Friends, Firearms, and the Law: IACP 2024 Recap

I have been to Boston a lot lately. It's a great city. I've written recently about its interesting history and its interesting food. I visit the city whenever I can. That's why I was glad to be back for the 2024 International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) Conference.

IACP is a lot like homecoming and promotes deep social interaction as well as professional engagement. I see so many friends and former colleagues there, and I always make great new connections. This year was no different.

National Policing Institute Awards Dinner

Perhaps the best social event I attend every year (not counting SoundThinking's own great party!) is the National Policing Institute's Annual Awards Dinner. Jim Burch and the team at NPI do a great job of creating a fun and open environment full of interesting people. Most importantly, they use the occasion to recognize standout leaders in the policing profession.

This year, NPI honored Kathleen M. O'Toole and Sheriff Jerry L. Clayton.

I first met Kathy when she was Chief of the Seattle Police Department, and I was Assistant Special Agent in Charge of ATF's Seattle Field Division. We have maintained professional contact ever since. Kathy's career is storied and has taken some incredibly interesting turns. Many people from Boston are rightly proud of their Irish heritage, but few actually move to Ireland to live and work! Despite her extraordinary credentials, Kathy is also a genuinely nice person, and she gave a very gracious speech when she accepted the award.

I had not met Sheriff Clayton before this event but he, too, gave moving remarks. He recounted his own personal journey into the policing profession and the difficult personal challenges he faced, not the least of which were overcoming the negative feelings his grandfather (an important figure in Sheriff Clayton's life) held of police. Sheriff Clayton committed to honoring the profession and using it to promote fairness and equality, and the award reflects his success in doing that. He's had an inspiring career that continues today.

Both recipients serve as prominent examples of ideals that NPI has long promoted for policing: professionalism, commitment and sacrifice, and devotion to serving others.

(BTW, if you love "Where's Waldo," then look at photos from the event and see if you can spot me and SoundThinking CEO Ralph Clark. We're in there!)

Presentations

Of course, the presentations are the centerpiece of the IACP conference, and the agenda was packed with high-quality discussions and lectures. I attended several that focused on legal issues and firearms.

Ethics for Government Lawyers

The first presentation I attended was What Your Lawyer Can (and Can't) Do For You: Ethical Obligations and Issues For and About Legal Advisors, presented by attorneys Jerome R. Spencer, General Counsel for the Charles County (MD) Sheriff's Office, and his deputy, Misty Good. They made what could have been a dry topic light-hearted and enjoyable. Government lawyers sometimes face unique ethical issues and have different challenges than their private-industry counterparts. One of the biggest questions they must answer is, "Who is the 'client' that the attorney serves?". It is almost never an individual (not even the Sheriff) but rather is typically the organization (e.g., the sheriff's office or the police department) or the greater municipal government that the organization falls under. Sometimes, though, courts view the taxpayers as the ultimate client of government attorneys. This is not a trivial matter and has consequences for confidentiality, which is central to legal practice. Relatedly, government attorneys face pressure to disclose information that, in private practice, would be protected as lawyer-client information. The trend towards open government (which is a good thing) often means disclosure of the information unless there is a compelling reason to protect secrecy.

Constitutional Protections

I also attended several presentations that dealt with ensuring policing doesn't just protect law-abiding people from crime, but also protects the constitutional rights of everyone.

In Effective Legal Training for Today's LEOs, Anthony Bandiero and John Blackledge talked about the importance of making training practical for those on the front line. There is a common belief that the law is "black and white," but the reality is it is mostly shades of gray. Attorneys endlessly litigate novel questions of law, or distinguish new cases from past ones on small details, or quibble about the meaning of words. That's fine in a courtroom, but law enforcement officers on the streets, tasked with carrying the laws into practice while simultaneously protecting the public-and themselves-in a dangerous and unpredictable world, don't have the luxury of endless debate. That's why it is important to produce and deliver training that arms them with principles they can apply in a wide range of circumstances to produce prosecutable cases while also protecting the civil rights and liberties the Constitution guarantees.

