Highly militarized and deeply integrated with other local, state, and federal policing agencies, the Cambridge Police Department has a long and documented history of illegal search and seizures, racial profiling, and the use of 'confidential informants' to set up drug arrests.
The Cambridge Police Department has its own "Tactical Operations" division, which includes a Special Response Team (SRT) (CPD's version of a SWAT team) and a Tactical Patrol Force (TPF), responsible for "riots, protests, and any other situation where citizen unrest may result." Cambridge police have participated in militarized "Urban Shield" trainings organized by the US Department of Homeland Security. (For more about Urban Shield, see entry on Boston Police.) The City of Cambridge is one of nine municipalities which belong to Metropolitan Boston Homeland Security Region. Through MBHSR, police forces in these nine municipalities participate in coordinated intelligence gathering and sharing under the Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC). The Cambridge Police Department is also a member of the Greater Boston Police Council, an organization set up in the 1970s explicitly to connect police departments in the greater Boston urban core to repress the movement against the Vietnam War, and which continues to militarize police departments. Although the Cambridge Police Department is not a member of NEMLEC, another "law enforcement council" set up for the same purpose, CPD has been known to participate in NEMLEC's joint activities.
Court cases in Massachusetts clearly document the Cambridge Police Department's history of engaging in illegal search and seizure, racial profiling, and the use of 'confidential informants' to set up drug arrests. (See for example: Commonwealth v. Valdez, 2000 Mass. Super. ; Commonwealth v. Meneus, 476 Mass. 231 ; Commonwealth v. Maurice, 2013 Mass. Super.)
In 2002, Cambridge Police stopped Palestinian activist Jaoudat Abouazza and searched his car--ostensibly because of an elapsed vehicle registration--before detaining him after finding flyers announcing a protest for an upcoming demonstration against a Day of Israel Celebration. Abouazza was later taken into custody by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS, later replaced by ICE) and placed in the Bristol County Detention Center, under the infamous Bristol County Sheriff Thomas Hodgson. In INS detention, Abouazza was beaten, tortured, and subjected to repeated interrogations by federal officials who showed him flyers and pictures of political associates and asked questions about them (see here for more about this and other repression cases connected with the New England Committee to Defend Palestine). According to an article published in the Harvard Crimson, Abouazza's arrest was cited by Harvard University Police as a reason for extraordinary security measures imposed on the Harvard University commencement in June of 2002, including the installation of metal detectors and the presence of "members of federal agencies and the National Guard." ("Arrest Caused Commencement Lock Down," by Jenifer L. Steinhardt, the Crimson, November 12, 2002)
In 2018, a video was publicized showing Cambridge Police tackling and punching a Black Harvard student after a call expressing concern about the student had been made to Harvard University Health Services. In the words of an open letter published by the Harvard Black Law Students Association, "He was surrounded by at least four Cambridge Police Department (CPD) officers who, without provocation, lunged at him, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. While on the ground, at least one officer repeatedly punched the student in his torso as he screamed for help." Cambridge's Police Commissioner and City Manager issued a joint statement defending this act of police violence, including CPD's repeated punching of the student as he lay on the ground.
Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert Haas and Cambridge Police Lt. Stephen Ahearn are also known to have participated in a 2008 “counterterrorism seminar” in Israel, as part of an all-expenses-paid delegation of US law enforcement to Israel sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). (This trip became the subject of a Cambridge City Council hearing in 2011.) Cambridge Police Deputy Superintendent Paul Ames participated in the ADL "Northeast Public Safety Executive Terrorism Training in Israel" in 2010. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) sponsors these and other similar expenses-paid delegations to Israel for high-ranking New England police, ICE, FBI, and other security officials, where these officials meet with Israeli military, police, and intelligence agencies, with whom they train and exchange tactics including surveillance, racial profiling, crowd control, and the containment of protests.
(For more information on policing in Massachusetts, see entry on Boston Police.)
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Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert Haas and Cambridge Police Lt. Stephen Ahearn are both known to have participated in a 2008 “counterterrorism seminar” in Israel, as part of an all-expenses-paid delegation of US law enforcement to Israel sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). (This trip became the subject of a Cambridge City Council hearing in 2011.) Cambridge Police Deputy Superintendent Paul Ames participated in the ADL's "Northeast Public Safety Executive Terrorism Training in Israel" in 2010. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) sponsors these and other similar expenses-paid delegations to Israel for high-ranking New England police, ICE, FBI, and other security officials, where these officials meet with Israeli military, police, and intelligence agencies, with whom they train and exchange tactics including surveillance, racial profiling, crowd control, and the containment of protests.
