gAlienLifeform

A majority of states – 32 states and Washington DC – have the crime of domestic terrorism. Further, 21 states and DC criminalize assisting or supporting terrorism, and 25 states have a separate crime of terroristic threat. Most of these state domestic terrorism laws were enacted in the wake of 9/11. They traditionally were relatively rarely enforced as crimes of political violence can, and have been, prosecuted by federal or state officials using other criminal law provisions. However, as concerns about terrorism have evolved in the United States, these laws have taken on an increasingly prominent and often politicized role.

Prosecutors in Georgia brought charges last year using its state domestic terrorism law against dozens of activists protesting a proposed law enforcement training facility near Atlanta, dubbed “Cop City.” While this case has progressed further than others, this targeting of protest-related activity is not a new occurrence. In the last few years, authorities in Oklahoma, New York, Louisiana, and Florida have all used domestic terrorism laws in the context of protests or activism. Meanwhile, three states – Texas, North Dakota, and Oregon – adopted domestic terrorism laws for the first time in 2023, signaling new interest in these laws. And in the 2024 legislative session, at least 15 states have considered changes to their domestic terrorism laws, many in response to pro-Palestine protests.

Since political violence is already criminalized under other state and federal laws, state domestic terrorism laws are arguably unnecessary. In addition, these laws create serious, and often underappreciated, civil liberties concerns, particularly in relation to the freedoms of speech, assembly, and association. State domestic terrorism laws are frequently overbroad and trigger severe penalties that have been used in multiple states to target individuals, including nonviolent activists, in activity not typically associated with terrorism. Policymakers in both major political parties though are only slowly waking up to the danger these laws can pose.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240906120919/https://www.justsecurity.org/99787/state-domestic-terrorism-laws/

Denverite reviewed the news stories and the claims made by the landlord, officials, politicians, activists and the police. We spent time at one apartment building, speaking with residents; observed the City of Aurora displacing residents of another building; and reviewed federal and local government statements.

We learned the apartment buildings have been in terrible shape for years and still are. Many residents say they are not scared of gangs, instead saying they fear the owners of the complex. And local police departments say Tren de Aragua does not have an outsized role in metro area crimes, despite claims the gang has taken over the Denver area.

Still, the gang’s members have allegedly been involved in one high-profile robbery and an attempted homicide in the metro. Aurora police say they have identified 10 gang members and that six were in custody on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, while police acknowledged the allegations of rent theft, they said they had not yet found probable cause to make arrests in those cases. We could not substantiate whether the gang members had chased out property managers.

[Bolding added]

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240906120345/https://denverite.com/2024/09/04/venezuelan-gang-aurora-colorado-factcheck/

Bradley pleaded guilty to third-degree criminal sexual conduct and sexual battery with a student. He faced up to 15 years in prison, but Bradley’s lawyer and prosecutors agreed to ask the judge for probation and to keep him off the sex offender registry.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240905124019/https://apnews.com/article/jamel-bradley-sex-offender-deputy-south-carolina-fb8f014e4a882abc7a69ef216e69d54a

e; forgot the archive link

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240905124029/https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/utah-elevations-rtc-injuries-troubled-teen-facility-rcna159783

For over a decade, local authorities in U.S. border towns have redirected calls from lost Spanish-speaking callers to the Border Patrol, the subagency of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that pursues and arrests border crossers. The agency’s Missing Migrant Program is the federal government’s primary response to the migrant death toll, which has been trending upward for 20 years. Between 2014 and 2023, nearly 60% of the migrant deaths in the Americas occurred in the U.S.-Mexico border region — far surpassing the toll in the waters of the Caribbean and the jungles of the Darien Gap.

...