Speaking of the Constitution: in Identifying Blind Spots: The Story and Function of the Dallas Police Department's Constitutional Policing Unit, Deputy Chief Stephen Williams; Lt. Julio Gonzalez; Advisor Maddy Madrazo; and Criminologist Alex del Carmen discussed the birth of this unit, its evolution, and its ongoing work. "Constitutional Policing" sounds like a truism; of course, we expect all policing to be constitutional. This unit serves as a mechanism for ensuring that is true. Through its oversight work, it makes recommendations for improving the department's performance, and it delivers a measure of credibility and transparency to the community the department serves. Perhaps the best thing I heard in the presentation was when Advisor Madrazo said that the unit starts from a position of "presuming the good intentions of police." We could use a lot more of that in the world.

In The Importance of Protecting Privacy, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties…IT'S PART OF THE JOB! (emphasis in the original), Mike Sena, (who may be the busiest man in policing today!) brought his usual candor and insight to a vitally important topic. I first met Mike when I was working in ATF HQ, and learned that when Mike speaks, it's worth listening. He was joined by Jennifer Skinner, Institute for Intergovernmental Research (IIR), and Senior Policy Advisor David P. Lewis, from the Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Assistance. They talked quite a lot about navigating the intersection of ensuring public safety and protecting First Amendment rights.

PERF Town Hall

Of course, I also attended the PERF Town Hall meeting. It is a marquee event. This year, there was a great deal of discussion about police preparations for the upcoming election (which we now know went off without a hitch, probably due in no small part to those preparations). There was also a lot of discussion of other topical developments in policing, such as how to restrain individuals.

Firearms Enforcement

Most of my professional focus remains on using the law, good policing practices, and technology to address gun crime, so I attended several presentations relevant to that.

In Creating a Crime Gun Intelligence Center, ATF's Special Agent in Charge Jim Ferguson led a discussion of principles that ATF has touted for years-and which law enforcement and the Department of Justice have now widely adopted-to target shooters and firearm traffickers. Central to the strategy is using ballistic evidence to connect crime scenes and recovered firearms through the use of ATF's National Integrated Ballistic Information Network, or NIBIN, system. Of course, research consistently shows that using ShotSpotter can dramatically increase collection of this evidence. As the adoption of these "crime gun intelligence" principles has become more widespread, so too have the number of NIBIN leads developed from submitted cartridge cases. In 2021, the NIBIN system produced just over 155,000 leads. By 2023, that number had grown to over 223,000. Technology is helping police solve gun crimes.

That was also the focus of the discussion in Closing Cases: Improving Homicide Clearance Rates to Advance Public Safety, where Kathy O'Toole (the above-mentioned awardee) led a panel discussion with Keenon James, Senior Director of the Everytown Survivor Network and Phoenix Police Department Chief Michael Sullivan. This panel focused more specifically on how investing investigative resources into solving homicides (and non-fatal shootings) can pay big dividends in reducing violent crime. In her remarks, Chief O'Toole specifically mentioned her own experience with ShotSpotter and the important role the ATF plays in public safety. I was glad to hear it. It was also interesting to hear Director James' personal experience-he lost a brother to gun crime-and his insightful ideas on more effectively handling victim issues. I learned a few things from this discussion.

The "Koper Curve"

One of the most fascinating presentations I attended was delivered at the IACP Research Advisory Council meeting. Dr. Christopher Koper and SoundThinking's own Dr. Simen Oestmo presented preliminary results of their research using Resource Router data to analyze the principles Dr. Koper laid out many years ago in his groundbreaking research. The "Koper Curve" theory posits that 'doses' of visible police presence can have a deterrent effect long after police leave the area. Using data that trained observers gathered in the mid-90s, he determined that about 15 minutes of police presence can have a deterrent effect for about 2 hours. But with Resource Router being deployed in many cities, it has captured literally millions of data points-far more than would be practically possible with human observers. Using this new data, their research validates Dr. Koper's earlier measurements and shows that police can have a greater impact on crime than just through direct intervention. And, as Benjamin Franklin reminded us, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. (BTW, here's something you probably didn't know about Dr. Franklin.)

So, in conclusion, you can see why I am already looking forward to IACP 2025 in Denver!

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