First off, let’s look at the much-argued “Broken Windows” theory as applied to police work. It is an important jumping-off point. This is a seminal piece that ran in The Atlantic magazine in 1982, by George Kelling and James Q. Wilson:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/03/broken-windows/304465/
And here is an inevitable criticism of that theory, one of many criticisms:
http://www.businessinsider.com/criticism-for-giulianis-broken-windows-theory-2013-8
Are the police overly militarized? Here’s a piece of my own in The Times 16 months ago or so on the rise of SWAT teams:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/us/the-rise-of-the-swat-team-in-american-policing.html
Police forces, especially the NYPD, deal with many more menaces than before, not the least being terrorist threats. Here, via the NYPD, is a roster of known terrorist plot since Sept. 11, 2001. I guess the word “known” should be underlined. There may well be plots we don’t know a thing about.
http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/pr/plots_targeting_nyc.shtml
A year ago, Police Commissioner William Bratton announced a new way in which terrorism investigations will be handled:
The police tactic of stop, question and frisk has provoked considerable anger and reflection in recent years. This New Yorker article studies the judge who sharply curtailed the practice and her reasoning:
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/05/27/rights-and-wrongs-2
Do bad cops escape punishment all too often? Here’s a look at possible reasons:
http://www.thecrimereport.org/news/inside-criminal-justice/2015-01-why-do-bad-cops-escape-punishment
Police corruption (meaning cops taking bribes and related acts of wrongdoing) has not been a notable problem for quite a while. But it was huge in the 1970s. Revelations by a cop named Frank Serpico — portrayed by Al Pacino in a ’70s film called ‘Serpico’ — shaped a lot of the attitudes that still prevail. Here’s a look at the reclusive Serpico from a few years ago:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/nyregion/24serpico.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all
Well before the Eric Garner incident on Staten Island in 2014, a few cases of cops shooting unarmed black men contributed greatly to tensions. Here are two of the biggest from not that long ago:
The shooting of Amadou Diallo in 1999:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Amadou_Diallo
And the shooting of Sean Bell in 2006:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_Bell_shooting_incident
Here’s the NYPD’s Firearms Discharge Report for 2014, the last year that we have complete. Give it a look. I’ll walk you through the relevant numbers in class. There may be surprises there for many of you:
Finally, the U.S. imprisons more people than any other country. Here’s on examination as to why:
