The Speaker

Deputy Chief Ian Cyr is in his 25th year of service with the University of Massachusetts (Amherst) Police Department. He is a National Instructor for Fair and Impartial Policing LLC, which is the leader in providing implicit-bias-awareness training for law enforcement in North America. He has held a wide variety of assignments including Field Training Officer, Defensive Tactics and Firearms instructor, Tactical Team leader, Chemical Munitions instructor, and Police Academy instructor. He is also responsible for incident command during major events at the university.

Deputy Chief Cyr has been instrumental in developing the Citizens Police Academy and collaborates to develop strategic planning efforts for the department. He holds a B.S. in Criminal Justice and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Regional Planning. Deputy Chief Cyr graduated from the 234th session of the FBI National Academy. Cyr is currently assigned as the Deputy Chief of Police overseeing department operations.

The UMass Police is a 63-member fully sworn police department serving the University community of approximately 33,000 people.

The Workshop

Weaponizing the Police- Profiling By Proxy : Friday, April 17, 2020 10:30A

When an individual calls the police and makes false or ill-informed claims of misconduct about persons they dislike or are biased against—e.g., ethnic and religious minorities, youth, homeless people—police must be careful to avoid “profiling by proxy”.

At worst, the public’s use of law enforcement to confront minorities can be viewed as “weaponizing the police.” Even when no explicit animus is present, such encounters may constitute a form of profiling: profiling by proxy. Without proper leadership and guidelines, a biased caller’s inferences can generate accusatory claims by police, outraged denials of wrongdoing by the accused, and cause police to unwittingly couple themselves with the biases of third parties whose intentions are opaque.