Returning to pre-pandemic activity raises fears of anti-Asian gun violence: photo of April vigil flowers for those killed

Opinion: Returning to pre-pandemic activity raises Asian American fears of anti-Asian gun violence

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Going on outdoor walks without a mask. Hopping on a Washington, D.C. Metro train without holding my breath. Meeting friends at restaurants and bars … Resuming those and other parts of my pre-pandemic life has been fun. It’s also been scary — and not for reasons related to COVID-19. I’m Asian American, which can make being in public dangerous. 

The FBI reported that, in 2020, the number of hate crimes targeting Asian people rose from 158 to 274, a more than 70% increase. 

Living Redemption Youth Opportunity Hub youth, including those in the juvenile justice system, boxed up food donations to distribute in in their Harlem neighborhood.

Millions in seized money expanded Harlem youth hub’s “credible messenger” anti-violence project

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Headquartered in the upper rooms of a church on 124th Street, Living Redemption is one five such hubs that, in 2017, received $45.9 million of $250 million that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office seized from a drug-money laundering European bank. Decade-old Living Redemption got $10.3 million. The windfall expanded the program — even providing providing a paycheck for those mentoring messengers.

Savannah gun violence: close-up of male hands aiming a black, semi-automatic gun off-camera to right of image

Touristy Savannah’s anti-gun violence campaign launches in fits and starts, with parents of the dead taking the lead

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“It is an act of senseless violence that puts innocent families and children in danger,” said Savannah Police Chief Roy Minter, at a press conference about the two 20-somethings murdered and the six others left with wounds that weren’t life-threatening. Savannah’s gun violence has soared, according to WTOC-TV’s May 2021 analysis of Savannah Police Department data, to its highest recent level since 2016.

Savannah gun violence: Neighborhood folks gather at outdoor display tables with items for sale and a large sign with red and black text

Researcher: Trauma and grief-fueled resilience among those who lose someone to gun violence hasn’t been adequately examined

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It’s not uncommon for those traumatized by gun violence to project what outsiders might view as a kind of superwoman or superman persona — one that can melt away at any given moment — whose complexities may not be fully understood. Those who fund scientific research largely have not seen fit to examine the toll on families devastated by gun-violence deaths.

COVID-19 analysis: Juveniles were restrained less; a fraction of parents didn’t know how to contact incarcerated children as in-person visits slowed during pandemic

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Fewer juveniles were placed in restraints and more reported that they’ve had positives dealings with staffers at juvenile agencies, according to April 2021 data voluntarily submitted by 148 pre-trial and other short-term detention facilities, longer-term correctional facilities, assessment and in-community residential programs in 32 states. Released in August by the Performance-based Standards Learning Institute, partnering with Vera Institute, the snapshots of data gauge COVID-19’s impact on  juveniles in those states and on their families who, with in-person visits banned during he pandemic, had to find other ways to connect.

California Study: black youth injured during police encounters at greater rates than others: police officer holding nightstick against neck of Black youth during arrest

California Study: Blacks were 19% of youth injured during police encounters; their injury risks were as much as 6.7 times higher than that of whites

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A University of California at Berkeley School of Public Health analyzed 13 years’ worth of hospital records for almost 16,000 patients aged 19 and younger, starting roughly in 2013. Black girls in those reports were injured more often than any group other than Black boys. Whites had the lowest injury rates among all races of youth, according to the analysis, published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association’s JAMA Pediatrics.

Juvenile crime statistics: Foot in black tennis shoe and white socks with silver metal restraining chain

Juvenile cases in 2019 dropped to the lowest level in last 14 years, federal data show

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Juvenile offenses involving property, drug and public order offenses, combined, declined in 2019 to their lowest levels since 2005, according to recently released National Center on Juvenile Justice data also showing that probation, rather than detention, increasingly was assigned in five categories of juvenile crime.

Opinion: Disruptive students, often facing challenges at home and in their communities, deserve acts of “restorative justice”

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This is how practitioners of restorative justice approach things: First, focus on building strong, authentic relationships in a community, including schools that now are reopening.  Then, if and when community members or students make a mistake or cause harm, rather than simply looking at which rule was broken and which punishment should be prescribed, collaborate to help ensure that the erring individual has the space and support to hold herself or himself accountable.