The new method has been quietly honed for almost a decade in Chicago, where it is known as Operation Ceasefire. It has two main tools. The more conventional one is a team of outreach workers who try to mobilise communities to oppose violence, often in partnership with local clergy. Then, at night, “violence interrupters” hit the streets to sniff out trouble. Often former gang members and graduates of the prison system, the interrupters have a hard-nosed approach to law and order. They may, for example, encourage an aggrieved man to consider beating someone instead of shooting him, or try to convince rival drug-dealers that a turf war would be bad for business, as it would attract the police.
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