How They Did It: Tracking Down a Rwandan Genocide Suspect

One-third to half of those killed by police are disabled, a recent report says. “Our problem isn’t with police,” one mental health advocate says, but both sides say officers need more training.

In Prince George's County School system, two schools have offered international schools, which have a different curriculum for immigrants new to the USA. This has caused complaints and difficulties with the other students, the after school band program has helped bring the two groups together to socialize and form friendships.

Many young Latina women live their lives in fear of gang violence. The Montgomery County Street Outreach Network rescues girls in danger and offers services to them in order to help them change their chances of success.

In Albuquerque, New Mexico, a domestic violence court offers funnels perpetrators into programs that offer counseling and other services to address the root causes of their behavior. Its two tracks focus on first-time offenders to short-circuit any escalation into chronic abuse, as well as those with multiple domestic violence charges. Judges work closely with participants to encourage them and call them out when they aren't meeting their obligations, and recidivism rates among those who complete the programs are far lower than those who do not.

Since July 2019, New Zealand has held gun buybacks across the country and collected over 10,000 firearms. After a mass shooting at Christchurch mosque, the government rushed through legislation to ban semi-automatic and automatic firearms, offering owners of such weapons cash and a no-questions-asked policy. Such legislation has been implemented in other countries as well, including Australia, who in 1996 collected over 600,000 weapons.

Long the target of jail-reduction advocates, New York City’s Rikers Island jail released more than one-quarter of its inmates within the first two months of a coronavirus outbreak behind bars. The early releases stemmed from a combination of factors: a strategy to limit the spread of the virus, a result of a new state law limiting the imposition of cash bail, and a significant drop in crime during New York’s social-distancing lockdown. Police complained that large numbers of those released committed new crimes, but decarceration advocates say the releases on the whole were conducted safely.

A growing number of governments, companies, and nonprofit organizations are working together with new technology and data to identify fishing vessels that are breaking laws and engaging in human rights violations. Using satellite imagery and tracking signals, for example, a philanthropic company and a nonprofit worked with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime to help the Ghanian navy arrest four vessels for illegal fishing practices. Technology by itself won’t stop forced labor and unregulated ships, but it can be helpful for cash-strapped governments looking to increase oversight of their fisheries.

To mark the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre, in which a white mob killed hundreds of Black residents and destroyed the thriving neighborhood of Greenwood, the Centennial Commission supported a number of initiatives to learn from the past and build a better future. At the base of an ancient elm tree that witnessed the massacre, Up With Trees distributed 100 elm seedlings to children to plant around Tulsa. The commission convinced state education officials to develop a new curriculum on the massacre for K-12 students.

It turns out the old adage of knowing your neighbor really can help make your neighborhood safer. A study of more than 250 cities found that a key factor behind a drop in crime in the last 20 years was the mobilizing of citizens by nonprofit organizations like block clubs. In Milwaukee these “urban guardians” have helped bring communities together and foster safer spaces that also address urban blight.

The elder abuse task force is a specialized unit of the Genesee County Sheriff’s Department that provides critical services to older residents and issues abuse-related warrants. Since its founding in 2018, the unit has served nearly 2,000 elderly residents and issued over 275 warrants; now, this abuse-prevention model is being scaled statewide.