Baltimore De-Policing

A pretty well written article - which is surprising considering it's from USA Today:

• Just before a wave of violence turned Baltimore into the nation’s deadliest big city, a curious thing happened to its police force: officers suddenly seemed to stop noticing crime.
  
  Police officers reported seeing fewer drug dealers on street corners. They encountered fewer people who had open arrest warrants.
  
  Police questioned fewer people on the street. They stopped fewer cars.
  
  In the space of just a few days in spring 2015 – as Baltimore faced a wave of rioting after Freddie Gray, a black man, died from injuries he suffered in the back of a police van – officers in nearly every part of the city appeared to turn a blind eye to everyday violations. They still answered calls for help. But the number of potential violations they reported seeing themselves dropped by nearly half. It has largely stayed that way ever since.
  
  “What officers are doing is they’re just driving looking forward. They’ve got horse blinders on,” says Kevin Forrester, a retired Baltimore detective.

The entire article is extensive, covers both sides of the debate, and interviews a bunch of retired cops who have devastating insight into the political and social consequences of the "de-policing" phenomenon. Heather MacDonald did it first and more in depth, but for a USA Today article, it is deserving of a read.