We speak about the increasing militarization of police forces throughout the US. Armed with military equipment including assault rifles and tanks and trained by the military, the police force is treating our streets like a war zone and responding with excessive force to events, particularly when people of color are involved. Our guests, Carl Williams and Kade Crockford, from the Massachusetts American Civil Liberties Union have been studying this trend and the lack of transparency and accountability around it. We will talk about the problems and also what we can do in our communities to de-escalate the situation.
Listen here:
Demilitarizing the Police for Safer Communities with Carl Williams and Kade Crockford by Clearingthefog on Mixcloud
Relevant articles and websites:
War Comes Home: The excessive militarization of American policing by ACLU MA
Our Homes are Not Battlefields: Reversing the Militarization and Federalization of Local Police in Massachusetts by Privacy SOS
Tell Dept. Of Justice ‘End Racist And Militaristic Policing’
Guests:
Carl Williams joined the ACLU of Massachusetts as staff attorney in September 2013. He was previously a criminal defense attorney with the Roxbury Defenders Unit of the Committee for Public Counsel Services. Carl is a graduate of the University of Rhode Island and the University of Wisconsin Law School.
A long-time resident of Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood, he has been an activist and organizer on issues of war, immigrants’ rights, LGBT rights, racial justice and Palestinian self-determination. Carl is a member of the National Lawyers Guild and has served on its Massachusetts board of directors. During the Occupy Boston movement he was part of its legal defense and support team, which provided nearly 24-hour support to the participants.
More recently, Carl was a Givelber Distinguished Lecturer on Public Interest Law at Northeastern University School of Law, where he taught a class on social justice movements and the law.
Kade Crockford is director of the Technology for Liberty Initiative at the ACLU of Massachusetts. She Tweets at @onekade.