 | |
| Author | Kamala Harris Joan O'C Hamilton |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Nonfiction |
| Publisher | Chronicle Books |
Publication date | October 7, 2009 |
| Pages | 205 |
| ISBN | 978-0-8118-6528-9 |
| OCLC | 864320794 |
| Followed by | Superheroes Are Everywhere |
Smart on Crime: A Career Prosecutor's Plan to Make Us Safer is a book by Kamala Harris with Joan O'C Hamilton, first published by Chronicle Books on October 7, 2009. [1]
First published as Harris (then the San Francisco district attorney) was beginning her 2010 campaign for California Attorney General, the book outlines her vision of how the criminal justice system should function. She explains in detail why it is not enough to simply be tough on crime, and how prosecutors and lawmakers must also be smart and reform-minded in their approach. [2] She argues such changes would increase public safety, reduce costs, and strengthen communities. [1]
Children's Defense Fund president Marian Wright Edelman praised the book saying "Harris speaks from experience to debunk myths and offer real solutions to many of the problems with [our] current criminal justice system. Her suggestions have the potential to change and save lives." [3]
In view of the murder of George Floyd by a police officer and subsequent protests, some critics have observed that Harris did not pay enough attention to race, instead attributing the problem of disparities in the system to class, [2] and mentioning racial profiling from law enforcement only twice. [4] In one passage, she dispels the notion that communities of color are inherently hostile towards the police saying, "There is a widely held notion that poor communities, particularly poor African-American and Latino communities, consider law enforcement the enemy and that they do not want police officers in their neighborhoods. In fact, the opposite is true. Both my experience and scientific surveys reflect this fact again and again. I can state categorically that economically poor people want and support law enforcement." [2]
In response, Harris has stated that she is well aware of the racial biases in criminal justice and policing, citing her decision to become a prosecutor as an extension of the work her parents did during the civil rights movement. [2] Those same critics have also noted that since being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2016 and as Vice President in 2020, Harris has become more assertive on issues such as prison reform, racial equality, and scrutinizing police practices. [2] [4]
Criminal justice is the delivery of justice to those who have been accused of committing crimes. The criminal justice system is a series of government agencies and institutions. Goals include the rehabilitation of offenders, preventing other crimes, and moral support for victims. The primary institutions of the criminal justice system are the police, prosecution and defense lawyers, the courts and the prisons system.
"Driving while black" (DWB) is a sardonic description of racial profiling of African-American motor vehicle drivers. It implies that a motorist may be stopped by a police officer largely because of racial bias rather than any apparent violation of traffic law. It is a word play of "driving while intoxicated."
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Kamala Devi Harris is an American politician and attorney who is the 49th and current vice president of the United States. She is the first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, as well as the first African-American and first Asian-American vice president. A member of the Democratic Party, she previously served as the attorney general (AG) of California from 2011 to 2017 and as a U.S. senator representing California from 2017 to 2021.
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Proposition 47, also known by its ballot title Criminal Sentences. Misdemeanor Penalties. Initiative Statute, was a referendum passed by voters in the state of California on November 4, 2014. The measure was also referred to by its supporters as the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act. It recategorized some nonviolent offenses as misdemeanors, rather than felonies, as they had previously been categorized.
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On June 6, 2006, a teenage boy named Gabriel Granillo was stabbed to death at Ervan Chew Park, in the Neartown district in Houston, Texas. His killer, Ashley Paige Benton, underwent a criminal murder trial which resulted in a hung jury. Benton's lawyers and the assistant Harris County district attorney agreed to give Benton probation in exchange for Benton pleading guilty to aggravated assault. Her probation was ended early in 2009, and her criminal charge was to be dismissed as part of terms of successfully completing her probation.
Sex worker abuse by police officers can occur in one or more ways. Police brutality refers to the intentional use of excessive force by a police officer, be it physical, verbal, or psychological. Police corruption is a form of police misconduct where an officer obtains financial benefits and/or career advancements in exchange for not pursuing, or selectively pursuing, an investigation or arrest. Police misconduct refers to inappropriate actions taken by police officers in connection with their official duties. Sex workers, particularly poor sex workers and those who had been manipulated, coerced, or forced into sex work, are at risk of being obliged or otherwise forced to provide free sexual services to police officers out of fear of being harmed or arrested. Some sex workers have reported that they have encountered police officers who have physically assaulted them without evidence of a crime and without making an arrest.
The 2020 presidential campaign of Kamala Harris, a United States senator from California from January 2017 to 2021, officially began on January 21, 2019, with an announcement on Good Morning America. Harris had widely been considered a "high profile" candidate for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries since 2016.
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The political positions of Kamala Harris are reflected by her United States Senate voting record, public speeches, and interviews. Kamala Harris served as the junior senator from California from 2017 to 2021. On August 11, 2020, Harris was selected by presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden to be his running mate in the 2020 United States presidential election, running against incumbent U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. With Biden's election victory, Harris was subsequently elected as vice president. Harris was described by The New York Times as a pragmatic moderate, with policy positions that broadly mirror those of Biden. However, the non-partisan GovTrack rated Harris as the most liberal U.S. Senator, prompting debate over her position in center-left and left-wing politics. Despite this, left-wing activists have criticised Harris on numerous occasions for her past actions as prosecutors, which have been called “right-wing”.
The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021 was a policing reform bill drafted by Democrats in the United States Congress. The legislation was introduced in the United States House of Representatives on February 24, 2021. The legislation aims to combat police misconduct, excessive force, and racial bias in policing.
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Lara Bazelon is an American academic and journalist. She is a law professor at the University of San Francisco School of Law where she holds the Barnett Chair in Trial Advocacy and directs the Criminal & Juvenile and Racial Justice Clinics. She is the former director of the Loyola Law School Project for the Innocent in Los Angeles. Her clinical work as a law professor focuses on the exoneration of the wrongfully convicted.
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