.gov.au/news-and-publications/news/media-release-operation-tepito-final-report">failed to successfully implement</a> any of them. </p>
<p>Police overwhelmingly still subjected young people to intrusive, disruptive strategies. Some of these, such as home visits and searches, were unlawful. </p>
<p>There was <a href="https://www.lecc.nsw.gov.au/news-and-publications/news/media-release-operation-tepito-final-report">little evidence</a> of “positive interactions”, nor of support referrals.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-nts-tough-on-crime-approach-wont-reduce-youth-offending-this-is-what-we-know-works-160361">The NT's tough-on-crime approach won't reduce youth offending. This is what we know works</a>
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<p>First Nations young people were disproportionately targeted. </p>
<p>In 2022, First Nations people made up 48% of all young people on the plan.</p>
<p>This was an increase on the 42% reported in the 2020 interim report. </p>
<p>Crucially, the commission found that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The NSW Police Force did not undertake any analysis to try to determine the reasons for this and did not take steps to reduce this over-representation.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>First Nations young people are <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003115243/conflict-politics-crime-chris-cunneen">overpoliced, overcharged and overincarcerated</a>.</p>
<p>If you then use the same data to decide who is “risky” and deserving of intensified police harassment, it only reinforces the cycle of criminalisation. </p>
<p>The Commission also found other administrative issues, including:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>varied quality in intelligence assessments</p></li>
<li><p>unclear justifications for putting people on the plan</p></li>
<li><p>inflation of how some scores were calculated</p></li>
<li><p>poor record-keeping</p></li>
<li><p>inadequate consideration of complex needs or the alternatives to placing a young person on the Suspect Targeting Management Plan.</p></li>
</ul>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/raising-the-age-of-criminal-responsibility-is-only-a-first-step-first-nations-kids-need-cultural-solutions-186201">Raising the age of criminal responsibility is only a first step. First Nations kids need cultural solutions</a>
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<h2>A plan at odds with Closing the Gap</h2>
<p>The fact NSW Police didn’t implement any of the 2020 recommendations or reduce the over-representation shows the plan was never safe for First Nations young people in the first place.</p>
<p>Indeed, the management plan did precisely what it was designed to do: incapacitate and disrupt. </p>
<p>No amount of training or improvements to policy could remedy the extensive harms for First Nations young people put on the plan. </p>
<p>It was fundamentally a punitive surveillance approach, which made police the first responders for First Nations young people.</p>
<p>Aboriginal children need <a href="https://earlytraumagrief.anu.edu.au/files/ctg-rs21.pdf">culturally appropriate, therapeutic, trauma-informed services</a> run by Aboriginal community-controlled organisations. </p>
<p>They also need <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1362480615625763">safe distance</a> from police. </p>
<p>The Suspect Targeting Management Plan was always at odds with the NSW government’s commitment to divert First Nations people from the criminal justice system.</p>
<p>In its Closing the Gap <a href="https://www.aboriginalaffairs.nsw.gov.au/closingthegap/nsw-implementation-plan/2022-24-implementation-plan/">Implementation Plan</a>, all early interventions to support young people need to be community designed and driven. </p>
<p>There should also be health, housing and education support.</p>
<h2>A community development approach</h2>
<p>NSW Police has dropped the Suspect Targeting Management Plan for people under 18 and will soon scrap it entirely.</p>
<p>Police are now developing a replacement approach. Will they take the lead from communities? </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.unsw.edu.au/walgett-partnership/about-us">Yuwaya Ngarra-li</a> community-led partnership in Walgett is one example of how holistic diversion programs can work.</p>
<p>Another is <a href="https://www.justreinvest.org.au">Just Reinvest</a> in Bourke, Kempsey and Moree.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.uts.edu.au/research-and-teaching/our-research/jumbunna-institute-indigenous-education-and-research/our-research/indigenous-law-and-justice-hub/self-determination-and-criminal-justice">UTS Jumbunna Institute of Indigenous Education</a> has developed ideas around Aboriginal self-determination in youth justice that could shape guiding principles. </p>
<p>Police are the wrong people for providing Indigenous young people with non-coercive, therapeutic support.</p>
<p>Community alternatives to state policing are real and powerful.</p>
<p><em>Correction: This article has been amended to reflect that the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission did not make formal findings of agency maladministration because NSW Police abandoned the Suspect Targeted Management Plan for children before the report was released. The article previously did not include this context.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216627/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vicki Sentas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Law Enforcement Conduct Commission has handed down a damning report into an unlawful policing strategy. It’s the latest example of First Nations children being over-policed.Vicki Sentas, Senior Lecturer, UNSW Law, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2136552023-10-30T01:20:36Z2023-10-30T01:20:36ZIs Australia in the grips of a youth crime crisis? This is what the data says<p>In recent months, there has been increasing focus on <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-15/teenage-burglars-behind-rise-in-victoria-youth-crime/102483786">crime committed by young people</a> in Australia. Politicians are coming under more pressure to respond to these well-publicised criminal acts and the public perceptions that Australia is in the grips of a youth crime crisis.</p>
<p>In Queensland for instance, a group called Voice for Victims has been <a href="https://www.news.com.au/national/queensland/politics/protesters-call-for-zero-tolerance-on-youth-crime/news-story/52d9c2ef69cc42fcfcf76a074531a115">holding protests</a> and recently <a href="https://youtu.be/aqVKt0zv4YM?si=XRCaGPvef__atJ2k">met</a> with Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk to push their demands for a stronger law and order response and higher assistance payments to victims.</p>
<p>But is youth crime actually increasing? Are we at crisis point? It depends on how we define a crisis and what the data says.</p>
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<h2>Youth offending crime data</h2>
<p>The minimum <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-we-should-not-rush-to-raise-the-age-of-criminal-responsibility-in-australia-189463">age of criminal responsibility </a> is ten years old in all states and territories, except the Northern Territory which recently <a href="https://nt.gov.au/law/young-people/raising-minimum-age-of-criminal-responsibility">raised the age</a> to 12. Young people between the ages of ten and 13 can only be held criminally responsible, though, if it can be shown they knew what they were doing was seriously wrong. </p>
<p>In Victoria, <a href="https://www.crimestatistics.vic.gov.au/crime-statistics/latest-victorian-crime-data/alleged-offender-incidents-2">crime statistics</a> show that from 2014 to 2023, the rate of incidents involving youth offenders has been trending downward (despite some fluctuations).</p>
<p>However, from 2021-22 to 2022-23, there was a 24% increase in the rate of incidents committed by youth offenders under the age of 17, per 100,000 of population.</p>
<p>Likewise, data from <a href="https://www.bocsar.nsw.gov.au/Pages/bocsar_pages/Young-people.aspx">New South Wales</a> from 2011 to 2022 shows the rate of ten to 17 year olds being proceeded against by police has also been trending downward. This means the suspected offenders either faced court or a Youth Justice Conference, or received a caution from police. </p>
<p>However, from 2021 to 2022, the rate of young people being proceeded against by police increased by 7%, per 100,000 of population. The rate of those proceeding to court for more serious offences increased by 11% for the same period. </p>
<p>And the 2021-22 <a href="https://www.qgso.qld.gov.au/issues/7856/crime-report-qld-2021-22.pdf">Queensland Crime Report</a> showed a 13.7% increase in the number of children aged ten to 17 being proceeded against by police, compared to the previous year. The total number of youth offenders reached 52,742, the highest number in ten years. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Queensland premier faces questions about youth crime in a 9 News interview.</span></figcaption>
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<p>In most of the other states and territories, <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/crime-and-justice/recorded-crime-offenders/2021-22#data-downloads">Australian Bureau of Statistics</a> data shows the youth offending rates have trended downward over the past decade. From 2020-21 to 2021-22, these rates have either remained steady or decreased in most states and territories. Only the Northern Territory showed a larger increase of 13%. </p>
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<p>It should be noted the <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/crime-and-justice/recorded-crime-offenders/latest-release#queensland">ABS youth offender rate</a> only counts how many unique offenders came into contact with police – each offender is only counted once, regardless of how many times they may have offended in the period. This means it does not provide an indication of overall recidivism rates by individual young people. </p>
<p>The ABS does, however, provide other <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/crime-and-justice/recorded-crime-offenders/2021-22">data on recidivism</a>. In 2021-22, the proportion of youth offenders proceeded against by police more than once increased in several localities, including Queensland (10%), Tasmania (17%), the NT (5%) and the ACT (8.5%). The other states showed only minor changes from the previous year. </p>
<p>Queensland courts can declare a youth offender a serious repeat offender under <a href="http://www8.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/legis/qld/consol_act/yja1992185/s150a.html">the Youth Justice Act</a>. These young people are identified using a special index, which considers a young person’s offending history (including the frequency and seriousness), the time a young person has spent in custody and their age.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.courts.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/756649/cc-ar-2021-2022.pdf">2021-22 in Queensland</a>, nearly half of all youth offences were committed by serious repeat offenders. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-cant-go-shopping-without-police-coming-north-queenslands-at-risk-youth-feel-excluded-and-heavily-surveilled-211885">'We can’t go shopping without police coming': north Queensland's at-risk youth feel excluded and heavily surveilled</a>
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<h2>Which offences are showing increases?</h2>
<p>In Queensland, the <a href="https://www.qgso.qld.gov.au/issues/7856/crime-report-qld-2021-22.pdf">most prevalent offences</a> for young people in 2021-22 included theft, break and enter, and stolen vehicles. </p>
<p>Even though only 18% of all offenders in Queensland were under the age of 18, these youth offenders accounted for more than 50% of all break and enter, robbery and stolen vehicle offenders during the year. For stolen vehicles, the number of youth offenders almost doubled between 2012 and 2022. </p>
<p>In NSW, the <a href="https://www.bocsar.nsw.gov.au/Pages/bocsar_pages/Young-people.aspx">most common offences</a> for young people in 2022 were theft, break and enter, and stalking or harassment. Compared to 2021, young people proceeded against by police for thefts had increased by 21% and for break and enters by 55%. </p>
<p>And in Victoria, the most <a href="https://www.crimestatistics.vic.gov.au/crime-statistics/latest-victorian-crime-data/alleged-offender-incidents-2">common incidents</a> for youth offenders in 2022-23 were crimes against the person (a 29% increase compared to 2021-2022), property offences (36% increase) and public offences such as public nuisance, and disorderly and offensive conduct (29% increase). </p>
<h2>A crisis is a matter of perception</h2>
<p>A sense of crisis is created to some degree by not only rising crime rates, but also a sense of helplessness felt by the community and a perceived failing of the government to provide for a safe and secure community. </p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11205-022-02924-7">How the public perceives crime issues</a> is just as important as the reality of crime trends themselves. The <a href="https://www.pc.gov.au/ongoing/report-on-government-services/2023/justice/police-services">Commonwealth Report on Government Services</a> provides a snapshot of perceptions of safety. In 2021-22, 89% of people felt safe at home at night, while just 32.7% felt safe on public transport and 53.8% on the street. </p>
<p>Last week, a survey of Queenslanders <a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/yougov-poll-shows-queenslanders-living-in-state-of-fear-over-youth-crime-epidemic/news-story/39cb70d4de22debe1ababdf63d88331b">showed</a> nearly half of respondents believed youth crime was increasing or at a crisis point. Three-quarters of respondents had taken steps to improve their home security in the last year.</p>
<p>In Queensland, the government is responding to these concerns with tougher measures. It has controversially proposed using police watchhouses to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-23/qld-watch-house-youth-crime-human-rights-prison/102767700">detain youth offenders</a>, overriding its own Human Rights Act with a special provision only meant to be used in exceptional circumstances. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/queensland-is-not-only-trampling-the-rights-of-children-it-is-setting-a-concerning-legal-precedent-212377">Queensland is not only trampling the rights of children, it is setting a concerning legal precedent</a>
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<p>The government said this was necessary because the state’s <a href="https://documents.parliament.qld.gov.au/bills/2022/3118/Child-Protection-(Offender-Reporting-and-Offender-Prohibition-Order)-and-Other-Legislation-Amendment-Bill-2022---SoC-to-Govt-ACID-4d7c.pdf">youth detention centres were full</a> and, due to an increase in serious youth offenders, it needed to use police watchhouses to detain them to ensure the community is protected.</p>
<p>Youth justice advocates warn these watchhouses, however, are not suitable places for children, in part, because they could be held with adults and many of the facilities lack exercise yards, natural light and visitor facilities.</p>
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<p>Given the recent protests in Queensland, it is reasonable to conclude there is a perception of a crisis in the community over the inability of governments to deal adequately with youth crime, specifically repeat offenders. </p>
<p>While action needs to be taken in the short term to address community safety concerns, all states and territories also need to address the longer-term, multi-factoral causes of youth crime, such as truancy and disengagement from school, drug usage, domestic violence in the home and poor parenting.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213655/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Certain offences have shown increases in Victoria, NSW and Queensland over the past couple years, but the overall youth crime trend lines have been declining in the past decade.Terry Goldsworthy, Associate Professor in Criminal Justice and Criminology, Bond UniversityGaelle Brotto, Assistant Professor Criminology and Criminal JusticeTyler Cawthray, Assistant Professor in Criminology and Criminal Justice, Bond UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2148442023-10-16T01:07:55Z2023-10-16T01:07:55ZHow mistaken identity can lead to wrongful convictions<p>In March 1976, American Leonard Mack was convicted of sexual assault and holding two female victims at gunpoint. In September 2023, Mack’s wrongful conviction was finally overturned by a New York judge on his 72nd birthday with the help of the <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/news/hit-in-dna-database-proves-leonard-macks-innocence-after-47-years-of-wrongful-conviction/">Innocence Project</a>, an organisation that uses DNA evidence to prove factual innocence. </p>
<p>Mack’s conviction took 47 years to overturn. He served seven-and-a-half of these years in a New York prison. His case is the <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/news/8-moving-moments-from-leonard-macks-historic-exoneration-after-47-years/">longest</a> in United States history to be overturned using DNA evidence. </p>
<p>In June 2023, a similar historic moment occurred in Australia. Kathleen Folbigg was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jun/05/kathleen-folbigg-pardoned-after-20-years-in-jail-over-deaths-of-her-four-children">pardoned and released</a> after 20 years in prison for the murder and manslaughter of her four young children. </p>
<p>Considered one of the <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/folbigg-release-would-make-chamberlain-case-pale-into-insignificance-20230307-p5cpya.html">worst miscarriages of justice</a> in Australian history, Folbigg’s release has sparked discussion over whether Australia needs a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jun/12/not-a-rare-case-kathleen-folbigg-pardon-sparks-calls-for-new-body-to-review-possible-wrongful-convictions">formalised body</a> to deal with post-conviction appeals. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/serial-podcasts-adnan-syed-has-murder-conviction-vacated-how-common-are-wrongful-convictions-190968">'Serial' podcast's Adnan Syed has murder conviction vacated. How common are wrongful convictions?</a>
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<p>Mack and Folbigg are only two individuals on different sides of the world who have spent decades fighting to prove their innocence. </p>
<p>Many others are still fighting. The prevalence of wrongful convictions is hard to determine. The <a href="https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/about.aspx">National Registry of Exonerations</a> in the United States has recorded 3,396 exonerations nation-wide since 1989. </p>
