Skip to Main Content
Lloyd Sealy Library
John Jay College of Criminal Justice

NYPD - Historical and Current Research: Police Response to Demonstrations

This is a guide mainly focusing on the history of the NYPD, but modern sources are covered too. By Ellen Belcher

Organizations' Reports on Policing of Protests

Protest and Assembly Rights Project (2013) Suppressing Protest: Human Rights Violations in the U.S. Response to Occupy Wall Street. This report is discussed here  Stacks ; HC110 .I5 K56 2012a

Police Executive Research Forum - P.E.R.F.(2006) Police management of mass demonstrations : identifying issues and successful approaches.  also available ectronically  Stacks - HV8055 .P645 2006

California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training (2003) California Crowd Management and Civil Disobediance Guidelines. .

Christopher Dunn, NY-ACLU Arresting protest: a special report of the New York Civil Liberties Union of New York City's protest policies at the February 15, 2003 antiwar demonstration in New York City  Open Special Collections ; HV8148 .N52 A77 2003a

Police Use of Oleoresin Capsicum or "O.C." or Pepper Spray

Below are some suggested recent resources on Pepper Spray and its use. It is also suggested that a search using the some of these keywords Pepper Spray or Oleoresin Capsicum and Police or Law Enforcement and Demonstrations or Crowd Control in OneSearch for books and reports or in Academic Search Complete and/or Criminal Justice Abstracts for Articles.

Encyclopedia Articles

Action Medic Groups. Encyclopedia of Activism and Social Justice. Ed. Gary L. Anderson and Kathryn G. Herr. Vol. 1.  Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Reference, 2007. p18-19.

Steve Ijames. Nonlethal Weapons. Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement. Ed. Larry E. Sullivan, M. R. Haberfeld, Marie Simonetti Rosen, and Dorothy Moses Schulz. Vol. 1: State and Local.  Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Reference, 2005. p305-307.

Less-lethal Weapons Technology. World of Forensic Science. Ed. K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. Vol. 1.  Detroit: Gale, 2005. p416-417.

Books and Reports

Lynne Wilson. The Use and Abuse of Pepper Spray. National Police Accountability Project, National Lawyer's Guild. [Reprinted with permission of the Police Misconduct and Civil Rights Law Report © 1997 Thomson West, Rochester, NY]

The effectiveness and safety of pepper spray.  Washington, DC: U.S. Dept. of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice, [2003]. Stacks - HV8080 .A6 E34 2003

Blogs

Deborah Blum About Pepper Spray. Scientific American Guest Blog 11/21/2011

Rosemary Joyce. Pepper Spray The Berkeley Blog. 11/20/2011

Pepper Spray Cop/Casually Pepper Spray Everything Cop Imagery Know Your Meme Blog

Subject headings to search on Police and Demonstrations

Try using these words for subject, keyword subject, and keyword searching.

Demonstrations

Demonstrations -- United States

Crowd control

Crowd control -- United States

Spectator control -- United States