FW: Spies in the city skies
Dianne Tramutola-Lawson
From: The Marshall Project [mailto:info=themarshall...@mail143.suw12.mcsv.net] On Behalf Of The Marshall Project
Sent: Thursday, August 25, 2016 6:08 AM
Subject: Spies in the city skies
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Opening Statement |
Edited by Andrew Cohen |
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Opening Statement is our pick of the day’s criminal justice news. Not a subscriber? Sign up. For original reporting from The Marshall Project, visit our website. |
Smile, Baltimore, you’re on candid camera. Police in Baltimore have been testing an aerial surveillance system to spy on the city’s residents, without their knowledge or consent. The company handling the program, Persistent Surveillance Systems, hopes that the trial leads to lucrative contracts with cities across the country. So far, though, the business plan isn’t working. Los Angeles took a look and said no. Public pressure in Dayton, Ohio, forced officials to back away. And Baltimore? Looks like the public debate has just begun. Bloomberg More: “This is a 21st-century investigative tool” for solving crimes, say cops in defense of the program. The Wall Street Journal Related: There are questions about whether the donors funding the program knew what it was for. Ars Technica “You’re Asian, right? Why are you even here?” A Chinese-American intern working as a journalist covering the recent police protest in Milwaukee was confronted by rioters who began to beat him until one said: “Stop, he’s not white. He’s Asian.” The scary episode got him thinking about where Asian-Americans fit in the era of Black Lives Matter. Politico Magazine The troubled-teen industry is a failure — and it’s likely to remain so. Parents have been sending their children to get “tough love” for generations, but there is little evidence that the isolation and humiliation the kids often endure can turn around their lives. Meanwhile, residential treatment facilities for teenagers are highly susceptible to incidents of abuse. The industry is almost entirely free of regulation, and lawsuits by parents after their children are harmed (or killed) are time-consuming and often unsatisfactory. Huffington Post A prison within a prison. Within Louisiana’s notorious prison system is an extraordinary program that teaches inmates how to use sign language so they can help their fellow inmates and, if released, perhaps get good jobs. But the lessons do not come without controversy. Advocates say the prisoners are vulnerable to exploitation by prison staff. Truth-Out “I have a black son in Baltimore.” He is a white police officer. She is a black lawyer. The married couple lives in Baltimore, and they just had their first child, a boy, who will grow up in a city roiling with racial tension and particularly dangerous for young black men. Together, Bill and Shanna Janu represent the epicenter of the national debate over policing and racial disparities. The New York Times
A North Carolina police officer shot a deaf motorist to death last week in a tragic episode that the victim’s family says could have easily been avoided. The New York Times In Chicago, Illinois, and elsewhere, the trauma of witnessing police violence stays with children long after the encounter ends. The Chicago Reporter Related: Especially if you are a 10-year-old boy in New Jersey chased by shotgun-toting cops. New York Daily News Welcome to Wisconsin — more specifically zip code 53206 — which has far more than its share of gun violence and tragedy. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel A contentious decision by the Missouri Supreme Court casts doubt on the state’s felony theft statutes and leaves attorneys scrambling. Talking Points Memo Illegal drugs are still flowing into California’s prisons, including its death row, where condemned men are dying of overdoses. Los Angeles Times
The great Leavenworth prison scandal. Where’s the outrage over private prison officials and prosecutors colluding to violate attorney-client privilege? By Dahlia Lithwick. Slate How long? Too long. It’s time to build a lynching memorial. Today. By Charles Pierce. Esquire Life and death, zombies, and the police. Two memorable Florida cases, both involving police responses to maniacal men eating the faces of their victims. Police killed the black one. The white one lived. The Washington Post The real crime is what is not done. Effective regulation, not selective prosecution, is the way to respond to environmental and safety disasters. The New York Times We have no idea how many rapes occur in America. Because government officials cannot even agree on a definition of the term. Mother Jones
Profile of the Day: Meet Keeda Haynes, whose journey to the public defender’s office in Nashville started with a five-year stint in prison. Nashville Scene Decision of the Day: In which a federal appeals court overturns the murder conviction of a Pennsylvania man after finding that prosecutors hid key pieces of exculpatory evidence, including a receipt that supported the defendant’s alibi. U.S. Court of Appeals, 3rd Circuit Related: Here’s context on a famous, old case. Philly.com First Amendment of the Day: The University of Kentucky is suing its own student newspaper to keep secret the details in a sexual-assault case against a professor. BuzzFeed News Lawsuit of the Day: In which the family of Victor Rogers filed a federal civil-rights suit against South Carolina prison officials alleging that they allowed him to die, untreated, of a kidney infection while they watched him descend into mental illness. The Greenville News Brief of the Day: In which a group of former judges blasts the work of Missouri’s judicial system in a capital case involving a death row inmate deprived of effective counsel. U.S. Court of Appeals, 8th Circuit Related: A problem of funding. The Constitution Project |
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