RALEIGH – Campbell Law School and the North Carolina Conference of District Attorneys will host a pivotal ethics training program for more than two dozen local law enforcement officers and prosecutors on May 10-11 as part of a larger effort to help improve ethical policing across the country.
The goal of the program is to seek to provide a sustainable training program for our justice community that promotes integrity and honors and protects basic human rights, said Dean J. Rich Leonard, who is one of 54 founding deans of the American Bar Association (ABA) Law School Police Practices Consortium and a member of its 10-dean steering committee.
“The primary purpose of the Consortium is to collaborate with law enforcement officials to improve ethical policing across the country,” he explained. “To that end, we have been identifying novel police training programs and circulating information about them. We have sponsored colloquia on the EPIC (Ethical Policing is Courageous) Program located at Loyola New Orleans Law School and a similar program out of Georgetown Law.”
Developed by public defenders and prosecutors in Arizona in collaboration with The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, “What You Do Matters” is one of the pivotal policing programs in the country. Leonard has worked with Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman to bring the Arizona trainers to the law school for a pilot session.
The course examines policing within the legal and political framework of Nazi Germany, providing important insight into the consequences that can occur when the government shifts the mission of police from protecting individuals to a policy of abusing basic human rights. Using historical images and stories from the Holocaust, the course uses trained facilitators to engage law enforcement officers and prosecutors in a dialogue about the role of law enforcement in today’s communities and the importance of core values in insuring the integrity and vibrancy of democracy.
“Its thesis, as I understand it, is that fascism was allowed to flourish because people across all walks of German life, including law enforcement, quit doing what they were trained to do and knew they should,” Leonard added. “After the pilot session we will evaluate to see if we want to offer the program more broadly.”
ABOUT CAMPBELL LAW
Since its founding in 1976, Campbell Law has developed lawyers who possess moral conviction, social compassion, and professional competence, and who view the law as a calling to serve others. Among its accolades, the school has been recognized by the American Bar Association (ABA) as having the nation’s top Professionalism Program and by the American Academy of Trial Lawyers for having the nation’s best Trial Advocacy Program. Campbell Law boasts more than 4,300 alumni, who make their home in nearly all 50 states and beyond. In 2021, Campbell Law is celebrating 45 years of graduating legal leaders and 12 years of being located in a state-of-the-art facility in the heart of North Carolina’s Capital City.