GROWING UP WITH MURDER ALL AROUND: This New York Times article reviews a grim book—entitled An American Summer—about the Summer of 2013 in some of Chicago’s highest crime neighborhoods.

The good news is that we’ve come a long way since the high crimes rates of the late 1960s through early 1990s. Many neighborhoods that used to be dangerous—minority neighborhoods especially—have since blossomed. The book tells the story of some of the much smaller number of neighborhoods that continue to have obscene rates of violent crime.

My worry is that “deincarceration reform” and other efforts at criminal justice reform could easily go off the rails and throw decades of gains away if they aren’t handled carefully and in a hardheaded manner. Alas, the current rhetoric is anything but hardheaded.  If you agree (or especially if you don’t), take a look at my Commissioner Statement on Police Use of Force: An Examination of Modern Policing Practices.