<p>But data on official exonerations fail to capture the many individuals whose convictions are yet to be overturned. </p>
<p>Estimates of the prevalence of wrongful convictions in the United States range from <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/08874034221106747?casa_token=DL_gPkxNcI8AAAAA:uI-en9junmLXXScDGthXAuC9JcLsxp5OF1J4QB1WdA2L2cZRcwRuwtxVmIMiKYbYaSDj_ji4EdPSLA">0.5 to 5%</a>. The exact prevalence in Australia is less clear but we do know <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/pdf/10.3316/informit.801706351305383?casa_token=cpZBfZmh944AAAAA%3Ax_zYUlnogLjuDWl81jc38vmeOovzw44M171rP7G3ibNnU35rvWS0yeIO_Ad0eBa54nE54KxaKzIb3w4">71 cases of wrongful convictions</a> have been identified in Australia between 1922 to 2015.</p>
<p>Some have argued there could be <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/pdf/10.3316/informit.308199161216493">350 convictions per year</a> of individuals who are factually innocent in Australia. </p>
<p>A witness mistakenly identifying an innocent suspect is common in many wrongful conviction cases.</p>
<p>Eyewitness misidentification is the leading contributing factor in wrongful convictions overturned by the <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/exonerations-data/">Innocence Project</a>, present in 64% of their successful cases. </p>
<p>In Australia, <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/pdf/10.3316/informit.801706351305383?casa_token=cpZBfZmh944AAAAA%3Ax_zYUlnogLjuDWl81jc38vmeOovzw44M171rP7G3ibNnU35rvWS0yeIO_Ad0eBa54nE54KxaKzIb3w4">6%</a> of recorded wrongful convictions involved an eyewitness error. </p>
<p>This may be an underestimate given many applications to innocence initiatives in Australia alleging wrongful conviction, such as the <a href="https://bohii.net/">Bridge of Hope Innocence Initiative</a>, report <a href="https://bohii.net/blog/positiononestablishingccrcas">eyewitness evidence</a> as a potential contributing factor.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kathleen-folbigg-pardon-shows-australia-needs-a-dedicated-body-to-investigate-wrongful-convictions-205645">Kathleen Folbigg pardon shows Australia needs a dedicated body to investigate wrongful convictions</a>
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<p>In Mack’s case, two victims misidentified him as the perpetrator. These identifications proved to be instrumental in his wrongful conviction. How did the two victims get it wrong? </p>
<h2>How problematic procedures influence eyewitnesses</h2>
<p>Eyewitness identification evidence relies on witnesses to accurately remember criminal perpetrators. Several factors affect eyewitness memory accuracy. Features of the crime can impact memory, such as whether it was light or dark, or whether the perpetrator wore a disguise. </p>
<p>Memory can also be affected by characteristics of the witness at the time of the crime, such as their stress or intoxication levels. </p>
<p>These factors are present at the time of the crime and cannot be changed. What is perhaps more crucial is that eyewitness memory can also be affected by the procedures law enforcement use to collect identification evidence.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/news/hit-in-dna-database-proves-leonard-macks-innocence-after-47-years-of-wrongful-conviction/">Mack’s case</a>, there were serious problems with the procedures used to get the identifications from the victims. One of the victims made three separate identifications of Mack. Witnesses should only complete one identification procedure for each suspect, because the first identification will bias future identification attempts. </p>
<p>For two of the identifications the victim made, she was only shown Mack by himself surrounded by police. Showing a lone suspect without any other lineup members may <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-29406-3_2">increase mistaken identifications</a>, particularly when the context in which they are shown is highly suggestive. </p>
<p>Seeing Mack in handcuffs and in the presence of police may have led the victim to identify him. Mack was the only person shown to the witness in these identification attempts, so the police officers organising the process knew he was the suspect. </p>
<p>“Single-blind” administration of identification procedures – where the police officers organising the lineup know who the suspect is – increase the likelihood of <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2017-49224-002">mistaken identifications</a>.</p>
<p>For the other identification this victim made, she picked Mack out of a photo lineup containing seven images. Mack’s photo was the only photo in the lineup that contained visible clothing and the year (1975) in the background. All members of a lineup must be matched and no one lineup member <a href="https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/lhb-lhb0000359.pdf">should stand out</a>, but Mack’s photo was distinct. </p>
<p>With all these problematic practices combined, we can see how Mack was misidentified and convicted.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kathleen-folbigg-is-free-but-people-pardoned-and-exonerated-of-crimes-face-unique-challenges-when-released-from-prison-207017">Kathleen Folbigg is free. But people pardoned and exonerated of crimes face unique challenges when released from prison</a>
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<p>In 2020, a team of eyewitness experts published <a href="https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/lhb-lhb0000359.pdf">nine evidence-based recommendations </a>for conducting identification procedures. </p>
<p>These recommendations serve to reduce mistaken identifications and enhance accurate ones. </p>
<p>The recommendations address the problematic practices in Mack’s case, but also include things like making sure there is sufficient evidence to place a suspect in a lineup, and giving appropriate instructions to witnesses during the procedure. </p>
<p>Identification procedures should also be video recorded to identify any poor practices. </p>
<p>While these recommendations will go a long way to reducing wrongful convictions resulting from faulty eyewitness identifications, they will only be effective if followed by police. </p>
<p>The next step is ensuring these recommendations are embedded into everyday policing practice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214844/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hayley Cullen previously worked on a voluntary basis for Not Guilty: The Sydney Exoneration Project, an organisation that reviews cases of potential wrongful conviction. She was not involved in any of the cases discussed in this article.</span></em></p>Leonard Mack spent years in a US jail for a crime he didn’t commit. Here’s how identification procedures can, and have, led to wrongful convictions, and what can be done to prevent it.Hayley Cullen, Lecturer, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2148332023-10-12T22:49:49Z2023-10-12T22:49:49ZNZ police are using AI to catch criminals – but the law urgently needs to catch up too<p>The use of artificial intelligence (AI) by New Zealand police is putting the spotlight on policing tactics in the 21st century.</p>
<p>A recent Official Information Act request <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/499181/new-police-intelligence-tool-speedily-sending-information-on-risk-to-frontline-officers">by Radio New Zealand</a> revealed the use of SearchX, an AI tool that can draw connections between suspects and their wider networks.</p>
<p>SearchX works by instantly finding connections between people, locations, criminal charges and other factors likely to increase the risk of harm to officers.</p>
<p>Police say SearchX is at the heart of a NZ$200 million front-line safety programme, primarily developed after the death of police constable Matthew Hunt in West Auckland in 2020, as well as other recent gun violence.</p>
<p>But the use of SearchX and other AI programmes raises questions about the invasive nature of the technology, inherent biases and whether New Zealand’s current legal framework will be enough to protect the rights of everyone.</p>
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<h2>Controversial technologies</h2>
<p>At this stage, New Zealanders only have a limited view of the AI programmes being used by the police. While some the programmes are <a href="https://www.police.govt.nz/sites/default/files/publications/technology-capabilities-list.pdf">public</a>, others are being <a href="https://thebit.nz/deep-dive/the-high-tech-stocktake-new-zealand-police-didnt-want-you-to-see/">kept under wraps</a>.</p>
<p>Police have acknowledged using <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/300176755/police-using-technology-riddled-with-controversy-overseas">Cellebrite</a>, a controversial <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/300176755/police-using-technology-riddled-with-controversy-overseas">phone hacker</a> technology. This programme extracts personal data from iPhones and Android mobiles and can access more than 50 social media platforms, including Instagram and Facebook.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-profiling-the-social-and-moral-hazards-of-predictive-policing-92960">AI profiling: the social and moral hazards of 'predictive' policing</a>
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<p>The police have also acknowledged using <a href="https://www.police.govt.nz/sites/default/files/publications/technology-capabilities-list.pdf">BriefCam</a>, which aggregates video footage, including facial recognition and vehicle licence plates. </p>
<p>Briefcam allows police to focus on and track a person or vehicle of interest. Police <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/490353/ai-used-across-multiple-departments-in-camera-surveillance">claim</a> Briefcam can reduce the time analysing CCTV footage from three months to two hours.</p>
<p>Other AI tools such as <a href="https://sci-hub.se/10.1177/2032284420948161">Clearview AI</a> – which takes photographs from publicly accessible social media sites to identify a person – were tested by police before being abandoned. </p>
<p>The use of Clearview was <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/416483/police-trialled-facial-recognition-tech-without-clearance">particularly controversial</a> as it was trialled without the clearance of the police leadership team or the Privacy Commissioner. </p>
<h2>Eroding privacy?</h2>
<p>The promise of AI is that it can <a href="https://daily.jstor.org/what-happens-when-police-use-ai-to-predict-and-prevent-crime/">predict and prevent crime</a>. But there are also concerns over the use of these tools by police.</p>
<p>Cellebrite and Briefcam are highly intrusive programmes. They enable law enforcement to access and analyse personal data without people realising, much less providing consent. </p>
<p>But under current legislation, the use of both programmes by police is legal.</p>
<p>The Privacy Act 2020 allows government agencies – including police – to collect, withhold, use or disclose personal information in a way that would otherwise breach the act, where necessary for the “<a href="https://privacy.org.nz/tools/knowledge-base/view/252">maintenance of the law</a>”.</p>
<h2>AI’s biased decisions</h2>
<p>Privacy is not the only issue being raised by the use of these programmes. There is a tendency to assume decisions made by AI are more accurate than humans – particularly as <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-87480-9">tasks become more difficult</a>. </p>
<p>This bias in favour of AI decisions means investigations may <a href="https://innocenceproject.org/news/when-artificial-intelligence-gets-it-wrong/">harden towards the AI-identified perpetrator</a> rather than other suspects. </p>
<p>Some of the mistakes can be tied to <a href="https://bhm.scholasticahq.com/article/38021-misguided-artificial-intelligence-how-racial-bias-is-built-into-clinical-models">biases in the algorithms</a>. In the past decade, <a href="https://virginia-eubanks.com/automating-inequality/">scholars have begun to document</a> the negative impacts of AI on people with low incomes and the working class, particularly in the justice system. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australian-police-are-using-the-clearview-ai-facial-recognition-system-with-no-accountability-132667">Australian police are using the Clearview AI facial recognition system with no accountability</a>
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<p>Research has shown ethnic minorities are more likely to be <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/12/19/federal-study-confirms-racial-bias-many-facial-recognition-systems-casts-doubt-their-expanding-use/">misidentified by facial recognition software</a>. </p>
<p>AI’s use in predictive policing is also an issue as AI can be fed data from <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12027-020-00602-0">over-policed neighbourhoods</a>, which fails to record crime occurring in other neighbourhoods. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://daily.jstor.org/what-happens-when-police-use-ai-to-predict-and-prevent-crime/">bias is compounded</a> further as AI increasingly directs police patrols and other surveillance onto these already over-policed neighbourhoods. </p>
<p>This is not just a problem overseas. Analyses of the <a href="https://www.otago.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0027/312588/https-wwwotagoacnz-caipp-otago711816pdf-711816.pdf">New Zealand government’s use of AI</a> have raised a number of concerns, such as the issue of transparency and privacy, as well as how to manage “dirty data” – data with human biases already baked in before it is entered into AI programmes. </p>
<h2>We need updated laws</h2>
<p>There is no legal framework for the use of AI in New Zealand, much less for the police use of it. This lack of regulation is not unique, though. Europe’s long awaited AI law <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20230601STO93804/eu-ai-act-first-regulation-on-artificial-intelligence">still hasn’t been implemented</a>.</p>
<p>That said, New Zealand Police is a signatory to the <a href="https://www.anzpaa.org.au/homepage-announcements/australia-new-zealand-police-artificial-intelligence-principles">Australia New Zealand Police Artificial Intelligence Principles</a>. These establish guidelines around transparency, proportionality and justifiability, human oversight, explainability, fairness, reliability, accountability, privacy and security. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.police.govt.nz/sites/default/files/publications/algorithm-charter-english.pdf">Algorithm Charter for Aotearoa New Zealand</a> covers the ethical and responsible use of AI by government agencies.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-could-be-a-force-for-good-but-were-currently-heading-for-a-darker-future-124941">AI could be a force for good – but we're currently heading for a darker future</a>
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<p>Under the principles, police are meant to continuously monitor, test and develop AI systems and ensure data are relevant and contemporary. Under the charter, police must have a point of contact for public inquiries and a channel for challenging or appealing decisions made by AI. </p>
<p>But these are both voluntary codes, leaving significant gaps for legal accountability and police antipathy. </p>
<p>And it’s not looking good so far. Police have failed to implement one of the first – and most basic – steps of the charter: to establish a point of inquiry for people who are concerned by the use of AI. </p>
<p>There is no special page on the police website dealing with the use of AI, nor is there anything on the main feedback page specifically mentioning the topic. </p>
<p>In the absence of a clear legal framework, with an independent body monitoring the police’s actions and enforcing the law, New Zealanders are left relying on police to monitor themselves. </p>
<p>AI is <a href="https://theconversation.com/nzs-political-leaders-are-ignoring-the-mounting-threats-from-ai-and-thats-putting-everyone-at-risk-214714">barely on the radar</a> ahead of the 2023 election. But as it becomes more pervasive across government agencies, New Zealand must follow Europe’s lead and enact AI regulation to ensure police use of AI doesn’t cause more problems than it solves.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214833/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexandra Sims does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Current laws governing policing don’t take into account the capacity of AI to process massive amounts of information quickly – leaving New Zealanders vulnerable to police overreach.Alexandra Sims, Associate Professor in Commericial Law, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata RauLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2143122023-10-02T20:35:28Z2023-10-02T20:35:28ZMontréal’s ‘mixed’ police squads don’t help the city’s unhoused people — they cause more harm<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/montreals-mixed-police-squads-dont-help-the-citys-unhoused-people-they-cause-more-harm" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Since 2009, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/mixed-squads-montreal-homeless-1.6972877#:%7E:text=A%20new%20report%20is%20calling,unhoused%20people%20in%20public%20space.">Montréal has seen a proliferation of what are known as “mixed squads</a>,” which generally involve a police officer working alongside a social worker or health worker to respond to situations in public spaces. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.homelesshub.ca/sites/default/files/attachments/1.3%20Hurtubise%20Rose.pdf">Some experts</a> and police say these squads <a href="https://spvm.qc.ca/fr/PDQ1/Actualites/15209">can help leave repression behind to provide support to marginalized people</a>. </p>
<p>But what happens when we pay attention to the perspectives of those who work on the front lines with unhoused people? Listening to these perspectives and bringing them into the public debate is the aim of <a href="http://rapsim.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/rapport-sur-les-escouades-mixtes-20-sept-2023.pdf">a new report</a> on mixed squads in Montréal. We contributed to the research.</p>
<p>The perspectives of front-line workers couldn’t be clearer: far from being a form of support, mixed squads have further harmed unhoused people. </p>
<p>The squads add a layer of surveillance and harassment that leads unhoused people to leave the spaces they know best and distance themselves from their support network in order to avoid police. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, they continue to be harassed by <a href="https://www.observatoiredesprofilages.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Judicialization-of-homelessness-in-Montreal.pdf">conventional police officers</a>.</p>
