Posts Tagged: crime
Opinion
OPINION: The terrible gun violence in Sacramento shows, once again, that we cannot delay our effort to make Californians safer. Sadly, this task is being made harder by individuals making false claims about the incident to advance an incarceration-first agenda that is both ineffective and very expensive.
News
California may well have the toughest gun laws in the country, but criminals still get automatic weapons and everyday people still head to the gun store in times of trouble. And the pandemic with its parade of woes has motivated thousands of first-time gun buyers. It turns out, while some Californians hoarded toilet paper and hand sanitizer, others bulked up on firepower.
News
The stories behind Gov. Jerry Brown’s nine recent sentence commutations reveal tangled lives marked by murder, abuse, addiction and determined efforts by criminals — usually over decades — to turn their lives around. Here are their stories.
Opinion
OPINION: Today, April 4, during National Victim Rights’ Week, nearly 500 hundred crime survivors were gathering in Sacramento to share our stories, honor our loved ones and call for new safety priorities. From mothers who have lost loved ones to young men experiencing violence in our communities, we are coming together to call for change.
News
Republican Duf Sundheim started on the attack at Wednesday’s debate in San Diego among five candidates vying to be California’s next U.S. senator. But the GOP hopeful missed hard on a fact about the state’s violent crime rate.
News
For decades, Californians and their representatives in the state Capitol had a “lock-‘em-up-and-throw-away-the-key” approach to lawbreakers. But that view is changing. Following years of a steadily increasing prison population and some communities repeatedly being devastated by crime, public discussion has shifted in part toward reforming law enforcement’s approach to crime prevention.
Opinion
OPINION: As a public safety officer for nearly 20 years, I am often asked what I believe is an effective way to suppress crime in our nation. The answer is simple: Solve our drug problem. And while many envision street drugs as the problem, the misuse of prescription drugs is a huge crisis with no bias toward any community in this state. Prescription opioid abuse is estimated to cost the United States about $56 billion annually due to health costs, criminal justice costs and lost productivity.
News
The California Correctional Peace Officers Association was once one of the most visible – and powerful – political forces in Sacramento. It thrived with the state’s vast prison expansion and it muscled concessions from Democratic and Republican governors alike. But the CCPOA now is in transition. The 28,500-member union still has the power – but it keeps a far lower profile.
News
Property theft in California increased in the first year of correctional realignment, according to a new report by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California highlighting the policy’s possible effect on future crime rates. Under realignment, the state shifted responsibilities to the counties — including the incarceration of some state prisoners — and gave them money to cover the costs.
News
While public attention has focused in recent years on startling changes in California’s prison system, the transformation of the youth correctional system has been even more dramatic.
California, which just a few years ago had 11 state juvenile prisons, now has three. The number of youth offenders sent to state lockups has dropped by 90
Participants in a protest against police use-of-force policies speak with an LAPD officer. (Photo: John Doukas, via Shutterstock)
