ALC engages at every point in the criminal legal system and along its carceral pipeline, and challenges all of its institutions. As we’ve expanded our capacity, we’ve increased our focus on challenging policing, the system’s brutal entry point.

ALC has co-counseled class action litigation on behalf of survivors of intense police violence in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh during the racial justice uprising in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd in May 2020, including Smith v. City of Philadelphia that resulted in Philly agreeing to pay monetary damages totaling $9.25 million collectively to those who were harmed — one of the largest settlements of its kind in the city’s history.

We’ve supported families whose loved ones have been harmed by police in our communities; agitated around police budgets and attempts to (re)establish aggressive and biased policing practices; published impactful research about how apartheid policing targets BIPOC and poor people; and monitored the accountability measures for police departments that our litigation has mandated.