<h2>Needs of the homeless are ignored</h2>
<p>None of this is surprising.</p>
<p>While mixed squads differ from conventional policing in terms of their personnel, their objective remains the same: to intervene in lives of unhoused people in the interests of businesses, wealthier residents or other city residents who wish to see them displaced. </p>
<p>In short, the interests and needs of unhoused people are secondary, if not simply ignored.</p>
<p>The impact of mixed squads on community work is equally significant and negative. The report found the squads hinder the work of front-line workers, complicating their interventions and relationship-building and making it harder to maintain their independence from law enforcement. Police officers, meanwhile, are occupying an ever-bigger space in the ecosystem of the services unhoused people need.</p>
<p>The squads also have an increasing share of public funds. As a result, they both represent and accelerate a shift in Montréal’s management of homelessness away from the community groups that support unhoused people and work to resolve the problems they experience over the long term. Instead, the squads ignore long-term solutions and ultimately move people from one space to another on a continual basis.</p>
<p>Faced with these problems, the report calls for a new approach to homelessness, including abolishing mixed squads and reallocating their funding to two types of interventions.</p>
<h2>1. A new all-civilian squad</h2>
<p>The squad would be co-created by all concerned groups to respond to non-criminal 911 calls. This type of squad is <a href="https://theappeal.org/what-public-safety-without-police-looks-like/">increasingly common in North America</a>, and Fady Dagher, director of the Montréal police force, <a href="https://www.ledevoir.com/politique/montreal/772079/fady-dagher-promet-un-equilibre-entre-la-repression-et-la-prevention?">is in favour of creating one</a>.</p>
<p>We should emphasize that an existing squad, the Équipe mobile de médiation et d'intervention sociale (ÉMMIS), is not the civilian squad we are calling for. Although ÉMMIS teams don’t involve police, the initiative was created to respond to complaints about unhoused people, with funding of <a href="https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/montreals-mobile-intervention-program-to-be-expanded">$50 million over five years</a>. </p>
<p>The ÉMMIS approach turned marginalized people into objects of intervention, rather than the equivalent of housed city residents.</p>
<p>The ÉMMIS squad also patrols the city, talking to unhoused people in public spaces to establish “a relationship of trust.” This role makes it difficult for the unhoused to distinguish between those who are really working in their interests and needs and those who are working to improve the sense of security of others. </p>
<p>This leads to further disengagement from, and loss of confidence in, the institutions of society.</p>
<h2>2. More funding to community groups</h2>
<p>In addition to a new civilian team, we are calling for community organizations to be refinanced. The primary focus must be supporting people experiencing homelessness, and working towards long-term solutions to the problems they face.</p>
<p>That’s why the report calls for most of the funds currently devoted to mixed squads to be transferred to community organizations that share this mission.</p>
<p>Our report doesn’t claim to have all the answers. Its main objective is to challenge a public discourse dominated by the police and various city officials by prioritizing the perspectives of front-line workers who are well placed to understand what unhoused people really need. </p>
<p>We encourage further debate on this issue, which is why we are asking the city — as Montréal’s primary network of homeless-serving organizations, <a href="http://rapsim.org/">Réseau d'aide aux personnes seules et itinérantes</a> (RAPSIM), did back in 2007 — to hold public consultations soon to discuss the creation of an all-civilian response to non-criminal 911 calls.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214312/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karl Beaulieu receives funding from SSHRC</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ted Rutland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Front-line workers who support unhoused people say far from being a form of support, mixed police squads add a layer of surveillance and harassment.Ted Rutland, Associate professor, Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia UniversityKarl Beaulieu, PhD student in Social Work, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2124222023-09-21T12:43:48Z2023-09-21T12:43:48ZTraffic tickets can be profitable, and fairness isn’t the bottom line in city courts where judges impose the fines<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/547636/original/file-20230911-19-g0j5s5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C0%2C4013%2C2999&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A police officer pulls over and tickets a delivery person in the New York City borough of Queens on March 22, 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/doordash-delivery-person-pulled-over-by-traffic-police-and-news-photo/1480061224?adppopup=true">Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When city governments spend more money than they take in, officials often search for ways to generate revenue. One <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087419834632">increasingly common source</a> of money is traffic tickets. And <a href="https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.961967">research shows police officers issue more traffic tickets</a> when cities are financially in a deficit. </p>
<p>But police represent only one aspect of this revenue-generating system. Judges and their courts also use traffic citations to generate money for the cities that employ them.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=D2biqfmENKAC&hl=en">scholars of public finance</a>, we study <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=_5eMV20AAAAJ&hl=en">how cities raise money</a> to pay for their operations. Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13595">new research</a> indicates that judges in cities facing red ink often use their positions to maximize revenue from traffic tickets. They can do this by adding financial penalties to unpaid tickets. Judges often use the extra penalties to encourage people to pay.</p>
<p>The process of generating dollars through traffic tickets, though, begins with the police.</p>
<h2>Revenue-motivated policing</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?tid=702&ty=tp">Traffic violations are common</a>. Whether drivers fail to signal a turn or drive a few miles per hour above the speed limit, it is not difficult for police to find someone who violated a traffic law. Officers have the discretion to pick and choose when to ticket and can adjust the number of tickets they issue based on factors that are not related to whether someone broke the law. </p>
<p>Those factors include the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-020-0858-1">race of the driver</a> or the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1098611107306995">racial makeup of the neighborhood</a> the officers are patrolling. Usually, this means African American drivers and drivers in neighborhoods with more African American residents <a href="https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3355599">are ticketed at higher rates</a> than other people.</p>
<p>Another factor affecting ticketing, but unrelated to whether drivers are breaking traffic laws, is the budgetary situation of the city.</p>
<p>One high-profile example of how a city’s use of traffic tickets can be a problem is Ferguson, Missouri. According to a 2015 Department of Justice report, “<a href="https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/03/04/ferguson_police_department_report.pdf">Ferguson’s law enforcement practices are shaped</a> by the city’s focus on revenue rather than by public safety needs.” And those practices affected African Americans disproportionately. According to that report, African Americans made up 67% of the city’s population at the time, but they were the subjects of 85% of traffic stops, 90% of the tickets, 92% of the warrants police issued and 96% of the arrests.</p>
<p>Ferguson was neither the first nor the only local government to replenish its coffers <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/589702">through traffic tickets</a>. In the years since that federal report, numerous studies <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13125">have shown that</a> police and other city personnel <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/lapo.12228">increase the volume of traffic tickets</a> they issue based on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13125">budgetary need</a>. </p>
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<img alt="A long line of uniformed police officers stand with their backs to range cones as they speak individually to the motorists in the cars parked in front of them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/547634/original/file-20230911-17-cyckg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">San Francisco police officers check drivers at a sobriety checkpoint on Dec. 26, 2004.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/san-francisco-police-officers-check-drivers-at-a-sobriety-news-photo/51895744?adppopup=true">Justin Sullivan/Getty Image</a></span>
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<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/aler/ahaa001">The practice is actually so common</a> that it has several names: “<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2020/06/12/policing-should-not-be-about-generating-profit/">policing for profit</a>” and “<a href="https://news.clemson.edu/clemson-research-cites-shortfalls-of-revenue-motivated-law-enforcement/">revenue-motivated policing</a>” among them.</p>
<p>After a police officer tickets a driver, the process moves to a court.</p>
<h2>Ticketing incentives in court</h2>
<p>In some cases, the court that will process traffic tickets is operated by the state; in others, it is operated by the municipality. Regardless, the court is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/pbaf.12277">responsible for collecting money from traffic tickets</a>.</p>
<p>But which court hears the case matters quite a bit. If a traffic ticket is settled in a state court, the money from fees is divided across the state and its various local governments. But if that same ticket is settled in a municipal court, then the vast majority of the money goes to the city.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13595">research</a> examined how this difference affected traffic tickets in Indiana. Like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087419834632">prior research</a>, we found that police from cities facing revenue shortages issued more tickets. But we showed that this only happened when cities ran their own municipal courts. Put another way, the <a href="https://ij.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Taxation-by-Citation-FINAL-USE.pdf">police are only more likely to ticket when it is profitable for</a> the cities they serve.</p>
<p>We also examined how judges use their power to collect more money.</p>
<p>Ferguson once again provides <a href="https://www.npr.org/2014/08/25/343143937/in-ferguson-court-fines-and-fees-fuel-anger">an example of how authorities can abuse this power</a>. As detailed <a href="https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/03/04/ferguson_police_department_report.pdf">in the Justice Department report</a>, judges did not consider a person’s financial status when levying penalties or setting payment deadlines. They also aggressively applied optional fees for late payments. Lastly, judges and police officers provided incorrect or incomplete information about when or whether defendants were required to appear in court. That meant defendants often racked up additional fees – and sometimes arrest warrants – for failure to appear.</p>
<p>Our research explored whether the problems in Ferguson happened elsewhere. We studied Indiana, where judges can suspend defendants’ driver’s licenses if they have not paid their fines. <a href="https://dc.uwm.edu/eti_pubs/4">This is a powerful, but potentially harmful, way to coerce payment</a>. We counted the number of days judges waited before suspending a driver’s license. Then, we looked at whether the city was experiencing a revenue shortfall. We found that judges suspend licenses faster when their cities need more money. The effect was pretty large: A 1% decrease in revenue caused licenses to be suspended three days faster.</p>
<p>Indiana’s property tax system places limits on the amount of revenue cities can collect through property taxes, and cities do not discover how much of their property tax levy they will be able to collect until after the city budget process is complete. This system allowed us to compare cities facing different levels of revenue shortfalls due to state-imposed reductions in property tax revenues.</p>
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<img alt="The words Court House are etched onto a concrete wall." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549447/original/file-20230920-29-em1ks5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">An undated photo shows the exterior wall of a courthouse building.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/the-words-court-house-etched-into-stone-wall-royalty-free-image/1464181858?adppopup=true">Chris Jongkind/via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>The bottom line</h2>
<p>In some cities and states, officials operate their courts – not just the police department – <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/pbaf.12277">to generate revenue</a>. We believe this is inherently a problem. The criminal justice system should exist to maximize public safety, not revenue.</p>
<p>But if states change the rules about who keeps the money generated by traffic tickets and related fines, the incentives for revenue maximization go away. </p>
<p>Our research bears this out. Judges will have no reason to suspend licenses faster when their cities are facing a budget crunch if the revenue goes to the state. </p>
<p>This change won’t fix everything. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12355">Racial bias in the criminal justice system will still be pervasive</a>. But it could help get rid of policing - and judging - for profit.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212422/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Research shows police officers issue more traffic tickets and judges impose more fines when their city gets the money and when the budget is tight.Sian Mughan, Assistant Professor of Public Affairs, Arizona State UniversityAkheil Singla, Assistant Professor at the School of Public Affairs, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2133302023-09-20T12:47:01Z2023-09-20T12:47:01ZAmericans do talk about peace − just not the same way people do in other countries<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549141/original/file-20230919-29-46yjz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children wave peace doves at a concert for peace in Bogota, Colombia, in August 2022. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/choir-made-up-of-more-than-10000-children-wave-peace-doves-news-photo/1419832116?adppopup=true">Chepa Beltran/Long Visual Press/Universal Images Group via Getty Images </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Americans don’t talk much about peace. But <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/lsi.2022.94">it turns out</a> they care about it a lot – they just don’t talk about it the way people who have experienced war or civil conflict do. </p>
<p>When public opinion polls in the U.S. ask people about peace, it’s either in the context of <a href="https://www.thearda.com/data-archive?fid=GSSPANEL2">religion</a> or <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/245705/americans-higher-hopes-prosperity-peace-2019.aspx">world peace</a>.</p>
<p>Instead of using the word peace, Americans are more likely to say that they care deeply about safety and security and issues like <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/02/06/economy-remains-the-publics-top-policy-priority-covid-19-concerns-decline-again/">terrorism, crime, illegal drugs and immigration</a>. </p>
<p>But they still care about the same things people in places that have faced war are focused on. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="People wear face masks and hold large yellow and white peace signs on a city street." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549142/original/file-20230919-15-3xgj0l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Protestors hold peace signs in support of Black Lives Matter in July 2020 in Oakland, Calif.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/protesters-hold-peace-signs-in-support-of-black-lives-news-photo/1258684586?adppopup=true">Natasha Moustache/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What is peace?</h2>
<p><a href="https://sps.columbia.edu/faculty-staff/peter-dixon-phd">We are</a> <a href="https://www.scu.edu/cas/political-science/faculty--staff/fiorella-vera-adrianzen/">social scientists</a> who are part of a <a href="https://www.everydaypeaceindicators.org/team">network of peace and conflict</a> <a href="https://www.scu.edu/cas/political-science/faculty--staff/naomi-levy/">researchers </a> and <a href="https://possibilitylab.berkeley.edu/">community-engaged</a> <a href="https://gspp.berkeley.edu/research-and-impact/faculty/amy-e-lerman">scholars</a> at several universities. We and our other colleagues have spent a lot of time talking with different communities that have experienced war, including in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/huac030">Colombia</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17502977.2020.1812893">Afghanistan</a> and <a href="https://www.everydaypeaceindicators.org/_files/ugd/849039_a2d4c66b63cc4e67815a6b736cc42cd5.pdf">Bosnia and Herzegovina</a>, about what <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-photography-can-build-peace-and-justice-in-war-torn-communities-166143">peace looks like</a> to them.</p>
<p>Peace is hard to define. In the dictionary, it’s equated with tranquility or the absence of war. We see it as broader. Peace is the ability for people to live in harmony with themselves and with each other. In practice, however, that can mean <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0263395715622967">many different things</a> to different people. </p>
<p><a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/everyday-peace-9780197563397?cc=us&lang=en&">We know</a> that <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/reclaiming-everyday-peace/BEB6532292D692933AABC68EFFF9ACB3">people who directly experience conflict</a> and violence tend to have very broad, but also nuanced, definitions of peace. </p>
