Study blames 'ACLU effect' for spike in Chicago's violence in 2016

The Chicago Tribune reports:

A new study blames Chicago’s sudden spike in gun violence in 2016 on the dramatic drop in street stops by Chicago police that year, but several crime experts quickly discounted its findings, particularly its conclusion that the Laquan McDonald scandal wasn’t a factor.

Chicago’s 58 percent jump in homicides in 2016 has fueled fierce debate about its cause among law enforcement officials, politicians and academics.


The study by two professors from the University of Utah cited the so-called ACLU effect as the most likely explanation for the sharp rise in violence to levels unseen in two decades.

Beginning in 2016, Chicago police officers had to more thoroughly document every street stop as part of a landmark agreement between the Police Department and the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois to try to curb racial profiling and other unconstitutional practices. As a result, street stops plummeted, to about 100,000 for all of 2016, an 82 percent drop from about 600,000 in 2015, department records show.

Using what it called “empirical research tools,” the 98-page paper, which has not yet been published, calculated that the far fewer street stops led to nearly 240 additional killings in 2016 alone.

Chicago voters: we like strict gun control laws with police officers that make less arrests.