Archive

Advocates and community members unveiled their assessment of a pilot program giving federal immigration agents unfettered access to the Fresno County Jail. The program is shrouded in secrecy and leaves immigrants vulnerable to abuses by ICE. Read More

Sacramento – Several police officers from five Bay Area cities, including Oakland and Richmond, are currently the subject of internal investigations following allegations that over 20 current and former officers abused their power and had sex with a sex worker in exchange for protection and advanced warning about prostitution stings. Now 18, the woman says she was underage when some of the encount... Read More

A lawsuit was filed today against Solano County Superior Court, challenging the court’s practice of suspending the driver’s licenses of people who are too poor to pay exorbitant traffic fines. In 2015, over 11,000 driver’s licenses were suspended in Solano County for failure to pay alone. Read More

Citing the continued widespread criminalization of young people of color through marijuana enforcement, the American Civil Liberties Union of California today announced it has endorsed the Adult Use of Marijuana Act (“AUMA”) to control, regulate, and tax adult use, sale and cultivation of marijuana in California. The measure is expected to qualify for the November state ballot. Read More

California voters will be asked to legalize marijuana in November – and we couldn’t be happier that our state might finally end this chapter of the failed war on drugs. Read More

In response to recent sweeps, in which the City and its agents have taken, discarded and/or destroyed property belonging to homeless individuals, a coalition of legal groups today delivered a demand letter to San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee charging that these practices are unlawful. Read More

The ACLU Foundation of Northern California filed a suit under the California Public Records Act to demand records from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation related to lethal injection. The ACLU Foundation of Northern California issued this request for documents in advance of the department's promulgation of a new, one-drug lethal injection protocol, so that the ACLU Foundati... Read More

Despite marijuana usage rates being similar across racial and ethnic lines, data provided by the Los Angeles and Fresno Police Departments show that black and Latino people in those cities were issued marijuana possession citations at higher rates than white people in the years immediately following the penalty change from misdemeanor to infraction. The data also reveal that marijuana possession e... Read More

Police transparency law, SB 1286, was held in the Senate Appropriations committee today. The law would have shined light on how police departments handle confirmed instances of officer misconduct and serious uses of force. Today is a sad day for transparency, accountability, and justice in California. Read More

Every four years, the U.S. explodes into a frenzy with coverage and commentary about the next President of the United States. You literally have to be hiding under a rock right now not to be bombarded with Clinton, Sanders, and Trump coverage. Read More