<p>In Colombia, for example, many communities told us they felt at peace when they had the infrastructure necessary to supply basic needs, like clean water, or when they could actively participate in regular social gatherings. In Bosnia, residents highlighted the ability to use public spaces, including rebuilt ruins from the war, as well as the presence of more day-to-day amenities like streetlights and parking.</p>
<p>But until a recent project in Oakland, California, we weren’t thinking about our work in America as also being about peace. </p>
<p>Since 2021, we’ve been working with six community organizations in Oakland to understand how people define and experience safety and well-being in their everyday lives. As it turns out, these concepts helped us get at how Americans, who have not experienced war like the people in other regions we’ve worked with, might also understand peace.</p>
<h2>Re-imagining safety</h2>
<p>Our research’s focus on safety was inspired by a number of <a href="https://www.nlc.org/post/2021/02/16/nlc-assembles-task-force-of-local-leaders-to-reimagine-public-safety-in-communities-across-the-u-s/">cities and towns</a>, like <a href="https://www.columbus.gov/reimaginesafety/">Columbus, Ohio</a>, and <a href="https://www.austintexas.gov/publicsafety">Austin, Texas</a>, that have launched projects to reform how public safety is conceived of and protected following the widespread <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html">Black Lives Matter protests</a> in 2020. </p>
<p>Oakland has undergone a similar process of asking residents to help their local government <a href="https://www.oaklandca.gov/topics/reimagining-public-safety">rethink what safety</a> means. And, like <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-voters-rejected-plans-to-replace-the-minneapolis-police-department-and-whats-next-for-policing-reform-171183">other cities</a>, Oakland residents have had an intense <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/The-Oakland-Police-Department-claims-it-is-16386039.php">debate over the police department</a> and how the government should reform its approach to crime. </p>
<p>We spoke to over 500 residents across parts of Oakland that have been especially hard hit by crime and violence and who live in areas that have historically been both overpoliced and underserved with public resources. </p>
<p>We asked questions like, “What does safety or the lack of safety look like here,” and “What are some signs that the community is doing well or not doing well?”</p>
<p>These conversations covered a lot of ground – ground that was similar to other conversations we’ve had about peace with people who live in conflict zones or countries with long histories of war.</p>
<p>Some Oakland residents spoke about how kids are desensitized to gunshots and violence or are arrested or kicked out of their homes. We heard that these kids and teenagers ultimately lose sight of how their lives – and the lives of others – have value.</p>
<p>High school students also reflected on the prevalence of guns, shootings and gangs in their lives. As one told us, “I want to go back” to a more innocent time, when “I didn’t know nothing about any of this.”</p>
<p>But just as we know that violence and security are only two aspects of people’s understandings of peace, the same is true of safety. The police – and even crime – are just two aspects of how communities think about safety in their everyday lives. They also think about economic opportunities, public space and social connections.</p>
<p>We heard about how, when kids have basic life skills and job skills training, or have mentors and role models, this can give them choices that are alternatives to criminal activity and help them invest back in their communities.</p>
<p>We heard about block parties and <a href="https://www.townnights.org/">town nights</a>, which inspire people of different races and ethnicities to look out for each other and build trust with their neighbors. “By us, for us,” as one resident put it.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The back of a man flashing two peace signs with his hands is seen on a city street, with many other people walking past him." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549145/original/file-20230919-25-r870wu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A man flashes the peace sign as protesters march during an Occupy Oakland protest in November 2011 in Oakland, Calif.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/man-flashes-the-peace-sign-as-thousands-of-protestors-march-news-photo/131201340?adppopup=true">Justin Sullivan/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>From safety to peace</h2>
<p>The United Nations marks the annual <a href="https://www.un.org/en/observances/international-day-peace">International Day of Peace</a> on Sept. 21, 2023. </p>
<p>In general, the U.S. does not widely recognize or celebrate global holidays like these, including <a href="https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/america-started-international-womens-day-so-why-don-t-we-celebrate-it-50b10ec7829e">International Women’s Day</a> or <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/04/30/1095729592/what-is-may-day-history">International Labor Day </a>. </p>
<p>But, like peace, safety is about far more than reducing violence. It’s being able to trust that police <a href="https://law.yale.edu/yls-today/news/whats-next-policing">have communities’ interests in mind</a> and knowing that residents will receive fair treatment in the courts. </p>
<p>It’s also being able to breathe clean air and access work and educational opportunities. It’s about being able to openly share past trauma, feel loved and connected, and so much more.</p>
<p>This all has important implications for what Americans want – and what they actually get – from their local governments. When policymakers define safety as the absence of violence and benchmark it primarily against metrics like <a href="https://theconversation.com/republicans-say-crime-is-on-the-rise-what-is-the-crime-rate-and-what-does-it-mean-192900">crime statistics</a>, they limit the kinds of policies that cities and their residents can look to. </p>
<p>Typically, the main policy responses in the U.S. to crime and violence have centered on policing and incarceration.</p>
<p>In contrast, our conversations across Oakland suggest that communities are already using different frameworks and language to assess safety. These in turn offer up a more holistic set of potential interventions. What, we might ask, would city leaders focus on if they were evaluating the success of public safety reforms by whether children are playing outside in the park, or whether people know the names of their neighbors?</p>
<p>Building safety in the U.S. is more akin to building peace internationally than many Americans may think. As we celebrate world peace, we think people should remember that these conversations matter here at home, too.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213330/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dixon received funding for this project from Santa Clara University. He is a Board Member of Everyday Peace Indicators. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amy E Lerman received funding for this project from the California Community Foundation / California 100 Initiative.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Fiorella Vera-Adrianzen received funding for this project from California Community Foundation / California 100 Initiative through Santa Clara University. She is a research associate at Everyday Peace Indicators.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Naomi Levy received funding for this project from the California Community Foundation / California 100 Initiative. She is a member of the Everyday Peace Indicators Board of Directors. </span></em></p>While Americans tend not to use the word “peace,” and instead opt for terms like “safety and security,” their desires and fears are not so different from what people in war-torn places express.Peter Dixon, Associate Professor of Practice, Negotiation and Conflict Resolution, Columbia UniversityAmy E Lerman, Professor of Political Science & Public Policy and Executive Director, Possibility Lab, University of California, BerkeleyFiorella Vera-Adrianzén, Political science lecturer, Santa Clara UniversityNaomi Levy, Associate Professor of Political Science, Santa Clara UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2127522023-09-19T21:13:40Z2023-09-19T21:13:40ZDiscriminatory policing is denying Black youth their childhood<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549188/original/file-20230919-17-h1y5xk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=28%2C40%2C3805%2C2115&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Youths’ stories detail concerning interactions with the police which speak to ongoing anti-Black racism in Canadian policing.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/discriminatory-policing-is-denying-black-youth-their-childhood" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>A <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/toronto-police-hit-with-class-action-lawsuit-over-carding-stops/article_472b85b0-9220-5e9a-aa4c-461ccc2cc0d0.html">class-action lawsuit</a> was brought against the Toronto Police Service in August over the force’s historic use of street checks, known as carding. The <a href="https://www.mccarthy.ca/en/carding-class-action">lawsuit</a> highlights the damaging and discriminatory impacts of carding, which has disproportionately affected Black and Indigenous youth. </p>
<p>Officially, the practice was halted years ago, though the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ont-toronto-police-carding-1.6939215">lawsuit alleges that the practice continues</a>. The allegations have not been tested in court.</p>
<p>Following the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52861726">2020 murder of George Floyd</a>, millions mobilized worldwide to demand accountability from police and bring attention to the anti-Black racism embedded in policing practices. <a href="https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.3138/9781442602502-005/html?lang=en">Racial disparities are evident in Canada</a>. Black communities are significantly over-represented in the criminal justice system, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/21533687211006461">second only to Indigenous communities</a>. </p>
<p>The Canadian judicial system is a complex, integrated network of policing, courts and correctional institutions. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0145935X.2023.2243436?src=recsys">Our recent research</a> focuses on policing practices in Ontario, specifically when Black youth encountered police before 18-years-old. Youths’ stories highlighted concerning interactions with the police which speak to the ongoing problem of anti-Black racism in Canadian policing.</p>
<h2>Black youth and policing practices</h2>
<p>Anti-Black racism occurs early in the legal process, well before sentencing and incarceration. Anti-Black racism persists in policing, evidenced by the <a href="https://www.ohrc.on.ca/sites/default/files/A%20Disparate%20Impact%20-%20TPS%20inquiry%20%28updated%20January%202023%29.pdf">Ontario Human Rights Commission’s interim report</a> on racial profiling and discrimination against Black individuals by the Toronto Police Services. </p>
<p>When examining Black children’s experiences, extra nuances concerning age must be considered. Childhood and adulthood have been recognized as distinct developmental ages since the 1900s and have been officially enshrined in Canadian law with the introduction of the <a href="https://publications.gc.ca/collections/Collection/J2-248-2004E.pdf">Juvenile Delinquents Act in 1908</a>.</p>
<p>Youth criminal justice legislation has centred on diversion and prevention, rather than punishment, which recognizes young people’s distinct developmental needs. The <a href="https://www.laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/y-1.5/index.html">Youth Criminal Justice Act</a> recognizes the lasting impact of confinement on young people; since coming into effect in 2003, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/ontarios-new-child-welfare-policy-is-promising-but-youth-leaving-care-need-more-support-202437">number of youth in detention</a> has <a href="https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/may-2018/learning-from-our-success-in-reducing-youth-imprisonment/">steadily decreased</a>. Despite positive outcomes that signal the success of diversion practices, Black youth in Ontario continue to experience negative encounters with police. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A logo of the toronto police service on a glass door." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/548972/original/file-20230919-21-velats.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In August a class-action lawsuit was brought against the Toronto Police Service over street checks, alleging the practice disproportionately harmed racialized people.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Our study</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/0145935X.2023.2243436">Our research explores the experiences of Black youth</a>, ages 16 to 26, living in the Greater Toronto Area. We discuss findings from the <a href="https://rcypartnership.org/en/">Rights for Children and Youth Partnership</a>, a research project exploring the rights of Latin American and Caribbean youth. </p>
<p>We conducted interviews with 47 Black youth who had previous contact with police between ages 12 and 17. We found that, despite their age or degree of vulnerability, Black youth felt police perceived them as agitators to be feared and as threats to the general public, rather than children in need of protection.</p>
<p>One interviewee, Matt, told us how he was first stopped by police while walking home from school with two friends while in eighth grade. According to Matt, the police claimed that the three boys matched a description. The boys were handcuffed and forced to sit on the curb. While two were eventually let go, one was arrested and taken to the station. Matt said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“We [were] underage first and foremost…they didn’t read us no rights…didn’t ask no questions, and they didn’t tell us what we were being arrested for…They came in there for one thing.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While the use of force is concerning and <a href="https://www.ccja-acjp.ca/pub/en/wp-content/uploads/sites/8/2021/08/Full-Report-PUF.pdf">supposed to be a last resort</a> in all police interactions, its use with youth is particularly concerning, given their vulnerability. Youth recalled threats of implied or explicit violence from police. </p>
<p>Another interviewee, Shawn, recounted being arrested for shoplifting. The officer said he wished he could have used more force on the then 17-year-old. Shawn said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I got kneed a couple of times … the cop was saying, "Oh I wish I was here, I would have got to use this,” and he was talking about his taser … “I wished you had tried to escape from me, I would have used this on you.”“ </p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://genderjusticeandopportunity.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/girlhood-interrupted.pdf">A study by the Center on Poverty and Equality</a> in the United States found that Black children — particularly girls — were perceived as older, needing less protection and more knowledgeable about "adult” topics. Black youth felt they were expected to know the full extent of the law and were granted little leeway if they were unaware. </p>
<p>In nearly every interview of our study, youth disclosed receiving little to no support or information from the officers with whom they interacted. Caity told us how she was arrested after a fight broke out at school. She was 12 at the time and described the lack of support from police officers: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I’m terrified at this point because I didn’t know it was going to be this serious and everything was a surprise to me … I’m crying a little bit. The lady is very cold with me, she’s in no way — not that she had to be kind — but she just didn’t, there was no warmth in her at all.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Most of the people we spoke to had their first encounters with police officers at a young age — for some as early as 12 or 13. The youth consistently felt they were perceived as criminals, regardless of the setting they were in. </p>
<p>These racially discriminatory practices indicate anti-Black bias wherein routine activities involving Black children and youth result in active policing. The participants largely expressed that they believed the police had mistreated them. </p>
<p>Minors are meant to be treated differently than adults in the legal system because of their young age. Police are denying Black youth their childhood, and governments must demand greater transparency. Ultimately, more accountability is needed from police to the young people they are meant to be protecting and serving.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212752/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Veronica Escobar Olivo receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marsha Rampersaud receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p>Black youth felt their age and inexperience were often disregarded by police officers who held them wholly responsible for knowing and abiding by the law.Veronica Escobar Olivo, Research Associate, School of Social Work, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityMarsha Rampersaud, Assistant Professor, Department of Social Science, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2124232023-09-08T12:25:10Z2023-09-08T12:25:10ZPhiladelphia police rarely release body camera videos − here’s why it happened in the fatal shooting of Eddie Irizarry<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546768/original/file-20230906-27-fxewci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C26%2C6000%2C3961&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">About 68% of Philadelphia police wear body cameras, but the footage is rarely made public.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/philadelphia-police-officers-carry-metal-barricades-as-news-photo/1504681837">Michael M. Santiago via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>After weeks of public pressure, Philadelphia police on Sept. 8, 2023, released <a href="https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/eddie-irizarry-police-bodycam-charges-philadelphia/3640947/">body camera footage</a> capturing the fatal shooting of 27-year-old Eddie Irizarry by police in August.</em> </p>
