June, 23 2020, 12:00am EDT
New Brief Finds NYPD Enforcement of Low-Level Broken Windows Offenses Accounts for Huge Department Expenditures, is Marked by Extreme Racial Disparities
Amid explicit racism in enforcement and unprecedented budget shortfalls, NYC must redirect $1 billion of NYPD FY21 budget to impacted communities.
WASHINGTON
New York City criminalizes drugs and low-level broken windows offenses at a startling rate, with enforcement in these areas accounting for a vast proportion of the NYPD's policing activities and the city's budget, according to a new brief from Drug Policy Alliance. DPA released the brief in support of the Communities United for Police Reform coalition call for Mayor de Blasio and the NYC Council to cut the FY21 NYPD expense budget by $1 billion and redirect savings to core needs in Black, Latinx and other NYC communities of color that have long been the target of the drug war and racist policing.
The brief, "NYC's Costly Drug Enforcement & Broken Windows Policing," finds that in 2019, NYC spent an estimated $96 million enforcing drug arrests and violations, and an estimated $456 million enforcing low-level broken windows offenses, which accounted for 28.5% of all NYPD arrests and violations issued for the year.
"For decades, we've seen the harms of overpolicing up close in our work to end the marijuana arrest crusade in New York. We've watched as policing has played a pivotal role in the racist drug war and how resources have been funneled into law enforcement instead of vital services that make our communities safer. In too many cases, drugs have been used by the NYPD -- the largest and most militarized police force in the United States -- as an excuse to target, harass, assault and kill Black people," said Melissa Moore, New York State Deputy Director at Drug Policy Alliance. "It's beyond time to shift resources and reinvest that funding into ending our city's overdose crisis, homelessness, and vast inequality - especially as we face extreme budget shortfalls due to the pandemic. Mayor de Blasio and the NYC Council must act in this historic moment to cut at least $1 billion from the NYPD's FY21 expense budget and reallocate those resources to the more relevant city agencies, harm reduction programs, and community-based organizations who are better trained and equipped to actually keep our communities safe."
In 2019, there were more than 21,000 drug enforcement arrests and violations in New York City, with two-thirds being for only possession of marijuana, a controlled substance, or paraphernalia. Further, nearly 15,000 summonses were issued by the NYPD for marijuana in 2019, accounting for 17% of all criminal summonses issued citywide that year.
Stark racial disparities persist among these drug arrests and violations, despite data showing similar rates of use across populations. In 2019, more than 45% of people arrested or cited for drug offenses in NYC were Black, despite Black New Yorkers making up under 25% of the city's total population. A further 38.8% were Latinx, with Latinx people making up less than 30% of the city's total population. Only 11.7% of people arrested or cited for drug violations were white, yet white people comprise 47.2% of the city's population.
The trends in drug enforcement in NYC mirror enforcement of other low-level offenses, often referred to as broken windows policing. Extreme racial disparities exist in broken windows enforcement as well: more than 45% of people arrested or cited for broken windows offenses in NYC were Black, 33% were Latinx, and only 15% of people were white. This is nearly an inversion of the proportion of each group within the city's population -- and reflects racialized targeting of communities of color for broken windows enforcement.
"The drug war has been waged on Black and Brown communities since its inception, and the police have acted as its foot soldiers. They have, and always will, constantly target us," said Hiawatha Collins, Community Leader and Board Member at VOCAL-NY. "We can't talk about the resources people who use drugs need without ending the racist policies and policing of our bodies and neighborhoods. It's time to defund the NYPD by at least $1 billion this year, and invest in housing, harm reduction, healthcare, and social services. We can't wait a second longer as we continue to die from preventable overdoses at historic numbers."
Read the full brief here: https://www.drugpolicy.org/sites/default/files/dpa_drug_policing_nypd_cost_0.pdf
The Drug Policy Alliance is the nation's leading organization promoting drug policies grounded in science, compassion, health and human rights.
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South Carolina Execution 'Assembly Line' Rolls On With Killing of Richard Moore
"The state is motivated to kill condemned people as quickly as possible, and they do that despite evidence that might change their minds," said one anti-death penalty campaigner.
Nov 01, 2024
Despite pleas from his sentencing judge, jurors in his trial, and the former head of the state Department of Corrections, South Carolina executed Richard Moore by lethal injection Friday evening after Republican Gov. Henry McMaster and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in the latest in a series of state-sanctioned killings.
The Charleston Post and Courierreported that Moore was pronounced dead at 6:24 pm local time, 21 minutes after the lethal injection was administered.
