Resources

This report is a review of the community safety process in Brattleboro, Vermont. This community safety review process sought to understand the current state of the community safety systems in Brattleboro and their impact on community members’ actual experiences of safety, danger, or harm. The process was led by two core facilitators and informed and guided by a nine-member committee, who each brought their own identities, perspectives and lived experiences. From October through December, this team sought input from community members about their experiences with safety, danger, harm and safety response systems. All community members were welcomed to share their experiences and visions, and engagement efforts were focused on connecting with individuals who carry marginalized identities and who are most impacted by policing and police-like systems. We heard from over 200 community members and professionals working in over 25 organizations. We also performed a quality review of the Brattleboro Police Department policies, practices, and some areas of data collection. The Town of Brattleboro has embarked on a courageous and imperative process of evaluating community experiences with safety, danger, harm and policing/safety systems. This step must be followed next by action.

This report was written by Pascal Emmer, Woods Ervin, Derecka Purnell, Andrea J. Ritchie, and Tiffany Wang for the COVID19 Policing Project, hosted by the Community Resource Hub for Safety & Accountability. It gathers and expands on regular project updates, and is the first in a series on the impacts of policing and criminalization in the context of the coronavirus pandemic.

Defund Sheriffs is designed to support organizers in launching their own campaigns to defund their local sheriff. The toolkit brings into focus how sheriffs fit into the broader law enforcement landscape and why defunding them is an essential step towards building more safe and just communities across the country. It also provides a step-by-step guide, applicable to any locale, on how to restructure public safety to prevent jail deaths and put a stop to the over-policing of Black and brown communities. This includes guidance for understanding budgets, identifying leverage points, and creating an alternative vision that prioritizes safety and community needs.

Civil forfeiture allows police to seize property on the mere suspicion that it is involved in criminal activity. Prosecutors can then forfeit, or permanently keep, the property without ever charging its owner with a crime. By contrast, criminal forfeiture requires prosecutors to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that an owner is guilty of a crime and then, in the same proceeding, prove the property is connected to the crime. This report demonstrates that local, state and federal agencies use civil forfeiture to collectively forfeit billions of dollars each year.

Home is where you should feel the safest. For many Chicago families, it’s being invaded by the people worn to serve and protect them. When a confidential informant gives officers information, such as tips on crimes, police are required to verify it’s correct before acting. In the case of a search warrant, it must be signed by a police supervisor, an assistant state’s attorney and a judge. But Chicago Police officers often fail to verify the address before executing search warrants, leading to the wrong homes – and innocent families – being the targets.

This page was originally published on Oct. 6, 2019. On May 18, 2020, an epilogue was added. On July 29, 2020, the epilogue was updated with new data provided by police.

In the wake of nationwide demonstrations for racial justice prompted by the murders of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, and countless other Black individuals, Los Angeles has become a focal point for critical discussions around police and community relations. StudyLA’s 2020 Police and Community Relations Survey focuses on the attitudes and opinions of city of Los Angeles residents toward the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) following this period of nationwide demonstrations. Residents were asked a range of questions to measure public opinion toward policing. Specifically, we gauge how residents feel that the LAPD is doing with respect to the many facets of its mission: to safeguard the lives and property of the people the LAPD serves, to reduce the incidence and fear of crime, and to enhance public safety while working with the diverse communities to improve quality of life.

This website was inspired by decades of work by grassroots movements, journalists, civil rights attorneys, academics and policy makers that have advocated for learning from litigation data to improve policing policies, trainings, early intervention systems and accountability. The data was collected by The Legal Aid Society’s Special Litigation Unit Cop Accountability Project team, led by Cynthia Conti-Cook and Julie Ciccolini. It was first collected for Legal Aid’s Criminal Defense Practice defenders and the thousands of clients we serve every year all over the City.

Calls for reform suggesting the deployment of social workers instead of police in our communities overlook the past and present damage done by the child welfare system as co-conspiring with police. The primary goal of this brief is to discuss the ways the Department of Children and Family Services is interconnected with police through data sharing, predictive analytics, and direct partnership. We see this brief as just the beginning of a larger endeavor in understanding the harm of the child welfare system on children and families.

Toolkit for the Movement is a collection of resources from the Center for Constitutional Rights to support and protect our communities. We’ve long known the authoritarian playbook; these resources are chapters in the People’s Playbook. The resource contains: the newly-updated If An Agent Knocks, offering information and advice for individuals targeted by the FBI or other federal agents; FOIA Basics for Activists, updated with a case study and annotated FOIA requests, which breaks down how to use the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), a tool that anyone can use to expose government and corporate actions and equip themselves with the information they need to organize; and, together with Immigrant Defense Project, an updated version of our Defend Against ICE Raids and Community Arrests Toolkit to resist the criminalization, deportation, family separation and much more.