Authentic inclusion

The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police sponsors an annual Global Studies course for selected mid-career staff. The 2018 cohort was assigned the topic “Equity, Inclusion and Fundamental Respect in the Diverse Policing Organization.” Class members discuss their initial trepidation and what they learned from tough conversations among themselves, in their home agencies, and from visits with police in 17 other countries in this article and this report. They concluded that diversity is largely a reality in Canadian policing but authentic inclusion is much more challenging and difficult to achieve.

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Shifting face of international terrorism

Counter-terrorism efforts directed mainly at ISIS, Al Qaeda, and the Middle East will need to shift attention to Russian-speaking individuals and networks in the coming years, according to this article. Terror groups that previously resisted oppressive governments in their own countries are now focused on perceived international enemies. Attacks in Turkey, Sweden, and the U.S. over the past several years were committed by Uzbeks, and fighters from several former Soviet countries who joined ISIS in Syria have since slipped back into Europe and Central Asia.

NORAD tracking UFO

This website tracks an airborne globe-circling craft that reappears each year around this time. One Nordic touch-down documented here. Lights and music phenomena here.

Policing & higher education

The UK is engaged in a vigorous debate over whether to begin requiring university education for police. Some in the police think the country’s College of Policing has been pushing the academic agenda too hard, at the expense of recognizing the skills and experience obtained within the profession. This brief essay reviews the arguments, urging both sides to focus on “the value and worth that external formal recognition can add onto the complex work that police officers and staff do on a daily basis” while also giving “policing professionals … a greater say in shaping their own policing context.”

Interpol elects South Korean president

Kim Jong Yang of South Korea has been elected president of Interpol by a vote of member countries, as reported here. He replaces Meng Hongwei of China, who was detained in his country earlier this year and faces corruption charges. Today’s election generated controversy as a leading candidate was Alexander Prokupchuk, former chief of Russia’s Interpol bureau, which critics say has systematically abused the international Red Notice system. Some countries including Lithuania and Ukraine had treatened to quit Interpol if Prokupchuk was chosen.

Big data vs. community policing

This article summarizes a police conference keynote presentation focused on the impact of austerity and big data on more traditional forms of community policing in Australia and elsewhere. Professor Rogers observes that, in the ongoing demand to do more with less, “it’s no surprise that police, as with many other public agencies, turn to technology in order to assist them in this struggle.” He notes that social and organizational change are inevitable, but “we must be careful that in rushing to seek a technological answer to the problems of modern policing, we do not throw out the ‘community support baby’ with the bathwater.”

529 app reducing bike thefts

This article reports that a bike registration app adopted by police in Vancouver, Canada has become wildly popular for preventing thefts and increasing recoveries. The app, Project 529, has helped reduce Vancouver bicycle thefts by about 1/3 in two years while bike registrations went from 22,000 to 70,000. The app is also used in the U.S. as Garage 529 and is being promoted internationally by the World Bank because it promotes sustainable mobility (biking) by engaging the community, businesses, and the police.

NZ release new recruiting video

This press release announces a new “Breaking News” recruiting video for the New Zealand police, following last year’s “hugely successful ‘World’s Most Entertaining Police Recruitment Video'” which generated 2,500 applicants above the normal level. The NZ police are aiming for 1,800 additional staff by 2020. Women currently represent 21% of sworn personnel while 36% of police academy graduates over the last year were women.

An American in Al-Qa’ida

This article decribes the experiences of the first American foreign fighter to join Al-Qa’ida following the 9/11 attacks. He traveled from Long Island to Pakistan and Afghanistan, completed several training courses, and participated in two failed missions before being captured. He subsequently renounced the affiliation, became a western intelligence asset, and testified against captured jihadists. He is coauthor of the article along with a former NYPD intelligence official.

Global gun deaths

This article summarizes a study of global gun deaths recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. World-wide, gun deaths average about 250,000 per year — 64% homicide, 27% suicide, 9% accident. The global average rate, 4 per 100,000 people, changed little over the period 1990-2016. El Salvador has the highest firearm death rate at 40 per 100,000 residents, Singapore the lowest at 0.1. The U.S. leads all other countries in the rate of civilian gun ownership and in gun suicide rate (6 per 100,000).