<p><em>The Conversation spoke to <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=los44hoAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Jordan M. Hyatt</a>, associate professor of criminology and justice studies and the director of the Center for Public Policy at Philadelphia’s Drexel University, to explain the rules controlling when the public gets to see body cam footage – and how Philadelphia’s legal framework compares to other places in the U.S.</em> </p>
<h2>How long have Philadelphia police been using body cams?</h2>
<p>The department began using what are more formally known as “body-worn cameras” as part of <a href="https://billypenn.com/2022/03/06/philadelphia-police-12-year-old-killing-thomas-siderio-body-cameras/">a pilot program in 2014</a> – about seven years after <a href="https://www.policeforum.org/assets/BWCCostBenefit.pdf">the cameras first became available</a> <a href="https://americanpoliceofficersalliance.com/police-use-body-worn-video-brief-history/">in the U.K.</a> However, their use in Philadelphia did not become <a href="https://whyy.org/articles/philly-reaches-12-5m-deal-taser-maker-police-body-cameras/">widespread until 2017</a>. Even now, only about 68% of all officers wear one, according to numbers provided by the Philadelphia police. </p>
<h2>Who decides when this video is made public?</h2>
<p>The district attorney’s office has the final say regarding any video release while there is an active, potentially criminal investigation. Officer Mark Dial <a href="https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/eddie-irizarry-police-bodycam-charges-philadelphia/3640947/">surrendered to police on Sept. 8</a> and faces <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/philadelphia-officer-shot-eddie-irizarry-car-surrenders-police/story?id=103027894">murder and other charges in the shooting</a>. Earlier, the police commissioner had indicated her <a href="https://www.inquirer.com/crime/eddie-irizarry-shooting-mark-dial-officer-philadelphia-police-20230823.html">intent to fire him for insubordination</a> after a 30-day suspension.</p>
<p>Videos of police encounters with the public are <a href="https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/LI/consCheck.cfm?txtType=HTM&ttl=42&div=0&chpt=67A">not considered public records</a> at the state level. <a href="https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/li/uconsCheck.cfm?yr=2017&sessInd=0&act=22">A change in Pennsylvania law passed in 2017</a> prevents the release of these recordings under <a href="https://www.openrecords.pa.gov/RTKL/About.cfm">right-to-know</a> processes. </p>
<p>In deciding to release footage, the Philadelphia police and district attorney <a href="https://www.pccd.pa.gov/criminaljustice/advisory_boards/Documents/BWC%20Policy%20Recommendations%20Commission%20Approved.pdf">try to balance state</a> and <a href="https://www.pccd.pa.gov/criminaljustice/advisory_boards/Documents/BWC%20Policy%20Recommendations%20Commission%20Approved.pdf">federal</a> rules with the wishes of the victim and their family, the need to preserve the integrity of videos as evidence in a criminal trial, ongoing investigations and public safety concerns.</p>
<h2>Can a resident of Philadelphia ask for video to be released?</h2>
<p>Yes, but the process can be slow and is rarely successful. A <a href="https://www.openrecords.pa.gov/RTKL/PoliceRecordings.cfm#:%7E:text=A%20written%20request%20must%20be,%22delivered%22%20by%20certified%20mail">detailed request</a> must be submitted within 60 days of the incident either in person or by certified mail. The requesting party must also pay the costs associated with the request.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/li/uconsCheck.cfm?yr=2017&sessInd=0&act=22">State laws</a> and <a href="https://www.phila.gov/open-records-policy/">local regulations</a> require the law enforcement agency to first decide if a video can be released and provide an explanation for any denial. Decisions can be <a href="https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/li/uconsCheck.cfm?yr=2017&sessInd=0&act=22">appealed to the Court of Common Pleas</a> – a judicial process that can take quite some additional time.</p>
<p>That is not to say that body camera footage is never released, but it is <a href="https://whyy.org/articles/why-is-it-still-so-hard-to-see-police-bodycam-footage-in-pennsylvania/">exceedingly uncommon across Pennsylvania</a>. The Irizarry video is <a href="https://www.axios.com/local/philadelphia/2023/08/23/philadelphia-police-body-camera-footage">only the second</a> such video released in Philadelphia.</p>
<p>The first video released showed <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8897219/Bodycam-footage-showing-fatal-police-shooting-Walter-Wallace-Jr-released-week.html">the police-shooting death of Walter Wallace Jr.</a> <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8897219/Bodycam-footage-showing-fatal-police-shooting-Walter-Wallace-Jr-released-week.html">in 2020</a>. That video also came out after an intense public outcry. </p>
<h2>Why has the Irizarry case drawn so much attention?</h2>
<p>Initially, the Philadelphia police declined to release the Irizarry footage, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/eddie-irizarry-video-philadelphia-police-officer-shooting-kensington-family-news-conference/">citing the ongoing investigation</a>. And, at first, District Attorney <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/eddie-irizarry-mark-dial-philadelphia-police-shooting-video-released/">Larry Krasner</a> agreed to withhold it.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A gray-haired white man wearing a suit and a blue tie looks into the camera" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=770&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=770&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=770&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=967&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=967&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546757/original/file-20230906-19-w0a39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=967&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner leaves a TV studio on Aug. 24, 2023, after discussing the release of the body camera footage from the police officer who shot and killed Eddie Irizarry.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/district-attorney-of-philadelphia-larry-krasner-is-seen-news-photo/1636123422?adppopup=true">Gilbert Carrasquillo/GC Images via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>But a home security system also captured video of the incident, and the homeowner released it to the Irizarry family’s attorney about a week after the shooting. It seems to show Dial <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0xjpvDWlmM">opening fire</a> almost immediately after arriving at the scene. </p>
<p>Shortly after this third-party video came out, and amid increasingly visible protests, Krasner allowed Irizarry’s family to view the official footage and promised to release it to the public. On Sept. 8, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/08/us/mark-dial-eddie-irizarry-shooting-charges/index.html">Krasner made good</a> on that promise.</p>
<h2>Is Philadelphia’s record for releasing footage unusual?</h2>
<p>The approach in both Philadelphia and Pennsylvania is fairly common. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.policeforum.org/assets/BWCCostBenefit.pdf">2018 survey by the Police Executive Research Forum</a> found that 17% of police departments never release videos. Like Philadelphia, nearly 80% can withhold them if they will be <a href="https://www.policeforum.org/assets/BWCCostBenefit.pdf">used as evidence or in a personnel matter</a>. </p>
<p>Philadelphia’s approach is broadly similar to other large cities, including <a href="https://www.nyc.gov/site/nypd/about/about-nypd/equipment-tech/body-worn-cameras.page">New York</a> and <a href="https://mpdc.dc.gov/node/1143942">Washington, D.C.</a> Unlike jurisdictions in <a href="https://www.psp.pa.gov/contact/Pages/REQUESTING-AUDIO-AND-VIDEO-RECORDINGS-FROM-THE-PENNSYLVANIA-STATE-POLICE.aspx">Pennsylvania</a>, however, these cities allow for the online submission of requests to view video footage under relevant open records laws, potentially speeding up the process.</p>
<h2>Why don’t all of the city’s police wear body cameras?</h2>
<p>The program is widespread; however, cameras have not yet been issued to the <a href="https://districts.phillypolice.com/districts/15th/">15th district</a>, highway, traffic, airport, narcotics strike force, neighborhood services and SWAT teams, according to the police department. Additionally, cameras are worn only by uniformed officers; undercover officers, for example, are exempt.</p>
<p>One of the biggest limitations to the adoption of body cameras nationwide has been the cost, which includes training, equipment and <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/1/24/18196097/police-body-cameras-storage-cost-washington-post">data storage</a>. In Philadelphia, <a href="https://www.axios.com/2023/02/27/philadelphia-police-body-camera-footage-not-reviewed">the program has cost US$20 million</a> over the past decade, according to Axios. </p>
<p>Despite the large price tag, <a href="https://bfi.uchicago.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/BFI_WP_2021-38.pdf">some research suggests</a> that every $1 spent on body-worn cameras results in about $5 of savings by cutting down on complaints, including those that lead to lawsuits from citizens.</p>
<p>Zooming out, the use of body cameras has become commonplace in the U.S., with <a href="https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/articles/research-body-worn-cameras-and-law-enforcement">80% of large police departments adopting their use by 2018</a>. While the associated costs are a significant hurdle, especially for smaller municipalities, <a href="https://bja.ojp.gov/funding/opportunities/o-bja-2023-171562">federal support has increased</a>.</p>
<h2>Advocates hoped body cameras would reduce violence by creating more transparency about police interactions with the public. Have they had that effect?</h2>
<p>A review of all the rigorous, available research on the topic in 2020 found that body-worn cameras were associated with <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/cl2.1112">decreases in the number of citizen complaints</a> and an increase in the quality of criminal investigations. Research findings on the effects on the use of force, arrests and assaults are more mixed, making drawing broad conclusions difficult.</p>
<p>In Philadelphia, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0734016818814895">recent studies suggest</a> that body cameras can reframe the role of police, emphasizing their position as community guardians. Additional, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-019-09383-0">high-quality research suggests</a> that Philadelphia police officers wearing cameras had about 38% less use-of-force incidents and made 39% fewer arrests compared to officers not wearing cameras. Earlier <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2016.1198825">studies in the city</a>, however, found that body cameras had no effect on arrest rates or compliance but did reduce complaints. </p>
<p>It remains an open question whether opening up public access to the video captured by these cameras would increase positive outcomes.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story was updated to reflect the release of the video and charges brought against Officer Mark Dial.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jordan Hyatt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The public’s right to know often gives way to concerns about privacy, public safety and protecting evidence.Jordan Hyatt, Associate Professor of Criminology and Justice Studies, Drexel UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2123262023-09-04T17:13:07Z2023-09-04T17:13:07ZPoor police practices are endangering 2SLGBTQ+ survivors of intimate partner violence<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/poor-police-practices-are-endangering-2slgbtq-survivors-of-intimate-partner-violence" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Intimate partner violence is a prevalent and growing issue in Canada. According to <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/221019/dq221019c-eng.htm">Statistics Canada</a>, there were 114,132 police-reported victims of intimate partner violence in 2021, marking the seventh consecutive year of increased rates of violence.</p>
<p><a href="https://women-gender-equality.canada.ca/en/gender-based-violence/intimate-partner-violence.html">Intimate partner violence</a> refers to harmful behaviours perpetrated by a current or former partner over another. This can include physical, sexual, emotional or financial abuse and <a href="https://lukesplace.ca/coercive-control/">coercive control</a>. </p>
<p>The issue is particularly significant in the Canadian Prairies, where <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210302/dq210302d-eng.htm">rates of police-reported intimate partner violence are consistently highest</a>. However, these rates do not reflect the pervasive nature of this issue, as approximately <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2018001/article/54893-eng.pdf">seven out of 10 incidents of intimate partner violence are never reported to police</a>.</p>
<h2>Intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ communities</h2>
<p>Considerably less is known about intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ relationships. This is because less research has focused on 2SLGBTQ+ experiences. In fact, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/a0038656">researchers have noted</a> that only three per cent of studies between 1999 and 2013 addressed intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ relationships.</p>
<p>The data that is avaialable suggests that it is a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-65263681">prevalent issue</a> in 2SLGBTQ+ communities. <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2021001/article/00005-eng.htm">Statistics Canada</a> estimates that two-thirds of sexual minority women experience intimate partner violence in their lifetime. </p>
<p>Scholars even suggest that rates of intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ communities are equal to, or higher than, heterosexual relationships. <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19319742/">Research has found</a> abusive dynamics in one-quarter to one-half of same-sex relationships. </p>
<p>Police have historically failed to protect 2SLGBTQ+ communities from harm. In fact, as the enforcers of anti-LGBTQ laws in the 20th century, police have actively participated in the oppression of 2SLGBTQ+ communities. </p>
<p>Tensions between police and 2SLGBTQ+ communities notably reached a turning point during the <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/gay-rights/the-stonewall-riots#stonewall-s-legacy">Stonewall Uprising in 1969</a>. The six-day protest was triggered by a police raid at the Stonewall Inn in New York City and served as a driving force for the LGBTQ+ rights movement. </p>
<p>Many advancements and milestones have been achieved in the LGBTQ+ rights movement since the uprising, but the relationship between police and 2SLGBTQ+ communities remains strained. This is largely because poor police practices continue today, with police failing to protect 2SLGBTQ+ survivors from harm — often from intimate partners.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.umanitoba.ca/sites/resolve/files/2022-10/2SLGBTQ%2B%20IPV%20Final%20Report%20October%2014%202022.pdf">Our research</a> examined how 2SLGBTQ+ communities seek help when experiencing intimate partner violence in the Canadian Prairies. We found that participants’ perceptions and experiences of dealing with police were negative. Police responses ranged from not taking the cases seriously to engaging in discriminatory behaviours towards 2SLGBTQ+ survivors.</p>
<h2>Survivor experiences with police</h2>
<p>As part of our study, we interviewed 47 2SLGBTQ+ survivors of intimate partner violence across the Canadian Prairies about their experiences. A range of gender identities and sexual orientations were represented including Two-Spirit, transgender, non-binary, genderfluid, gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual and asexual. Survivors ranged in age from 19 to 67 years old. </p>
<p>Around 55 per cent were of White/European ancestry, 17 per cent were Indigenous, 15 per cent were of mixed ancestry, six per cent were Black and four per cent were Asian. Almost half (47 per cent) had a mental or physical disability or chronic health condition.</p>
<p>Despite historical harms, many survivors described reaching out to police for help. However, police responses towards them ranged from disinterest at best to discriminatory at worst. While a few survivors reported positive encounters with police, these were reported much less frequently.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/r4Hy5q_d11E?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A video about the 1981 Toronto Police raids that targeted gay men. In 2016, the Toronto Police Service apologized for the raids. Police have historically failed to protect 2SLGBTQ+ communities from harm.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Many survivors told us they were not taken seriously when seeking police assistance. This was particularly true for lesbian survivors, who stated that police brushed off abusive incidents as a “catfight” or disagreement “between friends.”</p>
<p>This was echoed by survivors in other 2SLGBTQ+ communities, who felt the disdain they experienced from police invalidated their relationships and severity of abuse they experienced. Overall, misconceptions surrounding what abuse looks like in 2SLGBTQ+ communities were common in police responses.</p>
<p>Other survivors described blatant discrimination at the hands of police, including ridicule and dehumanizing rhetoric on account of their 2SLGBTQ+ identities. Transgender survivors in particular discussed instances of being misgendered, even after repeated attempts to express their proper name and desired pronouns. Discrimination was amplified for survivors with multiple marginalized identities, particularly those from racialized groups.</p>
<h2>Changing harmful practices</h2>
<p>Current policing practices must be addressed to improve responses to intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ communities, <a href="https://www.hrc.org/news/police-accountability-is-a-bedrock-issue-for-the-lgbtq-community">including demanding more accountability from police</a>. </p>
<p>The survivors we interviewed discussed several recommendations for tackling the issue, beginning with changing police attitudes and behaviours towards 2SLGBTQ+ communities. Specific changes include respecting 2SLGBTQ+ identities and pronouns, validating 2SLGBTQ+ relationships and taking intimate partner violence in 2SLGBTQ+ relationships seriously.</p>