The Cambridge Police Department has utilized Boston Dynamics' robotic dogs.
The Cambridge Police Department partners with BRIC as one of the nine municipal police agencies in the Metropolitan Boston Homeland Security Region participating in coordinated surveillance and information sharing. (The other municipalities are Boston, Brookline, Chelsea, Everett, Quincy, Revere, Somerville, and Winthrop).
Although the the Cambridge Police Department is not a member of NEMLEC, CPD has been known to participate in joint activities with other PDs through NEMLEC. See: "Cambridge Police and Somerville Police Arrest Three Suspects Following Investigation Into Sunday Morning’s Harvard Square Shooting," City of Cambridge (May 16, 2019).
The Cambridge Police Department is listed as a full member of the Greater Boston Police Council, a "law enforcement council" (LEC) set up in the 1970s to link regional police forces and share resources for policing anti-war protests. LECs in Massachusetts have played a central role in militarizing police by organizing SWAT teams and purchasing military equipment such as Lenco Bearcats and other armored vehicles.
Cambridge is one of nine cities designated as part of the Metro Boston Homeland Security Region (MBHSR) and has a representative on the Jurisdictional Point of Contacts Committee (JPOC). The JPOC makes plans and allocates funds from US Department of Homeland Security for projects aimed at integrating and militarizing police departments, fire departments, and emergency services in the MBHSR. Allocations include funding for communications and surveillance technology and for SWAT teams. The Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC), a Department of Homeland Security intelligence fusion center which runs Boston's racist "gang database," is a central project of the MBHSR.
Contrary to its stated commitment to racial justice, the City of Cambridge has consistently supported and emboldened the city's police department. Despite resounding calls from Black and Brown community members in the Summer 2020 to defund the Cambridge Police, in June 2021 the Cambridge City Council voted down a resolution to reduce the city's police budget by $3.7 million, and instead approved a $66 budget for the Cambridge Police Department for the forthcoming year, increasing the Cambridge Police Department's funding by over $3 million from its 2020 levels. The Cambridge Police Department has used this ever-ballooning pool of city resources to buy Lenco "Bearcat" armored vehicles along with military assault weapons, including sixty three Colt M4 assault rifles, eleven sniper rifles, and eighteen Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns -- a source of ongoing outrage amongst Cambridge residents.
As of 2016, the Cambridge Police Department was sharing and accessing information through COPLINK, a surveillance and criminalization platform developed by IBM and the software company i2, which has been called “Google for police officers." Through COPLINK, Cambridge Police officials share their field interviews along with arrest, complaint, accident, and citation reports with other departments who utilize the platform in MA and nationwide, and Cambridge Police officials are able to access the field interviews and arrest, complaint, accident, and citation reports of these other police departments. Agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) "have direct access to the Massachusetts version of the COPLINK system," enabling ICE agents to access any information Cambridge Police officials enter into COPLINK and utilize this information to facilitate ICE's regime of tracking, detentions, and deportations of Black and Brown migrants.
The Cambridge Police Department shares field interviews, arrest, complaint, accident, and citation reports, and other information through COPLINK, a surveillance and criminalization platform developed by IBM and the software company i2. Agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) "have direct access to the Massachusetts version of the COPLINK system," enabling ICE to access information Cambridge Police Department officers enter into COPLINK and utilize this information to facilitate ICE's regime of tracking, detentions, and deportations.
A 2020 Cambridge Police Department report revealed that the Cambridge Police owned one of Lenco's "BearCat" armored vehicles, a source of ongoing outrage amongst Cambridge residents. (See also here)
The Cambridge Police Department has collaborated with Microsoft to host propaganda conferences such as the "Police Innovation Conference," which took place in 2013 and again in 2015. Microsoft is listed as a conference sponsor on the conference website for both years. According to the City of Cambridge website: "'The Cambridge Police Department is once again proud to host the Police Innovation Conference along with WiredBlue and Microsoft,' said Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert C. Haas. 'I'm confident that participating law enforcement partners will leave the City of Cambridge with a greater knowledge and understanding of the latest innovative technologies that will influence the future of policing." Other participants in the 2015 Police Innovation Conference included: iRobot, Harvard University's Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, MIT Lincoln Laboratories, and the Sunlight Foundation.