State Regulation of Policing: POST Commissions and Police Accountability

This Article examines the untapped potential of Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) commissions to protect communities that experience police misconduct and discrimination. POST commissions, which are created by state laws and exist in all fifty states, have broad authority to regulate police officers and police departments. POST commissions determine eligibility and qualifications for police employment and regulate the content of training officers receive. Most POST commissions can also revoke certification of officers who commit serious misconduct or fail to meet continuing eligibility requirements set by the commissions. In some states, they can also impose statewide, compulsory reforms to policing policy. POST commissions have yet to fulfill their potential to protect the public from harmful police behaviors because (1) they lack clear legislative or organizational mandates to protect the public against unethical or unjust policing and (2) their membership tends to be dominated by law enforcement officials with little or no input from the communities that are most burdened by aggressive and discriminatory policing. If legislatures address these structural problems, POST commissions could regulate policing to protect communities from police abuse and misconduct

Measuring What Matters: Data Analysis and the Future of Police Reform

A fundamental principle of organizational management is that you measure the things that matter. In the field of law enforcement, the most routinely and intensely tracked metrics often relate to reported crime rates. Data-driven management systems like CompStat have a huge influence over law enforcement decisions about resource deployment, patrol assignments, performance evaluations, and promotions. Potential harms of racially disparate or unnecessarily burdensome policing, on the other hand, are rarely analyzed as routinely or intensely. As a result, evaluation of law enforcement policies and practices can often become a benefit-only cost-benefit analysis: Decisions about police intervention are made based on anticipated benefits of preventing crimes and catching offenders with little regard for the direct and indirect costs of police intervention to individuals and communities

State Regulation of Policing: POST Commissions and Police Accountability

This Article examines the untapped potential of Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) commissions to protect communities that experience police misconduct and discrimination. POST commissions, which are created by state laws and exist in all fifty states, have broad authority to regulate police officers and police departments. POST commissions determine eligibility and qualifications for police employment and regulate the content of training officers receive. Most POST commissions can also revoke certification of officers who commit serious misconduct or fail to meet continuing eligibility requirements set by the commissions. In some states, they can also impose statewide, compulsory reforms to policing policy. POST commissions have yet to fulfill their potential to protect the public from harmful police behaviors because (1) they lack clear legislative or organizational mandates to protect the public against unethical or unjust policing and (2) their membership tends to be dominated by law enforcement officials with little or no input from the communities that are most burdened by aggressive and discriminatory policing. If legislatures address these structural problems, POST commissions could regulate policing to protect communities from police abuse and misconduct

Toolkit for Equitable Public Safety

Across the United States, community groups are working to improve public safety and promote greater equity, transparency, and accountability in their local law enforcement agencies. They prioritize different issues and use different strategic tactics, but they are united in their desire to build safer, more just communities through the slow, hard, but lifesaving work of law enforcement reform. If you are part of one of these community groups (or want to be), this Toolkit is for you.Law enforcement reform is challenging, uphill work. Inequities in law enforcement outcomes are often deep-rooted, complex, and perpetuated by multiple different factors. Institutional resistance to necessary change is frequently strong. Conversations about increasing law enforcement equity too often reach an impasse where advocates, and those they are negotiating with, simply do not agree about what the underlying facts are. Faced with complex problems and limited resources, it can be difficult for community advocates to determine where to focus their efforts.The ultimate goal of this document is to help you assess aspects of public safety in your community and create or refine a step-by-step plan for influencing relevant stakeholders and creating the change you want to see

Complexities of oestrogen in stroke

Evidence exists for the potential protective effects of circulating ovarian hormones in stroke, and oestrogen reduces brain damage in animal ischaemia models. However, a recent clinical trial indicated that HRT (hormone-replacement therapy) increased the incidence of stroke in post-menopausal women, and detrimental effects of oestrogen on stroke outcome have been identified in a meta-analysis of HRT trials and in pre-clinical research studies. Therefore oestrogen is not an agent that can be promoted as a potential stroke therapy. Many published reviews have reported the neuroprotective effects of oestrogen in stroke, but have failed to include information on the detrimental effects. This issue is addressed in the present review, along with potential mechanisms of action, and the translational capacity of pre-clinical research