<p>The need for larger systemic change within policing was also discussed. An important step towards systemic change involves committing to in-depth and long-term training to better inform interactions with 2SLGBTQ+ survivors.</p>
<p>Training should be comprehensive and address problematic preconceptions that downplay or dismiss the issue. Holding police accountable for not adequately responding to intimate partner violence within these systems was also noted as crucial to ensuring that training is put into practice.</p>
<p>Finally, increasing the diversity of justice system staff was also recommended. Survivors specifically underscored the importance of having more 2SLGBTQ+ representation in policing. Additionally, having social worker liaisons responding to calls alongside police officers was recommended to better assess and address intimate partner violence.</p>
<p>Violence of all kinds affects people of every gender identity and sexual orientation. However, 2SLGBTQ+ survivors can experience different forms of violence and face additional challenges accessing assistance and support. Police must do better to gain the trust and confidence from 2SLGBTQ+ communities. All survivors of violence, regardless of gender identity and sexual orientation, have the right to safety and protection, including from the police.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212326/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kendra Nixon receives funding from the PrairieAction Foundation and research support from community partners Rainbow Resource Centre, OUTSaskatoon and Sagesse.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ashley Haller receives funding from the PrairieAction Foundation and research support from community partners Rainbow Resource Centre, OUTSaskatoon and Sagesse. </span></em></p>Research finds that police officers engage in discriminatory behaviours towards 2SLGBTQ+ survivors of intimate partner violence.Kendra Nixon, Professor, Faculty of Social Work & Director, RESOLVE (Research and Education for Solutions to Violence and Abuse), University of ManitobaAshley Haller, Research Technician at RESOLVE (Research and Education for Solutions to Violence and Abuse), University of ManitobaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2119652023-09-04T17:13:06Z2023-09-04T17:13:06ZPolice-academic partnerships could help tackle the crime of coercive control<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545546/original/file-20230830-15-1zhh9e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C5000%2C3315&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Research collaboration between police forces and academics could go a long way to ensuring federal legislation aimed at fighting coercive control in intimate relationships is effective.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 2020, calls to defund the police echoed a longstanding argument in critical criminology in favour of <a href="https://kpu.pressbooks.pub/introcrim/chapter/10-4-emergent-elements-of-critical-criminology/">police abolition</a>. </p>
<p>Academics who support abolition <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-018-9400-4">promote activism</a> over collaboration. But as calls for “defund the police” pivot to <a href="https://doi.org/10.35502/jcswb.315">“refund the police” in priority areas</a> — in particular mental health, issues faced by marginalized people and intimate partner violence — police-researcher partnerships are needed more than ever.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/defunding-the-police-is-a-move-towards-community-safety-181376">Defunding the police is a move towards community safety</a>
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<p>When faced with shifting priorities, police forces may lack the research capacity to evaluate existing policies. Most police officers and supervisors <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1461355719838930">don’t often read</a> academic research that could point them to current evidence-based practices.</p>
<p>Collaborating with independent researchers provides access to needed skills and may bolster public trust and <a href="https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1894-8693-2016-02-06">perceived legitimacy</a> of their work and efforts.</p>
<p>Academics who forgo working with police are losing out on opportunities for critical data access and effective knowledge mobilization. Researchers who seek to understand and evaluate policing practice need access to large-scale, timely and highly sensitive data on police operations. </p>
<p>Furthermore, if police participate in designing studies and interpreting findings, they may more readily acknowledge the need for change in light of unfavourable results — or adopt new practices that show positive effects.</p>
<h2>Intimate partner violence</h2>
<p>Academics who actively exclude the very people they seek to influence by their research are unlikely to be successful in that goal. Fortunately, many scholars now see co-operation and collaboration as the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01924036.2023.2202868">best way to conduct research in criminal justice</a>.</p>
<p>Intimate partner violence is one priority area that has seen the benefits of police-academic partnership. Beginning in the 1980s, researchers collaborated with police organizations to evaluate the effects of arrest for domestic assault in the <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/2095575">United States</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00977031">and Canada</a>. Studies showed that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9133.2002.tb00107.x">arrest reduced subsequent violence</a>, but the impact varied according to an individual’s <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/jfcj.12024">history of violence</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0093854807300757">and other risk factors</a>.</p>
<p>More recently, an academic team initiated a partnership with police and other services to conduct research with the shared goal of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/10887679231178786">preventing intimate partner homicide</a>.</p>
<p>We have been part of such partnerships over the course of our respective careers, from <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/1040-3590.16.3.267">the creation</a> of the first actuarial risk assessment tool for intimate partner violence to <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/tam0000175">the testing</a> of that tool in routine police practice. </p>
<p>Our current collaborators include researchers who have studied <a href="https://doi.org/10.35502/jcswb.150">how officers use such tools and assess risk</a> when responding to violent and non-violent incidents involving intimate partners. </p>
<h2>Coercive control</h2>
<p>Recognition of non-physically violent but coercive and controlling forms of abuse has grown rapidly in recent years, especially with the <a href="https://business-school.open.ac.uk/news/five-reasons-why-coercive-control-has-increased-during-covid-19">increase in coercive control incidents during the COVID-19 pandemic</a>. </p>
<p>Coercive control involves repeated, systematic acts of <a href="https://lukesplace.ca/coercive-control/#:%7E:text=Often%2C%20the%20abuser%20is%20able,when%20and%20for%20how%20lon">isolation, intimidation and violation</a> that undermine the partner and trap them in the abusive relationship. It’s a pattern of behaviour over time, making it challenging for police to identify because <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0032258X19876974">officers’ conventional understanding of intimate partner violence focus on overt acts of violence</a>.</p>
<p>Coercive control is considered a <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1177/0886260516675464">risk factor</a> for intimate partner femicide, and is believed to have <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/keiras-law-introduced-in-house-of-commons-1.6348729">played a role in the apparent murder of a four-year-old Toronto girl, Keira Kagan</a>, by her father in 2020.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Four men carry a white casket, one openly weeping." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545544/original/file-20230830-15-r6de19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People carry the casket at the funeral for four-year-old Keira Kagan in Toronto in February 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Researchers and activists have urged governments to make changes in how the criminal justice system responds to intimate partner violence in order to reflect coercive control. </p>
<p>Coercive control is now outlawed in the <a href="https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/controlling-or-coercive-behaviour-intimate-or-family-relationship#:%7E:text=Section%2076%20Serious%20Crime%20Act,penalty%20of%20five%20years'%20imprisonment.">United Kingdom</a> and <a href="https://legislation.nsw.gov.au/view/pdf/asmade/act-2022-65">Australia</a>, and similar legislation <a href="https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session/archives/measure_indiv_Archives.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=2425&year=2020">has been passed</a> <a href="https://malegislature.gov/Bills/192/S1112.Html">or considered</a> in several American states.</p>
<p>In Canada, <a href="https://www.parl.ca/legisinfo/en/bill/44-1/c-332">Bill C-332</a> seeks to criminalize coercive control, and the justice minister recently expressed the government’s <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/remfrew-county-1.6939642">openness to creating a new offence in the Criminal Code</a>. <a href="https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/bill/C-233/third-reading">Keira’s Law</a>, which <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9903160/supporters-celebrate-passing-of-keiras-law-aimed-at-battling-domestic-abuse/#:%7E:text=violence%2C%20coercive%20control-,'Keira's%20Law'%20set%20to%20educate%20judges%20on%20domestic%20violence%2C,grief%20to%20advocate%20for%20others">passed the Senate on Aug. 17, 2023</a>, is set to mandate coercive control training for judges.</p>
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<h2>How best to address coercive control?</h2>
<p>But research suggests that criminalizing coercive control is fraught with challenges, including potential <a href="https://theconversation.com/unintended-but-not-unanticipated-coercive-control-laws-will-disadvantage-first-nations-women-188285">racial bias</a> and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895817728381">difficulty of defining, detecting and documenting the behaviour</a>. </p>
<p>Police-academic partnerships can help answer crucial questions, including how police officers investigate coercive control, what the most effectual training methods are and whether policies are effective and equitable when implemented.</p>
<p>We are now collaborating with police to identify a common language for intimate partner violence risk appraisal. The <a href="https://celiaproject.squarespace.com/">CELIA IPV project</a> for intimate partner violence research is studying how police can recognize and respond to non-physical, coercive and controlling behaviours. </p>
<p>An expressed goal of our collaboration is to expand formal partnerships between researchers with expertise in intimate partner violence and policing services across Canada and to address research gaps in evidence-based policing for intimate partner violence.</p>
<p>We have so far established partnerships with the <a href="https://www.edmontonpolice.ca/">Edmonton Police Service</a>, the <a href="https://www.opp.ca/">Ontario Provincial Police</a> and the <a href="https://saintjohnpolice.ca/">Saint John Police Force</a> in New Brunswick. </p>
<h2>Evidence-based policing</h2>
<p>We’ll also examine risk-assessment approaches for people engaging in intimate partner violence <a href="https://celiaproject.squarespace.com/aims-1">across diverse gender and sexual identities</a>, extending our partnerships and enhancing the potential for improving evidence-based policing whenever officers respond to a domestic call. </p>
<p>Police-academic partnerships are not just about the academic search for knowledge, and not just about the evaluation of policing practice. </p>
<p>They are about the creation of relationships with the potential to transform how each partner understands and interacts with the other. Collaboration is the essence of knowledge mobilization and will be fundamental to the success of anti-coercive control legislation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211965/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>N. Zoe Hilton receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. She is an author of the ODARA, an IPV risk assessment tool.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sandy Jung receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>Police-academic partnerships are key to the success of evidence-based policing. Growing support for coercive control legislation makes research collaboration all the more urgent.N. Zoe Hilton, Professor, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of TorontoSandy Jung, Professor, Department of Psychology, MacEwan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2107712023-08-17T21:27:20Z2023-08-17T21:27:20ZEscaping justice: A flawed investigative body fails to curb RCMP sexual misconduct<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542888/original/file-20230815-21-e5htkx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Musical Ride troop practises at their stables in Ottawa in May 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/escaping-justice-a-flawed-investigative-body-fails-to-curb-rcmp-sexual-misconduct" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Workplace violence in the form of bullying, harassment and sexual abuse has reached a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-0935-9_5">crisis point in countries around the world</a>. In Canada, the fact that this pernicious problem <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-blue-wall-of-silence-allows-bullying-sexual-abuse-and-violence-to-infect-police-forces-198487">thrives within institutions</a> designed to uphold law and order makes it all the more startling. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rcmp-independent-centre-harassment-resolution-1.6891399">Recent stinging coverage</a> of the RCMP’s inability to manage internal complaints of abuse suggests its so-called <a href="https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/trnsprnc/brfng-mtrls/prlmntry-bndrs/20210930/05-en.aspx">“arm’s length” body</a> — the Independent Centre for Harassment Resolution (ICHR), created to investigate bullying, harassment and sexual abuse — is ineffective.</p>
<p>Const. Corey Flodell, a British Columbia Mountie, is the most recent manifestation of the systemic failure to confront the RCMP’s widespread culture of abuse. Despite admitting to five instances of misconduct against female co-workers, Flodell <a href="https://bc.ctvnews.ca/b-c-mountie-who-harassed-mistreated-female-colleagues-allowed-to-keep-his-job-1.6497418">remains a member of the RCMP</a>.</p>
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<p>Members of the RCMP are expected to maintain a high standard of professionalism and follow the force’s <a href="https://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/regulations/SOR-2014-281/page-5.html#:%7E:text=Members%20respect%20the%20law%20and%20the%20rights%20of%20all%20individuals.&text=Members%20act%20with%20integrity%2C%20fairness,their%20authority%2C%20power%20or%20position.&text=Members%20give%20and%20carry%20out%20lawful%20orders%20and%20direction.">Code of Conduct</a> that promotes good behaviour, integrity and impartiality. If misconduct occurs, the discipline authority — a detachment commander, for example — will address violations and ascribe corrective measures. </p>
<p>In more serious matters, like in the case of Flodell, <a href="https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/member-conduct">a conduct hearing</a> is held, a formal process used to pursue the dismissal of a member based on allegations. These proceedings take place in front of a board that hears evidence, renders decisions and administers sanctions, including dismissal.</p>
<h2>Inappropriate touching, harassment</h2>
<p>In a <a href="https://decisions.rcmp.gc.ca/rcmp/c/en/item/520921/index.do#_ftn34">decision by conduct board adjudicator Christine Sakiris</a>, Flodell was found to have committed one act of discreditable conduct by “touching inappropriately another member of the RCMP without her consent.” </p>
<p>Flodell was also found to have contravened the force’s code of conduct once by engaging in harassment and another three times by making “rude and/or inappropriate comments,” according to the decision that followed a joint agreement between parties.</p>
<p>Sakiris made clear in her decision that she had concerns about the proposed discipline against Flodell given that another investigation had determined charges could proceed against him, and because meagre sanctions against the constable amounted to only 120 hours of pay and 80 hours of annual leave. </p>
<p>She stated in her decision that Flodell’s description of his actions as “workplace banter and jokes” minimized the allegations and suggested he lacked genuine remorse. Nevertheless, Sakiris ultimately agreed with the proposal presented by Chief Supt. Steven Ing to simply reprimand Flodell. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A sea of Mounties in red serge and Stetsons." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541499/original/file-20230807-25-w77eb3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">RCMP officers in red serge march at the funeral of RCMP Const. Shaelyn Yang in Richmond, B.C., in November 2022 after she was stabbed to death on the job.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The consequences</h2>
<p>Flodell will be transferred to another detachment, must work under close supervision for a year and undergo additional training. He has been ordered to draft letters of apology. He will also forfeit 15 days of pay and 10 days of vacation.</p>
<p>That’s not exactly a punishment that fits his admitted misconduct.</p>
<p>The implications inherent in the decision are unmistakable: the RCMP is failing in its duty to protect its members from each other <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rcmp-sexual-harassment-history-1.3453413">through a culture of silence</a>. </p>
<p>By agreeing to what amounts to a slap on the wrist, Sakiris’s decision further perpetrates systemic violence by the RCMP’s conduct board. It strikes at the heart of public trust while supporting the systemic issues within this profoundly broken culture.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rcmp-discipline-decisions-1.6033809">Six Mounties have been terminated over the past few years</a> following conduct board findings that they engaged in discreditable sexual activities while 14 have remained on the job despite being found to have committed sexual misconduct.</p>
