OpenOversight

The Lucy Parsons Labs has launched OpenOversight, an interactive web tool that makes it easier for Chicago residents to file complaints against police officers. Using OpenOversight, members of the public can search for the names and badge numbers of those officers with whom they have negative interactions based on estimated age, race, and gender. Using this information, the OpenOversight web application returns a digital gallery of potential matches and, when possible, includes pictures of officers in uniform to assist in identification.

OpenOversight

“The deck is stacked against people harmed by Chicago police,” says Jennifer Helsby, CTO of the Lucy Parsons Labs and lead developer on the OpenOversight project. “Despite a long history of proven abuses, including torture, Chicago police are almost never held accountable for misconduct or crimes they commit. To file a misconduct complaint, the burden is on the public to provide as much detailed data about the officer as possible. OpenOversight aims to empower Chicagoans with tools that make it easier to identify officers and hold them accountable.”

Chicago Police Misconduct Facts:

OpenOversight uses publicly available data from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, Chicago police department social media accounts, and Flickr. Currently, the OpenOversight database has demographic data on every Chicago police officer and photos of about one percent of officers. OpenOversight uses data related to officers’ performances of their duties as public servants employed by the City of Chicago; it does not include private information such as driver’s license records, home addresses, or criminal records.

OpenOversight is the first project of its kind in the United States and is a direct response to the failure of Chicago’s leaders to take proactive steps to allow the public to identify and report problem police officers.

OpenOversight is released as free and open source software so others can launch similar police accountability projects in their own cities. The software is available for download on GitHub.


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