Personally, I think Loretta Lynch is a stellar replacement for the last A.G. in the U.S. Dept of Justice.
I am SOOO glad that she FINALLY got confirmed, after the record-breaking wait she had to endure due to GOP Stonewalling etc. -- even though she was superbly qualified for the top DOJ Job.
This no nonsense Attorney General has wasted no time, in addressing the rampant problems that exist in Police Departments across the country, with respect to how they handle issues of race, in their own jurisdictions.
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch Discusses Sandra Bland Tragedy, ISIL and More
by Katherine Grygo, Aspen Institute, huffingtonpost.com -- 08/04/2015
[...]
[U.S. Attorney General Loretta] Lynch is currently on a police-community relations tour to six cities that have exhibited strained relations between the police and community body. The cities on the tour include:
• Cincinnati, Ohio
• Birmingham, Alabama
• East Haven; Connecticut
• Seattle, Washington
• Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
• Richmond, California
In response to the recent death of Sandra Bland and the controversy over arrest tactics, Lynch is deeply disheartened that it took such a tragedy to finally bring the topic of officer de-escalation to the forefront.
In many of the communities that I'm visiting on my tour, those officers ironically have spoken exactly about that issue, about how they thought the most successful change in policing that they had done was to switch from the aggressive sort of catch-and-arrest mode to how can I really manage this situation and de-escalate something for everyone's safety. And they talked with great enthusiasm about learning those techniques.
[...]
America's Incarceration Rates
Following President Barack Obama's recent visit to a federal prison, America's mass incarceration problem is back in the news. During the Forum, Lynch explained the ways the Department of Justice is handling this issue. "We're looking at it from a financial view in terms of the cost of over-incarceration, but also from a public safety view," she said. "We've been able, with the Smart on Crime Initiative, to reduce the imposition of mandatory minimums on low-level nonviolent drug offenders, and crime has continued to go down."
[...]
Here are some of the goal's of the DOJ's
Smart on Crime Initiative program:
About the Smart on Crime Initiative -- justice.gov
At the direction of the Attorney General in early 2013, the Justice Department launched a comprehensive review of the criminal justice system in order to identify reforms that would ensure federal laws are enforced more fairly and -- in an era of reduced budgets -- more efficiently. Five goals were identified as a part of this review:
1) To ensure finite resources are devoted to the most important law enforcement priorities;
2) To promote fairer enforcement of the laws and alleviate disparate impacts of the criminal justice system
3) To ensure just punishments for low-level, nonviolent convictions
4) To bolster prevention and reentry efforts to deter crime and reduce recidivism
5) To strengthen protections for vulnerable populations
[...]
The Dept of Justice's director, also set aside time to commemorate the unjust killing of Micheal Brown, citing some progress during the last year, that resulted from this tragedy taking of a life.
Ms. Lynch also poignantly points out, how far America has to go, in order to heal its racial divide.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch: Ferguson 'Opened the Eyes of America'
nbcnews.com -- Aug 7 2015
[...]
A Department of Justice report following Brown's death showed a pattern of racially-biased policing and civil rights violations in Ferguson. Many of the traffic stops and enforcement of minor violations were driven by an attempt to generate revenue through fines, the report said.
In the wake of the report, the city saw a wave of government officials resign, and last month, a new interim police chief was appointed. Lynch said Ferguson wasn't the only city impacted after Brown's death and the subsequent scathing report.
"I think that the importance of that report was that it showed the world what people in Ferguson and similar situations had been saying for years," Lynch said. "They just weren't believed because it was ... outside the reality of people who didn't share the situation or didn't share their background or hadn't had those experiences happen to them," she said.
[...]
I guess, that's what "building bridges" should be all about --
sharing realities, that others are remaining clueless about. For not having experienced them.
This next story really surprised me, since I had thought that only Bernie Sanders was talking about improving "Community Policing" at the neighborhood level.
It would seem that our new Attorney General thinks that is an effective technique worth pursuing too ... Rebuilding Community-Police Relationships.
Loretta Lynch: Sandra Bland's Case Highlights 'Frustration' With Law Enforcement
The U.S. attorney general calls for a re-evaluation of police tactics.
by Marina Fang, Associate Politics Editor, huffingtonpost.com -- 07/26/2015
[...]
In the interview, which will air on Monday, Lynch also said that Bland’s case highlights the frustration and fear that people of color face when dealing with police but hoped that reforming policing tactics would mitigate those concerns.
“Many people see this situation escalating, and I think it shows the frustration that many minority communities feel when they feel that, you know, maybe it wouldn’t have escalated in a different community,” Lynch said. “I hope that that can bring this situation to light as well, so that people understand the frustration that many minority members feel when they’re stopped by the police.”
Earlier this year, the Department of Justice launched a pilot program that funds trainings for local police forces to build better relationships with the communities they serve. Lynch said that these strategies, if implemented more widely, could help minority communities feel more secure when dealing with police.
“We see situations where officers will reach out to young people and work with them. They’ll go into the classrooms with them. And so we’re hoping that these examples can be models for other police departments. But we’re also hoping that community leaders can work with police departments to build these connections so that we can all tell our children how to respect authority, but not to be afraid of police.”
Though it didn't get much of a News-cycle here at the time, the DOJ Ferguson PD Report recommended several corrective measures, that given time and serious implementation effort, could go a long ways to curtailing "structural racism" that is tacitly accepted in far too many Police Depts.
One possible way to make those reform recommendations "stick" -- is some sort economic incentives for those Depts that comply vs those Depts that don't. As was spelled out, as one of the goals in Sanders' recently published Racial Justice page, on his website:
• States and localities that make progress in this area [de-escalate confrontations] should get more federal justice grant money. Those that do not should get their funding slashed.
For a quick review of some the major points of DOJ Report on the systematic problems that were plauging the Ferguson Police Dept:
Undermining 'Public Trust' by Ignoring some Clear Standards
by jamess -- Mar 07, 2015
I also expressed my outrage at the implications of this structurally "corrupt" Police Dept here, around that same time.
How many more Police Depts are there, that are just like it in America?
That still remains an unanswered question.
A question that seriously deserves to be answered -- and then corrected, as fast as humanly possible. With the help of the Attorney General, maybe progress here can occur swiftly, and have a lasting impact.
Let's hope so. This kind of reform is long, long overdue.