"Tonight, the state of South Carolina needlessly took the life of Richard Moore—a loving father and grandfather, a loyal friend, and a devoted follower of Christ," the criminal justice reform group Justice 360 said in a statement. "He was not a danger to anyone, and the state eliminated a glowing example of reform and rehabilitation."
Moore, 59, was convicted of the 1999 murder of convenience store clerk James Mahoney. Moore—who was unarmed when he entered the store—argued that he shot Mahoney in self-defense after the clerk pulled out a gun during an argument over correct change. An all-white jury found Moore guilty of murder and armed robbery.
"This is definitely part of my life I wish I could change. I took a life. I took someone's life. I broke the family of the deceased," Moore said in a video accompanying his clemency petition. "I pray for the forgiveness of that particular family."
Death penalty opponents said Moore's case underscores capital punishment's literally fatal flaws.
"Richard Moore's case, like those of so many others on death row, was tainted with racial bias, including as the two prospective Black jurors were peremptorily dismissed, resulting in an all-white jury," Amnesty International USA researcher Justin Mazzola said in a statement after the execution.
"In addition to the racial bias, the crime that Moore committed was not premeditated, which raised serious concerns as to whether it rose to the level for which the death penalty is reserved in U.S. constitutional law," Mazzola added. "It's shameful that racial bias and lack of premeditation were not enough to convince Gov. McMaster to grant clemency to Richard Moore. Gov. McMaster could have used his clemency power instead of overseeing yet another execution in his state."
Moore was initially forced to choose whether he would be killed by electric chair or firing squad following the 2021 passage by South Carolina's Republican-led Legislature of a new capital punishment law amid a shortage of the lethal injection drug pentobarbital. Moore chose the firing squad.
In 2022, the South Carolina Supreme Court temporarily stayed Moore's execution. He subsequently changed his choice of execution method after the state restocked pentobarbital.
Advocates for Moore pointed to his flawless prison behavior and mentorship to other inmates. Among those urging clemency for Moore were Retired Circuit Court Judge Gary Clary, who sentenced Moore to die.
"Over the years I have studied the case of each person who resides on death row in South Carolina," Clary wrote to McMaster on Tuesday. "Richard Bernard Moore's case is unique, and after years of thought and reflection, I humbly ask that you grant executive clemency to Mr. Moore as an act of grace and mercy."
Jon Ozmint, director of the South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC) from 2003 to 2011, wrote, that that Moore "has proven himself to be a reliable, consistent force for good on death row."
However, McMaster informed SCDC Director Bryan Stirling Friday that he had "carefully reviewed and thoroughly considered" Moore's application and "declined to grant executive clemency in this matter."
Moore is the second person executed in South Carolina since it resumed executions. In September, the state killed 46-year-old Freddie Owens. Four more South Carolina death row inmates have exhausted their appeals. They are likely to be executed in the coming months.
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"This is a win for democracy and the rule of law," said one ACLU attorney. "The bottom line is that voters deserve to have their voices heard."
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After allowing Virginia Republicans' voter registration purge earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday rejected a GOP effort to block thousands of ballots for the November 5 election from being counted in the key swing state of Pennsylvania.
Democratic elections lawyer and Democracy Docket founder Mark Elias called the decision "a BIG victory for PA voters."
The ACLU, the group's Pennsylvania branch, and the Public Interest Law Center were all involved in the legal battle and similarly celebrated the high court's decision.
"This is a win for democracy and the rule of law," declared Ari Savitzky, senior staff attorney at the ACLU's Voting Rights Project. The court rightly rejected this eleventh-hour attempt to discount the votes of Pennsylvanians and interfere in the state's electoral process. The bottom line is that voters deserve to have their voices heard."
"A petty error that is irrelevant to a person's eligibility to vote should never interfere with the counting of ballots."
Witold Walczak, legal director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania, stressed that "a petty error that is irrelevant to a person's eligibility to vote should never interfere with the counting of ballots, and provisional ballots are a decades-old fail-safe, a backup, for voters."
Public Interest Law Center senior attorney Ben Geffen called the decision "a step toward a more inclusive election process that respects the rights of all Pennsylvanians."
The case began with the mail-in ballots of two Butler County residents. Justices on the nation's top tribunal upheld the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's recent ruling that commonwealth voters who had mailed ballots disqualified for failing to return them in the required secrecy envelope still have a right to vote by provisional ballot.
The Associated Presspointed out that "as of Thursday, about 9,000 ballots out of more than 1.6 million returned have arrived at elections offices around Pennsylvania lacking a secrecy envelope, a signature, or a date, according to state records."
As the AP reported:
The ruling comes as voters had their last chance Friday to apply for a mail-in ballot in a bellwether suburban Philadelphia county while a county clear across the state gave voters who didn't receive their ballot in the mail another chance to get one.