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<p>A snapshot of a naked woman being kept in a detachment’s detox cells was photographed and printed. One more yanked a subordinate’s hair, exposed himself to her and requested oral sex from her. </p>
<p>Other members of the RCMP have been disciplined for sexual misconduct but ultimately kept on. One RCMP officer was demoted and transferred after he rubbed the inside of a co-worker’s legs, touched her vagina and told her to “just relax.”<br>
In any other reasonable context with other public or private employers, criminal charges would be laid and the employees would lose their jobs.</p>
<h2>The scourge of protecting perpetrators</h2>
<p>Clearly the RCMP’s conduct board’s unchecked power, discretionary action and subjective decisions are not focused on the victims but rather on protecting the perpetrator.</p>
<p>The Mounties aren’t alone.</p>
<p>The Canadian Armed Forces doesn’t get it either after multiple scathing reports of their inability to address sexual misconduct.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-taking-canadas-armed-forces-so-long-to-tackle-sexual-misconduct-196869">What's taking Canada's Armed Forces so long to tackle sexual misconduct?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The same goes for the Vancouver Police Department. Const. Nicole Chan took her own life after reporting years of abuse at the hands of her supervisors.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/behind-the-blue-wall-the-toxic-culture-that-left-a-vancouver-police-officer-dead-204743">Behind the blue wall: The toxic culture that left a Vancouver police officer dead</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>At the RCMP, the outcome for Flodell is indicative of a systemic problem — the blue wall of silence within the RCMP allows officers to engage in sexual misconduct, receive lenient punishments and continue their careers with their reputations largely intact. </p>
<p>It sends a powerful message — “when you’re ‘one of us,’ you are above the law.” </p>
<p>The failure of the RCMP to address sexual misconduct is not an isolated incident but rather a pattern of behaviour documented in a succession of court cases spanning several years. </p>
<p>Notably, a class-action lawsuit exposed the pervasive discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault suffered by more than 2,000 female RCMP members, <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/landmark-deal-in-rcmp-sexual-harassment-class-action-wins-court-approval-1.3437485">resulting in a $125 million settlement.</a></p>
<p>Nonetheless, the Flodell case and too many others illustrate the RCMP continues to fail its members.</p>
<h2>Decisive action required</h2>
<p>In 2020, in response to the release <a href="https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/wam/media/4773/original/8032a32ad5dd014db5b135ce3753934d.pdf">of a comprehensive report</a> on RCMP misconduct, <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/it-shook-me-report-details-toxic-and-hateful-culture-within-rcmp-1.5195954">Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“If an organization cannot keep its own members safe from harassment and discrimination, how can Canadians have confidence in them, to keep them safe as they enforce the law? There is a need for a lot of work moving forward to improve and reform the RCMP.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The same holds true three years later.</p>
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<p>This is yet another wakeup call. The RCMP conduct board system of discipline is broken — and the RCMP leadership is incapable of fixing it.</p>
<p>Workplace violence is a public health issue impacting the physical and mental health of many Canadians. Tackling it requires immediate and decisive action. Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer, Theresa Tam, has the authority under the <a href="https://lois-laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/P-29.5/">Public Health Act</a> to create a national response beyond employer-driven reforms and superficial policy changes. </p>
<p>Another logical step would be to establish a national commissioner on workplace violence that’s independent of antiquated employment law. </p>
<p>This commissioner could be mandated to conduct impartial investigations and impose real penalties for perpetrators and employers that engage in and condone violence, bullying, harassment and sexual abuse at work.</p>
<p>The scourge of workplace violence requires a seismic shift in our perspective and response. Decisive action is required to prevent, address and end this crisis — within the RCMP and law enforcement agencies everywhere else.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210771/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jason Walker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The scourge of workplace violence necessitates a seismic shift in our perspective and response. Decisive action is required to prevent and end this crisis within the RCMP and other police forces.Jason Walker, Associate Professor & Program Director, Adler UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2110872023-08-13T13:36:45Z2023-08-13T13:36:45ZTo reduce rising crime rates, Canada needs to invest more in social services<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541565/original/file-20230807-27499-r8df14.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=40%2C53%2C8946%2C4877&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Crime Severity Index is calculated like a crime rate, but different crimes are given a different weight, or importance, based on their severity.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/to-reduce-rising-crime-rates-canada-needs-to-invest-more-in-social-services" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Every summer, Statistics Canada releases crime rate and crime severity data for the previous year. This year, <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/230727/dq230727b-eng.htm?">Canada’s Crime Severity Index (CSI)</a> increased by 4.3 per cent, the violent CSI increased by 4.6 per cent, and the non-violent CSI increased by 4.1 per cent. Moreover, aside from a drop during the COVID-19 pandemic, these indices have been on the rise since 2014.</p>
<p>An April 2023 poll found that <a href="https://leger360.com/surveys/legers-north-american-tracker-april-13-2023/">65 per cent of Canadians</a> felt crime has gotten worse compared to before the pandemic. Conservative Party leader <a href="https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/poilievre-blames-rising-violence-in-alberta-canada-on-his-political-opponents-1.6354594">Pierre Poilievre has criticized the Liberal government</a> for the rising crime figures in recent months. </p>
<p>Canada’s new justice minister, Arif Virani, said it was <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/canada-s-new-justice-minister-to-tackle-perceived-lack-of-safety-from-crime-1.6501641">empirically unlikely</a> that Canadians are less safe, but that the government would act to address feelings of growing insecurity.</p>
<p>But what is the CSI and what do changes in crime stats mean for Canadians?</p>
<h2>What is the Crime Severity Index?</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/lbrr/archives/cnmcs-plcng/cn5373-eng.pdf">CSI was introduced in 2009</a> and represented the first major change in measuring crime in Canada since the 1960s. Its purpose was to identify changes in the seriousness or severity of crime reported to the police. </p>
<p>The CSI is calculated like a crime rate, <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-004-x/2009001/part-partie1-eng.htm">but different crimes are given a different weight, or importance, based on their severity</a>. Without this kind of system, a community that has 10 low-level assaults will have the same violent crime rate as another that has 10 homicides because each incident would be given the same weight. </p>
<p>The CSI accounts for this by using different weights for different crime types: approximately 80 for <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-224-x/2008000/dd-eng.htm">assault level 1</a>, 7,000 for homicide and one for gambling. These weights are based on sentencing decisions in the court system.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A graph showing Canada's crime severity index between 1998 and 2022. The graph shows a decrease until 2014 followed by a slight increase in subsequent years." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541310/original/file-20230804-17921-t4cr8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Police-reported crime severity indexes in Canada from 1998 to 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/230727/cg-b001-eng.htm">(Statistics Canada)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Understanding the data</h2>
<p>At first glance, the CSI is great because it allows us to determine which areas experience more violence. However, there are at least three issues when considering what changes in the CSI mean for most Canadians.</p>
<p>First, the CSI must be considered over longer periods of time than year-to-year fluctuations. We now have the CSI for 1998-2022, <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/62-001-x/2018001/info-eng.htm">25 years of data</a>. Yes, the CSI has been increasing since 2014, but it is still much lower than it was 25 years ago. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s40163-017-0076-y">Crime has been falling around the world</a>, including Canada, since about 1990. It may be the case that 2014, for Canada, was just the low point for crime. Because of this, relatively small changes in incidents will have large percentage changes.</p>
<p>Second, because the CSI is calculated in a similar fashion to crime rates, places with lower populations will be “punished” by the CSI. For example, in a city of one million people, one homicide will lead to a homicide rate of 0.1 per 100,000 people. However, in a city of 15,000 people, one homicide will lead to a rate of 6.67 per 100,000 people. </p>
<p>Now if you add in the weights used in the CSI, this disparity becomes magnified. To be clear, the math is not wrong — it is just that the statistic has its limitations. The CSI is fine for Canada, its provinces and larger metropolitan centres. But, for the rest of the country, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12703">the CSI should be interpreted with caution</a>.</p>
<p>Third, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10940-016-9295-8">crime is usually concentrated in specific areas</a>. Across the world, including Canada, one-half of crime reported to the police occurs in approximately five per cent of the city. These places are, generally speaking, areas that experience more poverty, mental health and addiction problems, and other social challenges. </p>
<p>In short, those who are already suffering most, especially post-pandemic, are being victimized more with these increases in crime in Canada; this has been shown in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-021-09495-6">Vancouver</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2022.101881">Saskatoon</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A sign that reads Statistics Canada in front of a tall grey building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=367&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=367&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=367&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541564/original/file-20230807-35364-68n6bz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The CSI is calculated in a similar fashion to crime rates, which means rates in areas with lower populations can appear higher in the data.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Reducing crime</h2>
<p>What should our takeaway be here? We need to be careful of how we interpret the CSI. Crime has been increasing the past eight years: homicide, sexual assault, assault (particularly with a weapon) and vehicle theft are all increasing more than average. So, despite my caveats, crime has been increasing of late, particularly violent crimes. </p>
<p>The notable common thread in all of the media coverage of these violent attacks is the presence of mental health issues, addiction, homelessness and poverty. How did we get here? Over the past 40 years, <a href="https://doi.org/10.3138/cpp.2020-007">conservative governments</a> have defunded <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/welfare-state">social programs and social services</a>.</p>
<p>A result of these changes has been a decrease in social welfare and increases in social ills. Where we are today is the result of a 40-year process that we cannot expect to reverse in short order. We need to reinvest in social programs and services, knowing it will take time to see an impact. </p>
<p>Putting government funding back into social services is a large component of the <a href="https://defundthepolice.org/">Defund the Police</a> movement. Rather than continuing to spend on <a href="https://theconversation.com/data-shows-that-police-involved-deaths-in-canada-are-on-the-rise-201443">reactive models</a> such as policing that do little more than criminalize poverty and disadvantage, we need to reinvest in preventive strategies that actually work.</p>
<p>To prevent crime, governments need to invest more in existing social welfare programs and reestablish social services such as basic income.</p>
<p>This spending on social welfare services and basic income should be viewed positively across the political spectrum as well. The provision of basic income and social services would both <a href="https://lorimer.ca/adults/product/basic-income-for-canadians-2/">support vulnerable populations and be cost-effective</a>. </p>
<p>If we are concerned about crime and its severity, we should support reinvesting public funds into preventative strategies such as housing, mental health care, basic income and addiction services.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211087/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Andresen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Recent data from Statistics Canada shows crime rates in Canada rising. Crime has become a hot-button political issue in Canadian cities. But what does the data actually mean?Martin Andresen, Professor of Criminology, Simon Fraser UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2111532023-08-11T14:14:53Z2023-08-11T14:14:53ZWhy imprisoning repeat shoplifters rarely breaks the cycle of offending – and what may work better<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541706/original/file-20230808-25-1obzzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C16%2C5364%2C3910&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The possibility of introducing mandatory prison sentences for prolific shoplifters has been mooted by government ministers. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/londonenglandunited-kingdomjuly-21-2019-waterloo-rail-1676652064">Neil Bussey/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The UK government is taking a <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/action-plan-to-crack-down-on-anti-social-behaviour">harsher approach</a> to tackle criminal activity which is blighting local neighbourhoods. And recently, government ministers have been talking tough about repeat shoplifting, including <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/shoplifters-face-prison-under-crime-crackdown-ggdbv3j99">the possibility</a> of introducing new laws which would see prolific shoplifters imprisoned. This has all been against a backdrop of concern about a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jun/01/one-guy-uses-us-like-a-larder-the-british-shoplifting-crisis-as-seen-from-the-tills">rise in shoplifting</a> across the UK.</p>
<p>But there are some serious practical problems with any such measures and questions remain over whether such a policy could break the cycle of offending. Meanwhile, there is an innovative approach to this issue which may be a better way of dealing with crimes such as shoplifting called “<a href="https://www.gov.uk/guidance/integrated-offender-management-iom">integrated offender management</a>” (IOM). </p>
<p>Rolled out over the past few years, IOM is a novel criminal justice approach that is designed to break the cycle of re-offending. It is operated by 39 out of 43 police forces in England and Wales. </p>
<p>IOM involves police officers working closely with prison and probation services and criminal justice intervention teams. These are support staff who provide both clinical and therapeutic interventions for drug users involved in the criminal justice system. It is all in an effort to change or control the criminal activities of prolific offenders. </p>
<p>IOM was designed to address the underlying causes of offending. By the end of 2020, it was <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/integrated-offender-management-strategy">central</a> to the government’s neighbourhood crime strategy. In a report issued that year, former minister for crime and policing Kit Malthouse and former minister for prisons and probation, Luzy Frazer, said: </p>
<p>“We need a new approach – one with the tools to come down with full force on those responsible, but which also encourages rehabilitation and supports offenders to overcome the complex problems that we know can fuel this type of behaviour, such as substance misuse, poor mental health and issues with housing or employment.”</p>
<p>Any proposals which would see prison sentences for repeat shoplifters could risk undoing any positive progress made under IOM. </p>
<h2>The problem with prison</h2>
<p>The UK’s prison estate is running out of capacity for adult males. In November 2022, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/nov/30/uk-government-requests-urgent-police-cells-male-prisoners">the Ministry of Justice announced</a> emergency measures that would see some offenders who would ordinarily be imprisoned (typically remand prisoners) housed in police cells. <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prison-population-figures-2023">Figures</a> released in August 2023 show a total of just 980 available prison places.</p>
<p>The government has <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/500-million-boost-to-create-thousands-of-new-prison-places">already stated</a> that more prisons need to be built. But any criminal justice initiative that requires new prisons will take a long time to deliver. This is because, on average, new prisons take <a href="https://consult.justice.gov.uk/digital-communications/proposed-new-prison-in-chorley/supporting_documents/chorleynewprisonconsultation.pdf">two to three years to build</a> and open. </p>
