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The secret list of convicted cops

Robert Lewis, a reporter for the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley, had a list of California police officers who had been convicted of a crime. The list, which he’d gotten from a California state commission, included nearly twelve thousand names of current, former, and aspiring cops with convictions in the last decade.

Then the Attorney General of California sent him an email.

“Notice of inadvertent release of Department of Justice confidential information and request for destruction of information,” read the subject line. The email said that Robert was committing a misdemeanor by possessing the records, even though he’d been sent them by a state agency in response to a public records request.

“I was angry when I got this,” Robert said. “I think this is counter to our First Amendment.” So he started reporting.

His efforts eventually blossomed into a collaboration with dozens of reporters across California, from McClatchy, the USA Today Network, MediaNews Group and Voice of San Diego. In this week’s episode ([link removed]) , reporters travel from California’s rural valleys to downtown courthouses to track down the stories behind the names on the secret list.

Robert and his team found 630 current and former law enforcement officers convicted of a crime in the last decade. That means on average, a current or former cop in California is convicted of a crime more than once a week.

DUIs and other serious driving offenses were the most common charges by far, followed by domestic violence. In roughly a third of the cases involving serious domestic abuse charges, cops were able to plead guilty to nonviolent offenses that wouldn’t prevent them owning guns. Some of those officers returned to work, where they could be back on the street with a badge and a gun. Most of those cases were never covered by the news – and that’s not an accident.

HEAR THE EPISODE. ([link removed])

More on this topic:
* Explore a searchable database ([link removed]) of convicted current and former officers.
* California's Criminal Cops: Who they are, what they did, why some are still working ([link removed])
* These California police officers were charged with brutalizing loved ones. So why are so many still carrying a gun? ([link removed])
* How did this California police department hire so many officers with troubling pasts? ([link removed])
* Dozens of Police Officers Across San Diego County Have Been Convicted of Crimes ([link removed])

U Visas are supposed to protect immigrants who help solve crimes. But police aren’t cooperating.

After Nataly Alcantara’s family was robbed in their home at knifepoint, she immediately called 911.

Having resolved to find out who terrorized her family, Alcantara helped law enforcement as much as she could. She even did her own sleuthing and managed to help track down one suspect.

There was just one thing that Alcantara asked of Miami police: that they sign a letter confirming her cooperation. If they did that, she could apply for a U visa, created by Congress in 2000 to protect immigrant victims and help police solve crimes.

For Alcantara, the U visa would mean she could gain temporary status and someday apply for a green card. But after Alcantara’s months of cooperation, Miami police declined to verify that she helped investigators.

Nearly 20 years after its creation, the U visa is being undermined routinely by law enforcement agencies across the country. Our analysis ([link removed]) of policies from more than 100 agencies serving large immigrant communities found that nearly 1 of every 4 agencies create barriers never envisioned under the U visa program. Our review found that victims are at the mercy of whatever internal rules police choose.

READ THE FULL STORY. ([link removed])

Is your police department putting up additional barriers for immigrants seeking a U visa? Sign up for our U Visa Reporting Network ([link removed]) , and you’ll get a set of resources that will help you dig into this issue in your community.

Who owns Silicon Valley?

In the latest from Reveal’s Local Labs Initiative ([link removed]) , we collaborated with news organizations across Silicon Valley to examine its notoriously expensive housing market. While it’s known that a handful of tech companies are huge employers, what’s less obvious is that these firms are also some of the Valley’s biggest landowners. Some of the most valuable homes in Silicon Valley ([link removed]) , for example, hide their true owners behind LLCs and holding companies. We dug into hundreds of thousands of records to find out who owned homes with eye-popping price tags.

But the standout landowner is Stanford University ([link removed]) , whose $19.7 billion taxable property portfolio dwarfs the more celebrated acquisitions of the area’s tech titans. From academic facilities to residences to shopping malls, the value of Stanford’s empire is larger than those of Google, Apple and Intel combined. Officials in Santa Clara county think Stanford has a responsibility to help solve the region’s housing affordability crisis. But does Stanford agree?

READ THE FULL STORY. ([link removed])
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