Many local officials and residents believe that the Border Patrol should bear primary responsibility for migrant rescues and recoveries. The agency is part of CBP, which is itself part of the Department of Homeland Security, and its resources dwarf those of local emergency teams and nonprofits. But some aid workers and border researchers see a conflict of interest between the agency’s primary mandate, which is to detain and deport migrants, and the humanitarian goal of saving lives. Both outside critics and Border Patrol agents acknowledge that the two goals are intertwined, but only the former see this as a problem.

Type Investigations and High Country News looked into the complicated relationship between the Border Patrol’s law enforcement and rescue operations, using internal documents, data logs, congressional reports, migrant accounts and the testimony of agents. These records reveal how the agency’s dogged pursuit of migrants can increase the danger for those same migrants, occasionally ending in tragedy. Migrants drown or fall off cliffs; they die in car crashes and from the direct use of force by Border Patrol agents. While the agency does appear to pick up thousands of migrant callers alive, those rescues often end in arrest and deportation. So far, there has been little public accountability for the program’s failures, while the data shows that hundreds of migrants who reach out for help fall through the cracks and are never seen again.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240905124008/https://www.hcn.org/issues/56-9/the-fatal-flaw-in-the-border-patrols-rescue-program/

In response to a growing set of empirical studies demonstrating their widespread discriminatory effects, pretextual stops have been subjected to decades of criticism from scholars, the public, and jurists. However, pretextual stops have been defended by some as a necessary public safety measure, particularly in the fight against violent gun crimes. Following a series of highly publicized police shootings of unarmed Black drivers during pretextual stops, and in the absence of substantial judicial or legislative guidance, a growing number of prosecutors have developed policies deprecating the prosecution of pretextual stops absent a clear public safety benefit. Without empirical evaluations of pretextual stops, however, it has been difficult for practitioners or justice advocates to rebut complaints that these new policies remove an important deterrent to crime and the circulation of illegal firearms. This Article reports the results of the first empirical evaluation of the impact of pretextual stops on crime and gun seizures, made possible by the Ramsey County Attorney’s decision to both decline prosecution of non-public-safety stops and to share data about those stops. We find that reduced stops have led to decreased racial disparities without affecting crime rates. Notably, the most common justification for pretextual stops—the recovery of illegal firearms—remained constant in the largest police department aligned with the new policy. We urge prosecutors to review the growing body of evidence we describe and contribute to this evidence base by gathering and sharing data about their policies with researchers. To that end, this Article provides a comprehensive review of relevant empirical evidence, reports the findings of the Ramsey County evaluation, and outlines how prosecutors and police departments in other jurisdictions can utilize the Ramsey County model to engage in evidence-based reform.

[Bolding added]

Abstract page archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240829115138/https://digital.sandiego.edu/sdlr/vol61/iss1/4/

PDF download link is https://digital.sandiego.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3478&context=sdlr

PDF download archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240829115121/https://digital.sandiego.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3478&context=sdlr

On Aug. 1, a hearing committee of the District of Columbia Bar recommended the suspension of Jeffrey Clark from the practice of law for two years with reinstatement to be conditioned on demonstrating his fitness to practice law. Clark, one will recall, is the former Trump assistant attorney general who briefly seemed to be designated by Trump as acting attorney general at the Department of Justice, as part of Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

...

... the dissonance between the committee’s recommendation and the Supreme Court’s immunity decision in Trump v. United States is stunning. Clark is to be disciplined for conduct as to which the Court says Trump is immune. Though it is possible, logically, to resolve the dissonance without legal gyrations (if only on the ground that presidents are not their subordinates), the difference in outlook is, nonetheless, as stark a demonstration as possible of how differently the bar and the Court conceive of the law and the obligations of the president and the legal profession.

Archived at https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/jeffrey-clark--donald-trump--and-control-of-the-department-of-justice

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240829114852/https://washingtonmonthly.com/2024/08/25/the-origin-of-specious-2/

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240829114625/https://www.kansascity.com/news/state/missouri/article291530650.html

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240829121109/https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ruben-gallego-kari-lake-arizona-police-association_n_66cf833fe4b0b422df2148d1