This report, published by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), reviews school safety data and found that although crime and violence in schools have generally been decreasing for some time, multiple-victim homicide incidents have been increasing. The authors discuss the scope of violent crime in schools, the findings, and NIJ’s school-shooting database. 

This article, published by the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART), discusses incidents that involved stranger-perpetrated sex crimes and the importance of registry data. The question the article attempts to answer is whether a sex offender registry can influence the speed of case closure for sexual assault incidents involving strangers. The researchers found that there is evidence supporting the utility of the sex offender registry to aid law enforcement in speeding up the closure rate of stranger-perpetrated sex crime incidents. 

Hosted by the National White Collar Crime Center and funded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, this training provides basic information for first responders who may encounter digital evidence in the course of their duties. Topics include the definition of digital evidence, where it can be found, the importance of getting digital devices to a forensics expert, and the ways in which digital evidence can be compromised. This course also addresses the issue of when a warrant is required to seize and/or search digital devices. 

Hosted by the Justice Clearinghouse, and sponsored by The American Society of Evidence-Based Policing, this webinar discusses body-worn cameras (BWCs) from the perspective of police, as well as the implementation of BWC programs and its effects on other stakeholders, especially downstream criminal justice actors. An increasing amount of attention has been paid to prosecutors, but the defense has been virtually ignored, especially public defenders. In this webinar, we will discuss the benefits and challenges of police BWCs faced by public defenders.

When: Thursday, January 14, 2020
Time: 1:00 p.m. – 2:15 p.m., ET

Published by the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), this article discusses advancements in technologies to identify palm prints and how agencies can ensure that they capture palm prints correctly during booking. The author discusses the National Palm Print System, the cost of incomplete palm prints, how to capture a quality palm print, and resources to improve palm print capture.