By John S. Hollywood, Dulani Woods, Samuel Peterson, Michael J. D. Vermeer, Brian A. Jackson

Deficiencies in the quality and interoperability of law enforcement data have been identified as major problems that hamper law enforcement decisionmaking and operations. Data governance and data management (DG/DM) can address these issues by improving the quality and shareability of data. On behalf of the National Institute of Justice, the Police Executive Research Forum and RAND convened a panel to identify the most-pressing needs to leverage DG/DM knowledge to enable major improvements in the quality, availability, and interoperability of law enforcement data.

The panelists identified five themes: improving law enforcement's DG/DM capabilities; improving protections on law enforcement data; improving community participation in data decisionmaking; developing novel data and processes to support broad, multiagency conceptions of community safety; and improving the value of traditional law enforcement data. The panelists rated the problems and potential solutions they described to identify a set of high-priority needs for improving the quality and integrity of community safety data for law enforcement agencies and all other agencies and groups involved in the community safety enterprise. These needs and supporting context are described in this report. The highest-priority theme emerging from the workshop was using DG/DM to improve community safety data protections in various ways, including developing guidelines, core processes, training, and guidance for agencies to work with vendors and improving community participation in data decisionmaking.

RAND - Sep. 11, 2024

By Daniel S. Lawrence, Tom Christoff, Zoë Thorkildsen

Recognizing the urgent need for transparency, accountability, and legitimacy, the Mayor and City Council of San José, California directed staff to obtain an assessment of the San José Police Department’s (SJPD) use of force. CNA’s Center for Justice Research and Innovation was chosen through a competitive bid process coordinated by the Independent Police Auditor (IPA). This work coincided with an assessment of the SJPD’s efforts to bring the department in line with the recommended best practices promoted in the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing report and was completed by members of the same team. The use of force assessment focused on four key areas:

• A review of the SJPD’s use of force policies, procedures, training, and events.

• An examination into the characteristics of use of force events, including disparity across racial and ethnic groupings.

• The impact COVID-19 and social justice movements for policing reform had on calls for service and use of force.

• Disparity in use of force behaviors and sustained injuries across racial and ethnic groupings.

In this executive summary, we present a summary of the findings of our assessment and a summary of the key recommendations offered to SJPD and the city. We encourage interested individuals to read the details in the body of this report, where they will find detailed the supporting evidence associated with our 39 findings and 51 recommendations. See Appendix B for the full list of findings and recommendations.

Arlington, VA: CNA, 2022. 110p.