A judge in Erie County, in Pennsylvania's northwestern corner, ruled Friday in a lawsuit brought by the Democratic Party that about 15,000 people who applied for a mail ballot but didn't receive it may go to the county elections office and get a replacement through Monday.
There were no dissents in Friday's decision, though Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a brief statement joined by fellow right-wingers Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch that "the application of the state Supreme Court's interpretation in the upcoming election is a matter of considerable importance."
While voting rights advocates celebrated, NBC Newshighlighted that "the Supreme Court action does not definitively resolve the legal issue, which could yet return to the justices... More litigation is possible in the coming days."
The Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of Pennsylvania had asked the justices to block the state court's ruling—a request that, as SCOTUSblognoted, "came just eight days before Election Day, with Pennsylvania expected to play a key role in the 2024 presidential race."
Former Republican President Donald Trump is battling Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris for the White House. There is also a key U.S. Senate contest underway in Pennsylvania: Democratic Sen. Bob Casey versus Republican Dave McCormick.
Critics of Trump and his allies are already warning that he may deny the election results if he loses next week, as he did in 2020, even inciting the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol as Congress certified President Joe Biden's victory. Trump is running for president despite facing state and criminal charges stemming from his "Big Lie" about the last cycle.
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"The entire Palestinian population in north Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence."
Nov 01, 2024
The heads of 15 humanitarian organizations operating under the United Nations umbrella on Friday accused Israel of creating "apocalyptic" conditions in northern Gaza and called on Israeli forces to stop attacking the Palestinian enclave and the aid workers trying to help its people.
"The situation unfolding in North Gaza is apocalyptic. The area has been under siege for almost a month, denied basic aid and lifesaving supplies while bombardment and other attacks continue," the 15 group heads wrote in an open letter. "Just in the past few days, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed, most of them women and children, and thousands have once again been forcibly displaced."
The letter's 15 signers include directors of the Inter-Agency Standing Committee, a forum of United Nations and non-U.N. humanitarian partners, including the International Council of Volunteer Agencies.
"Hospitals have been almost entirely cut off from supplies and have come under attack, killing patients, destroying vital equipment, and disrupting lifesaving services," the group leaders wrote. "Health workers and patients have been taken into custody. Fighting has also reportedly taken place inside hospitals."
"Dozens of schools serving as shelters have been bombed or forcibly evacuated. Tents sheltering displaced families have been shelled, and people have been burned alive," the letter continues. "Rescue teams have been deliberately attacked and thwarted in their attempts to pull people buried under the rubble of their homes."
The signers wrote that "we have received reports of civilians being targeted while trying to seek safety," and that "the entire Palestinian population in north Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence."
The letter warns: "Humanitarian aid cannot keep up with the scale of the needs due to the access constraints. Basic lifesaving goods are not available. Humanitarians are not safe to do their work and are blocked by Israeli forces and by insecurity from reaching people in need."
"In a further blow to the humanitarian response, the polio vaccination campaign has been delayed due to the fighting, putting the lives of children in the region at risk," the signers added.
The humanitarian leaders lamented this week's approval by Israeli lawmakers of a pair of bills targeting the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
"If implemented, such measures would be a catastrophe for the humanitarian response in Gaza, diametrically opposed to the United Nations Charter, with potential dire impacts on the human rights of the millions of Palestinians depending on UNRWA's assistance, and in violation of Israel's obligations under international law," the letter states. "Let us be very clear: There is no alternative to UNRWA."
The humanitarian leaders then turned their attention to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) genocide case against Israel led by South Africa and backed by around 30 nations and regional blocs. Israeli forces have been accused of flouting ICJ orders that the country prevent genocidal acts in Gaza, allow humanitarian aid into the strip, and stop the assault on Rafah.
"Israel must comply with the provisional orders and determinations of the International Court of Justice," they asserted.
Since October 2023, Israel's assault on Gaza has left more than 155,000 Palestinians dead, wounded, or missing, and millions more displaced, starving, or sick. The Israel Defense Forces' renewed offensive in northern Gaza has killed or injured thousands of Palestinians since last month amid fears Israel is implementing the so-called "General's Plan" to starve and then ethnically cleanse northern Gaza to make way for Israeli recolonization, a policy promoted by senior members of Israel's far-right government.
The humanitarian leaders' letter also states that "Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups must release the hostages immediately and unconditionally and must abide by international humanitarian law."
"The entire region is on the edge of a precipice," the signers concluded. "An immediate cessation of hostilities and a sustained, unconditional cease-fire are long overdue."
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