Attorney Wood recently consulted on and was a signatory (as MACDL’s representative) to an amicus brief in Commonwealth v. Sweeting-Bailey. This brief by a coalition of civil rights groups explains why gang databases are artificial racist constructs and unreliable indicators of criminal behavior. Therefore, the fact that someone has been placed in a gang database should not be a basis for reasonable suspicion that he or she has committed a crime. Read the brief here.
Amicus Brief: Right to Alternative to Police Impounding Your Vehicle
On October 17, Attorney Wood co-authored an amicus brief on behalf MACDL and the ACLU in a Fourth Amendment case. The brief argues that police must notify people that they may propose an alternative to impoundment of their vehicle before the police may impound it. This is critical because impoundment inevitably leads to an invasive inventory search and because impoundment is an unreasonable financial burden on poor people if there is reasonable alternative to impoundment.