A crime summit held recently in St. Louis was a virtual who's-who of high ranking city and state government officials. Conspicuously absent from the gathering were the progressive, African American district attorneys of St. Louis and Kansas City, who were excluded despite having been elected to the top law enforcement post in Missouri's two largest cities. We look at the latest in a trend of anti-democratic attacks on reformist elected prosecutors.
Read MoreSince the creation of the first SWAT teams in the 1960s, militarized police units have multiplied. SWAT teams can rescue hostages or handle emergencies – but are they used that way? Do they increase public safety? And what’s the impact on the public, and on officers?
Read MoreAfter riots erupted Ferguson in 2014, investigations revealed that the entire criminal justice system in St. Louis County – not just the police department – levied massive amounts of fines and fees on its poorest citizens in order to fund itself. It was a wake-up call, but one organization had been in place working on these issues for five years.
Read MorePolice departments in the U.S. are under scrutiny like never before. Calls for change are the only constant. So how does a police chief lead a department in this climate? And what’s most important as we look forward, two years after Ferguson?
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