<p>Also, <a href="https://www.centreforsocialjustice.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/CSJ-Desperate-for-a-fix-WEB-1.pdf">70% of shoplifting</a> is estimated to be carried out by people funding an addiction to class A drugs – typically heroin and crack cocaine. These people arrive in prison as addicts and likely leave as addicts and so will continue shoplifting. Custody is not a panacea for prolific shoplifting and is unlikely to break the cycle of offending. </p>
<h2>Integrated offender management</h2>
<p>IOM work is done through a mix of rehabilitative and restrictive or enforcement-orientated interventions. Here, the police take a “<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10439463.2018.1547719">carrot and stick</a>” approach to the management of offenders. Plain-clothed officers, deployed as police offender managers, gather intelligence and monitor people for signs of re-offending. </p>
<p>Simultaneously, these officers attempt to draw offenders away from crime by working alongside the other agencies, facilitating access to drug services, education, employment and transitions into stable housing arrangements. This is the “carrot” approach. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="A police officer wearing a yellow high visibility jacket" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=715&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=715&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=715&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/542123/original/file-20230810-18-i6hwim.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Integrated offender management involves police officers working closely with other agencies.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-uk-19th-april-2019-police-1392717764">John Gomez/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Where there is evidence that a person is failing to comply with licence conditions, or engage with IOM positively, traditional catch-and-convict policing methods are used by uniformed patrol officers. This is the “stick” approach.</p>
<p>Prolific shoplifters are the type of offenders IOM schemes should be engaging with. </p>
<p>My own <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Integrated-Offender-Management-and-the-Policing-of-Prolific-Offenders/Cram/p/book/9780367254148">research</a> has focused on how police officers contribute to IOM schemes. </p>
<p>I have also spoken with offenders who were engaged with IOM in the community. A number said that, while it was initially challenging to do so, in time they were able to form working relationships with police officers. </p>
<p>And, significantly, because of this, IOM had had a positive impact on their lives. This was particularly the case when it came to IOM helping them enter employment and tackle any drug-related issues they were experiencing. </p>
<p>Broadly, IOM seemed to have a strong motivational influence and a positive impact on those who wanted to leave their criminal lifestyle behind. </p>
<p>But IOM can only fully operate when people are able to access the relevant support services in the community. People may be able to get very limited employment and substance misuse help when in prison, but IOM offers a much deeper and enduring level of support. </p>
<p>The prospect of removing sentencing discretion for prolific shoplifters from magistrates and judges and introducing mandatory jail sentences, would risk disrupting a significant criminal justice programme. IOM may be a better and more cost effective way to deal with the pressing issue of repeated shoplifting.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211153/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>My original research, on Integrated Offender Management, was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council. Grant number: EF/H011382/1.</span></em></p>Integrated offender management is a better way of dealing with shoplifters than prison.Frederick Cram, Lecturer in Law, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2093192023-08-10T12:42:23Z2023-08-10T12:42:23ZSan Jose and the reemergence of the donut city<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537435/original/file-20230714-21-id7lc7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C0%2C3982%2C3000&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">American downtowns were facing headwinds even before the pandemic began.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SanJoseDowntownMural.jpg">Mark Davidson</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The specter of downtown decline is again haunting American cities. </p>
<p>After many decades of reinvestment and repopulation, some American downtowns are now <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/03/domestic-migration-trends-shifted.html">showing signs of hollowing out again</a>. </p>
<p>The COVID-19 pandemic certainly bears some of the blame. </p>
<p>The widespread adoption of remote and hybrid work schedules has drained commercial offices and caused tenants to terminate leases. In many downtowns, office occupancy is at <a href="https://www.kastle.com/safety-wellness/getting-america-back-to-work/">50% pre-pandemic</a> levels. Ripple effects include <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2022/06/21/covid-restaurant-closures/">shrinking lunchtime crowds</a>, slumping retail sales and a drop-off of public transit ridership. For example, New York City’s subway is at <a href="https://www.apta.com/research-technical-resources/transit-statistics/ridership-report/">65% of pre-pandemic ridership</a> as of early 2023.</p>
<p>I study <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cico.12449">how urban governance challenges shape city budgets</a>, so I’m aware of how these pandemic-related changes are making long-term urban problems worse at a time many cities are <a href="https://www.route-fifty.com/finance/2023/05/cities-stare-down-huge-budget-gaps/386139/">dealing with strained budgets</a>. </p>
<h2>Pre- and post-pandemic urbanism</h2>
<p>Tightening city government finances and growing service demands are threatening to produce Donut City 2.0. A donut city is <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w28876">defined by out-migration</a>, with the city center losing residents and businesses to the suburbs. </p>
<p>This is not a rerun of hollowing out experienced in many <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/227170">U.S. cities in the 1960s</a>. The usual culprits of economic restructuring, racial tensions, shifting consumer preferences and government inefficiency are all still involved, but these forces are now manifest in new ways.</p>
<p>After the financial crisis that began <a href="https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/great-recession-and-its-aftermath">the Great Recession in 2007</a>, cities got spooked. When housing markets collapsed and stock markets sank, cities found themselves running out of money. Many of them, like Chicago and Memphis, siphoned revenues into reserves and made recessionary <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00330124.2020.1858886">budget cuts permanent</a>. Some cities, like Dallas and Portland, have also had to face up to their huge <a href="https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2022/07/07/states-unfunded-pension-liabilities-persist-as-major-long-term-challenge">unfunded pension liabilities</a>. Servicing debts and shoring up finances has often been prioritized over providing services and building infrastructure.</p>
<p>This post-Great Recession restructuring has now run headlong into the post-pandemic economy.</p>
<p>Exactly what this collision looks like varies from one municipality to the next, but some broad trends are emerging. Front and center is a growing demand for city services. Since 2020, this demand has been slaked by the federal government’s pandemic relief money, but now these funds are <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/coronavirus/assistance-for-state-local-and-tribal-governments">running out</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A young person rides a scooter past a shuttered store displaying the sign " src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541097/original/file-20230803-15-adaknt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A tight budget means San Jose has fewer dollars to put toward reinvestment.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/hank-cocas-downtown-furniture-slated-for-redevelopment-news-photo/1240400239?adppopup=true">Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A growing demand</h2>
<p>What kind of services are needed? Here are a few examples.</p>
<p>According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, nationwide homelessness numbers have been <a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2016-AHAR-Part-2.pdf">trending upward since 2016</a>. In 2022, a post-pandemic spike left this number just shy of <a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2022-AHAR-Part-1.pdf">600,000 people</a>, up 50,000 in six years. </p>
<p>The demand for law enforcement is also growing. <a href="https://datatopics.worldbank.org/world-development-indicators/">World Bank data</a> shows that U.S. crime rates began trending upward in 2014. This trend again accelerated during the pandemic. New York City’s 2021-22 spike in crime made <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/gun-crime-soars-as-police-retreat-in-americas-cities-l26dbss9l">headlines globally</a>. Although crime rates have now abated in most U.S. cities, local governments are <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/10/31/violent-crime-is-a-key-midterm-voting-issue-but-what-does-the-data-say/">dealing with a public perception that their cities are less safe</a>. Hiring remains <a href="https://www.policeforum.org/staffing2023">challenging</a>.</p>
<h2>Donut amid shimmering silicon</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A map of California, showing San Jose just south of San Francisco" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=730&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=730&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541583/original/file-20230807-28322-lk2qu0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=730&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">San Jose is located about 50 miles southeast of San Francisco.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/roads-and-national-park-vector-map-of-the-us-royalty-free-illustration/1307750212">Rainer Lesniewski/iStock via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>San Jose, California, a city of <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/sanjosecitycalifornia/PST045222">1 million</a>, does not conjure archetypal images of urban decline. It is not home to redundant smokestacks and empty houses. It is a city that is home to thousands of <a href="https://www.sanjose.org/attraction/silicon-valley-tech-tours">global technology firms</a> and suffers from <a href="https://www.point2homes.com/news/us-real-estate-news/rank-us-cities-share-of-luxury-homes-for-sale.html">vastly inflated housing costs</a>. And yet, despite its wealth, it is struggling with the pressures of Donut City 2.0.</p>
<p>As may seem fitting for the home of Zoom’s headquarters, San Jose has seen some of the lowest rates of return to office working. The city’s return rate is just 44% vs. national averages that are <a href="https://www.kastle.com/the-data-science-behind-theback-to-work-barometer/">at about 50%</a>. PayPal, Roku, Western Digital and X – formerly known as Twitter – have also laid off what amounts to thousands of San Jose-based employees, putting further pressure on <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/tech/article/san-jose-s-paypal-to-cut-2-000-jobs-as-bay-area-17754716.php">commercial occupancy rates</a>. </p>
<p>This does not make San Jose unique. What it does do is put more pressure on city revenues.</p>
<h2>Drop-off in investment</h2>
<p>When cities see declines in commercial occupancy, they get hit in multiple ways. </p>
<p>One way is that it makes future investment less likely. San Jose’s economic growth hinges on <a href="https://realestate.withgoogle.com/sanjose/">Google’s planned expansion</a> and an <a href="https://www.vta.org/projects/bart-sv">in-progress connection</a> to the regional BART transit system. Given all that empty office space and large drop-offs in BART ridership, these plans now face a more uncertain future. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman stands on an otherwise empty subway station." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/541585/original/file-20230807-2559-4jjun1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Fewer riders means less revenue for the Bay Area Rapid Transit, cooling plans for expanding the system to San Jose.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Transit%20Financial%20Woes/0eae75429d1e4dfa84ecefc26454396e?Query=Bay%20Area%20Rapid%20Transit&mediaType=photo&sortBy=creationdatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=477&currentItemNo=1">AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez</a></span>
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<p>San Jose has a US$1.2B <a href="https://www.sanjoseca.gov/your-government/departments-offices/office-of-the-city-manager/budget/budget-documents">general fund annual budget</a>. Business taxes represent a relatively small slice – 6%, or $70 million – of its total revenues. For comparison, property taxes are 32% and sales taxes are 23%. This means San Jose is less sensitive to commercial decline than other cities. And yet, small budget changes can have large consequences. </p>
<p>San Jose entered the pandemic with significant, if not unique, challenges. In 2011, San Jose acknowledged that it <a href="https://sanjosespotlight.com/can-san-jose-reduce-its-pension-debt-by-issuing-bonds/#:%7E:text=As%20of%20June%2030%2C%20San,federated%20plan%20was%2052%25%20funded">owed retirees $3 billion more</a> than it held in assets. An acrimonious fight between the city and labor unions followed. The <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2015/07/15/san-jose-unions-reach-pension-settlement/">eventual settlement</a> set San Jose on a path to make good on its pension promises, but correcting for years of skipped and inadequate payments will squeeze the city’s budget for decades to come.</p>
<p>This squeezing has already been felt. San Jose cut its payroll during the Great Recession and these cutbacks have not been restored. The city currently has nearly <a href="https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/san-jose-city-employees-prepare-for-possible-strike/">860 vacant staff positions</a>, unfilled because of a lack of funding.</p>
<p>This understaffing exacerbates other problems. Like other California cities, such as San Francisco, San Jose is experiencing a major homelessness crisis. In 2023, the city spent $116 million trying to alleviate the problem by providing counseling services and investing in affordable housing. Yet San Jose’s unhoused population <a href="https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/6340-people-hundreds-of-youth-are-homeless-in-san-jose-annual-census-finds/">grew to 6,340</a> by the spring of 2023 – up from an <a href="https://www.sanjoseca.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/38890/636987964835130000">estimated 4,350</a> in 2017.</p>
<p>Debate over the city’s 2023-24 budget revolved around how best to solve growing homelessness. The new mayor, Matt Mahan, succeeded in diverting some long-term affordable housing dollars to more <a href="https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-passes-budget-mayors-housing-plan-fails/">immediate housing needs</a>, but the overwhelming consensus was that this influx of cash would not be enough to solve San Jose’s homelessness problem. </p>
<p>New funds will be hard to find. Raising either property or sales taxes without incurring negative consequences, like further declines in local consumer spending and sales tax revenue, is unlikely. </p>
<p>In 2020, the city was successful in introduced a new property transfer tax to <a href="https://www.sanjoseca.gov/your-government/departments-offices/housing/resource-library/housing-investment-plans-and-policy/measure-e-real-property-transfer-tax">address housing problems</a>, making an additional tax a hard sell. So, the city is left moving around expenditures within a largely constrained budget.</p>
<h2>Multiple stressors</h2>
<p>San Jose is not alone in facing this conundrum. </p>
<p>Cities across the country are experiencing inflexible expenditures and highly constrained revenues. Without residents’ demands being met, the prospects of hollowing out increase. Budget projections look bleak in many cities, with notable cases including large metros such as <a href="https://news.wttw.com/2023/04/18/chicago-faces-85m-budget-shortfall-2024-says-lightfoot-while-defending-her-financial">Chicago</a>, <a href="https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/city-of-houston/2023/07/31/457387/houston-will-face-a-budget-crisis-by-2025-unless-it-cuts-spending-next-year-city-controller-says/">Houston</a>, <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/s-f-faces-bigger-deficit-even-months-ago-17867788.php">San Francisco</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/19/opinion/new-york-city-budget-cut-eric-adams.html">New York City</a>. </p>
<p>The outlook will largely depend on the reaction of residents and businesses. In 2022, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that San Jose had <a href="https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-shrinks-in-population-and-desirability/">lost 42,000 residents</a>, the city’s population declining 4.1% since 2020.</p>
<p>It’s not yet clear how important or uniform this trend will become. What we do know is that <a href="https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/national-deficit/">the federal</a> and <a href="https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2022/12/16/nine-states-began-the-pandemic-with-long-term-deficits">many state governments</a> have their own budget issues and will therefore not be moving in with a fix.</p>
<p>Unlike 50 years ago, cities are now more entrepreneurial, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2043820619890438">aggressively competing against each other</a> for residents, businesses and state and federal funds. Stemming decline will involve getting creative with limited financial resources. For those cities that lose out, the subsequent struggle for survival could mirror the worst of 20th century urban decline.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209319/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Davidson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Post-pandemic pressures are compounding stresses cities were already facing, leading to the hollowing out of some American cities.Mark Davidson, Professor of Geography, Clark UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.