“My main concern is that [politicians] don’t care about the details, they just want to have a good sound bite and a good promotional campaign,” says Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. Continue reading Newsweek Magazine — ‘Defund the Police’ Is Dead But Other Reform Efforts Thrive In U.S. Cities
Jeffrey Butts: “Researchers can at least eliminate possible explanations. So, you can look at data and test hypotheses. One hypothesis that has been around (you alluded to it) is that it’s somehow related to Defunding the Police. So, there have been researchers who have looked at police budgets, and changes from year to year… and there’s really no relationship there.” Continue reading MSNBC — The Sunday Show with Jonathan Capehart
Jeffrey Butts interviewed on Canadian radio about recent efforts to reform U.S. policing. Continue reading CBC News — Prospects for Police Reform in the U.S.
Cure Violence helped reduce shootings in the South Bronx by sixty-three per cent, according to a study by John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Continue reading The New Yorker — How the Police Could be Defunded
Cure Violence may be one of the few models that has been shown to successfully make highly violent communities a lot less violent without using the tools of arrest, force, and incarceration. Continue reading Vox — 4 Ideas to Replace Traditional Police Officers
Those supportive of reform may be quick to reverse themselves out of fear of being cast as soft on crime, so new initiatives need to be protected with solid evidence. If a city wanted to radically reduce expenditures on policing, Butts said, “I would totally back it, but I would be terrified we would squander all the good energy by not being fully prepared.” Continue reading The Appeal — The Bumpy Road to Police Abolition
