Ko Bragg

Bulletin

In Birmingham, Balancing Police Reform and Violence Prevention

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: Birmingham’s young mayor promised to radically rethink criminal justice. Then shootings spiked. Birmingham, Alabama, like many cities, has seen calls for police reform alongside skyrocketing gun violence over the last few years.

Bulletin

NYC to Roll Out Pioneering Anti-Violence Program

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: New York to spend $1 million piloting Advance Peace, a violence prevention program that uses financial incentives. The city will launch in a precinct in each borough and pair fellows, or young…

Bulletin

Stimulus Funds Keep Flowing to Community Violence Prevention

What To Know Today The latest plans for spending stimulus money on violence prevention. A number of cities and states this week announced how they intend to use relief funds in the American Rescue Plan for…

Bulletin

Putting the Focus on Victims’ Support

What To Know Today More board members quit the NRA. Citing governance failures and a lack of transparency from executive leadership, two of the National Rifle Association’s 76 board members resigned on August 6. Owen “Buz” Mills, who was among…

Bulletin

DOJ Probes Another Major Police Department

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: Baltimore bets on a new type of first responder: Librarians. After another difficult year for homicides and a pandemic that strained social services, the city is taking a novel approach to…

Bulletin

Mexico Sues U.S. Gunmakers

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: Biden’s nominee to lead the ATF comes down to a final decision by Senator Angus King. Supporters of David Chipman launched a final full-court press on the independent senator from Maine, with…

Bulletin

Two Years After El Paso, ‘We’ve Gone in the Opposite Direction’

What To Know Today On the anniversary of the El Paso mass shooting, concern about domestic terrorism, hate crimes in Texas. Tuesday marked two years since a man allegedly drove 10 hours across the state and opened fire in a…

Bulletin

‘The City Is Not a Laboratory’: The Human Cost of Philly’s Gun Violence

What To Know Today As researchers try to crack Philadelphia’s homicide spike, a family’s quest for safety ends in heartbreak. Philadelphia has featured heavily in discussions on criminal justice reform following the 2017 election of District Attorney Larry Krasner, who ran…

Bulletin

Ted Nugent Resigns From the NRA Board

What To Know Today Ted Nugent resigns from the NRA board. A high-profile National Rifle Association booster and vocal bigot, Nugent joined the board in 1995. In an email sent July 29, NRA general counsel John Frazer told board members that…

Bulletin

Wayne LaPierre’s Secret Elephant Trophies

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: Wayne and Susan LaPierre ordered their hunted elephants turned into stools and a trashcan. In early fall of 2013, an export company in Botswana prepared a shipment of animal parts for Wayne LaPierre,…

Bulletin

A Violent Summer Tests Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: Political headwinds and frequent shootings challenge plans from Baltimore’s young mayor to improve public safety. With at least 194 homicides this year, various city officials have been willing to try nearly anything to…

Bulletin

Oakland’s Bet on Community Gun Violence Prevention

What To Know Today Drawing funding from police, Oakland’s Department of Violence Prevention gets $17 million. Will it be enough? The city office formed in 2017, but got its first significant funding only this June. Its leader, Guillermo Cespedes,…

Bulletin

The Disparities in Gun Possession Cases

What To Know Today NEW from THE TRACE: After two decades helping victims through tragedy, a grocery store shooting brought her work home. Stephanie Rudy has volunteered as a victim advocate with the Boulder Police Department for more than…

Bulletin

Raising Clearance Rates → Preventing Violence

What To Know Today How to improve police clearance rates of shootings. Across the country, police departments rarely arrest or charge someone in shooting cases, even for fatal ones. A new report from the Manhattan Institute’s…

Bulletin

Tragedy From Coast to Coast

What To Know Today A violent weekend sees tragedy unfold coast to coast, including at a Major League Baseball game. From Friday night through Sunday night, a string of 12 mass shootings left 11 people dead…