Public Safety
Covering topics such as corrections, criminal justice, emergency management, gun control and police/fire/EMS.
The causes of these alarming gaps in equitable access to emergency care are complex. Fixing the problem won’t come from patchwork efforts or temporary fixes.
Many big-city departments are short of officers. It's not a new problem, but young people seem to be shying away from the field.
Six years ago, state police made a big push to catch up on a massive backlog. Now, waiting times exceed eight months and the number of untested kits is three times higher than in 2019.
Transit police have issued more than 700 citations over the past two months. Instead of fines, riders who don’t pay are being sent to court.
As the transit agency publicly worked to ensure their riders felt safe during their daily commutes, top executives experienced an internal breakdown in communication so bad that it resulted in a wrongful-termination lawsuit.
Last year’s Lahaina wildfire killed 102 people and forced thousands to flee. But more than 90 percent of 1,478 residential lots have been cleared of fire-related debris and a historic settlement will resolve 450 lawsuits.
Fire authorities wish people would stop doing stupid stuff like burning toilet paper, igniting smoke bombs or tossing cigarette butts out of cars. People, not nature, are responsible for most wildfires.
A June 2023 audit found tens of thousands of potentially fraudulent or inaccurate ticket records within the state police system. Federal investigators found most mistakes were unintentional, though some officers may face discipline.
CrowdStrike’s botched cybersecurity update affected airlines and other entities all over the world. Here’s how police and fire departments coped in the Arizona city.
The state’s largest law enforcement organization found that police staffing in the state is at a 30-year low and is especially bad in rural counties.
Mark Twain famous aphorism, “History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes,” reminds us that while exact circumstances may be unique, patterns do in fact repeat. That is true meteorologically this year as the U.S. navigates through another summer of extreme weather.
Talk instead of fight: It’s a crucial tool for police officers confronting people in crisis. But too often when it isn’t working, a reluctance to use non-lethal force leads to a shooting. Better training and a cultural shift are needed.
Texas ranked 10th in the nation for auto thefts per capita last year and Dallas had the fifth-highest number of car thefts among U.S. cities. But early data from this year reports that thefts are down by about 7.25 percent so far.
A new law extends the state’s sexual assault evidence protections to cover DNA samples. But getting justice in hundreds of cold cases will require more than just testing, survivors say.
Some experts believe that active shooter drills that aim to simulate a real-life situation can often traumatize participants. But the chief of the Miami-Dade Schools police says they’re helpful for officers to learn.
On Monday, July 15, Chicago issued 16 tornado warnings, the most sent on a single day since 2004. In an average year, the state only experiences 50 tornadoes annually. But as the air becomes more humid, tornadoes will become more common.
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