April 2012

By Deborah Ramirez, professor of law, Northeastern University School of Law, and Tara Lai Quinlan, a New York attorney. Professor Ramirez is founder of the Partnering for Prevention and Community Safety Initiative (PfP), and she recently testified before the U.S. House Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties on the Trayvon Martin killing. Ms. Quinlan is director of the Partnering for Prevention and Community Safety Initiative (PfP), and is pursuing an LLM in Criminal Law, Criminology & Criminal Justice at King’s College London, focusing on racial profiling and community policing in the United Kingdom.

Local law enforcement officials may not have fired the shot that killed Trayvon Martin, but police and policymakers are responsible for the systemic failures that contributed to this tragedy, and must address them in concrete steps to ensure that other innocent young men do not die needlessly.

One of the most important systemic flaws highlighted by this tragedy is that private security officers and volunteer community patrols have increasingly assumed law enforcement duties from cash-strapped police departments.  Today one in three policing related dollars is actually spent on private security guards and community patrols. In many communities across the country it is not uncommon for private security officers and volunteer community patrols to carry guns, patrol neighborhoods, report suspicious persons in the neighborhood, and deter unwanted people from entering or hanging out in the neighborhood. Cash-strapped police department often welcome private security officers and volunteer community patrols because they can serve as eyes and ears in local communities where police cannot be as often.

The increased privatization of law enforcement duties like neighborhood patrolling raises important questions about government accountability and government oversight. While police departments like Sanford routinely try to distance themselves from legal accountability when citizens like George Zimmerman take the law into their own hands, law enforcement officials are ultimately responsible for keeping our communities safe. Where was the training and oversight for Zimmerman about handling and reporting suspicious activity in the neighborhood? Where is the training for the throngs of other George Zimmermans across the country? While police officers are responsible for every bullet fired, where is similar accountability for private security officers and volunteer community patrols?

by Nicole Flatow

Responding to the concerns of 39 attorneys general over the impact of piracy on the U.S. manufacturing industry, a bipartisan group of senators has asked the Federal Trade Commission to “use all tools at your disposal to fight the theft of and use of stolen American manufacturing information technology (IT) and intellectual property (IP).”

The request comes in response to a November letter from the National Association of Attorneys General that asked the FTC to help the AGs combat piracy by deploying a section of the Federal Trade Commission Act that prohibits unfair methods of competition.

“Competition is the bedrock of free enterprise,” they write. “Competition is unfairly distorted, however, when a manufacturer gains a cost advantage by using stolen information technology, whether in its business operations or manufacturing processes. It offends our sense of fairness when such wrongdoers reap commercial advantage from their illegal acts.”