THREAD: My latest op-ed. After the shooting deaths of 2 NYPD officers, I thought about how alternatives to policing could actually prevent these kinds of tragedies. Right now we can't overlook this question: "Did the officers have to be there at all?" More:thenation.com/article/societ…
Just days after deadly shooting in Harlem, Mayor Eric Adams released a plan on gun violence. More police. Stricter enforcement. Told us: “NYPD is our first line of defense against gun violence.” Adams responded to this tragedy by disregarding the very lessons it contains. More: 
Officers Jason Rivera & partner Wilbert Mora were shot after responding to a routine call. From a mom asking for help diffusing an argument w/ her son. She calmly told 911 she wasn't in immediate harm. "What if she had a different option than to call 911"thenation.com/article/societ…
As a civil rights attorney & longtime public defender, I know well how triggering the mere presence of the police can be. How armed officers can inflame rather than defuse conflict, including domestic arguments. Might this have been what happened in the recent tragedy in Harlem?
"I met parents, sons/daughters, & partners who called 911 during arguments. For all sorts of reasons, including wanting to cause more trouble for the other person. In most cases, they hoped police would calm things down & ensure that violence would be avoided." They didn't.
Too often, the result of calling police is precisely—& tragically—the opposite of calming. "For many, especially in overpoliced neighborhoods, police presence alone is traumatizing. It means: Stops, frisks, interrogations, arrests handcuffs, assaults, prison, & even murder."
Think: "Even if there is no wrongdoing on the part of the police, once they arrive, a whole system is unleashed. Handcuffs lead to interrogations, fingerprints, and hours in holding cells and courtrooms. This, in turn, is often followed by unaffordable bail and incarceration."
More consequences of police response: "Prosecutors often request protective orders that separate loved ones for months against their will, forcing people from their homes & all too often leaving children w/o key caretakers & families w/o needed incomes."currentaffairs.org/2021/03/our-no…
While we can’t yet say for sure what would work best for every community, much less that the tragedy in Harlem could have been avoided, *we do know* that the presence of armed officers in altercations increases the chances that violence will ensue. thenation.com/article/societ…
"Perhaps the son, long free from legal trouble who moved in months earlier to support his mom following a surgery, made the fateful decision that he was not going to go through it all again under any circumstances once he knew armed police would arrive."thenation.com/article/societ…
Imagine: Instead of sending police officers, the dispatcher had another option: a mental health professional, a social worker, or a medic. Someone trained in defusing domestic situations. An example in Harlem: B-Heard. No guns. No police. It works. mentalhealth.cityofnewyork.us/wp-content/upl…
Another model: Oregon-based Crisis Assistance Helping Out on the Streets program (CAHOOTS) dispatches a crisis worker & medic to nonemergency calls. In 2019, police backup was requested in only 0.6% of the estimated 24,000 calls to which CAHOOTS responded.vera.org/behavioral-hea…
"We have been taught police should respond to every issue. As a result, their outsized budgets take resources from basic community needs. This one-solution-fits-all approach is backed by neither data nor common sense. All too often leads to violence/death.thenation.com/article/societ…
"I believe strongly that alternatives to policing are critical to the health & safety of overpoliced communities. We don't talk enough about how our failure of imagination in how we deliver public safety fails police too." thenation.com/article/societ…
Reducing unnecessary interactions between the police and the citizenry is good for the health and safety of both the public and the police themselves. Let’s give proven alternatives a try.thenation.com/article/societ…
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