Since its founding in 2020, the Center for Innovations in Community Safety (CICS) at the Georgetown University Law Center has made strides in advancing reform and reimagining public safety. One of its flagship initiatives, the Active Bystandership for Law Enforcement (ABLE) program, has implementation in over 400 law enforcement agencies across forty U.S. states and three Canadian provinces. These ABLE agencies, which include approximately 158,000 officers, serve around 100 million people. The ABLE program supports law enforcement officers in preventing misconduct and promoting a culture of accountability, providing training and tools for officers to intervene effectively and ethically in critical situations.

Another key program is the Police for Tomorrow (PfT) Fellowship, which has now completed its fourth cohort. This workshop-based initiative brings together law enforcement professionals to explore the historical, social, and scientific contexts of policing. The fellowship aims to equip officers with the knowledge and skills necessary to transform the culture of policing from within, promoting more community-centered and equitable approaches to law enforcement. PfT workshop topics include police use of force, implicit bias and institutionalized racism, over-criminalization and mass incarceration, among others.

Beyond these longstanding programs, CICS is dedicated to addressing the overreliance on policing and incarceration to solve societal issues which have often caused harm and undermined public safety. As part of this effort, CICS provides technical assistance to Alternative First Responder (AFR) programs and Hospital-Based Violence Intervention Programs (HVIPs). AFR programs, established in municipalities across the country, utilize peer responders, clinicians, and other specially trained behavioral health responders to handle a range of non-criminal service calls, helping to shift away from police involvement. CICS hosts events and conducts research to foster collaboration and knowledge-sharing among practitioners in these emerging responder models.

Additionally, CICS supports HVIPs, which offer comprehensive services to survivors of interpersonal violence, including safety planning, legal and medical support, and trauma-informed care. One of the key elements of HVIP success is building trust as soon as participants arrive at the hospital, ensuring that they receive the necessary support to recover and prevent future violence. CICS works closely with HVIP programs in the Washington, D.C. area, offering technical assistance and research expertise to help improve outcomes for survivors of violence.

Tahir Duckett is the Executive Director of CICS and a professor at Georgetown Law. Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Director Duckett graduated from Emory University, where he began actionizing his passion for social change, before attending Georgetown Law. During this time, he founded ReThink, an organization focused on preventing sexual violence by fostering a culture of consent and emotional awareness among adolescent boys, without relying on punitive criminal justice responses. Before starting ReThink, Duckett spent eight years organizing within the labor movement, most recently leading the AFL-CIO’s young worker program.

Prior to his current role, Duckett was an attorney at Relman Colfax, a leading civil rights law firm known for its work on discriminatory policing, housing, lending, employment, education, and public accommodation. He also helped found Law For Black Lives-DC (L4BLDC), which provides legal and policy support to the Movement for Black Lives in the Washington, D.C. area. Through this work, Duckett has facilitated numerous trainings, teach-ins, and discussions around community safety and justice reform.

In addition to his professional work, Duckett has written extensively on topics such as policing, masculinity, and labor, with his articles and essays frequently cited in discussions about sexual violence, criminal justice, and social justice movements.

In this interview, Director Duckett discusses his professional journey, shares his CICS work highlights, and offers insight into the importance of policing reform.

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