Lt. Shawn Hill works in the Santa Barbara police chief’s office as the community accountability manager.
SANTA BARBARA — Santa Barbara Police Department’s Lt. Shawn Hill has been selected as a National Institute of Justice LEADS Scholar for 2021.
The NIJ Law Enforcement Advancing Data and Science program selects 10 LEADS scholars annually from a nationwide selection process.
Lt. Hill currently works in the police chief’s office as the community accountability manager. He oversees the department’s Professional Standards Unit, which conducts investigations into complaints against employees.
In addition, Lt. Hill is assigned as the police department’s liaison to the Community Formation Commission, which is creating recommendations for how to conduct civilian oversight of the police department.
The plan is expected to be presented next year to the Santa Barbara City Council.
Lt. Hill’s other areas of work in academia include the impacts of intergroup communication on police-public relationships and translating research into practice for law enforcement.
“Practitioner and academic collaborations are critical to the improvement of our profession,” said Interim Santa Barbara Police Chief Bernard Melekian.
“Lt. Hill’s selection to this national cohort is a testament to his accomplishments in the field of evidence-based policing and his desire to continue the work of improving relationships and service to the many diverse communities we serve,” Chief Melekian said in a news release. “It also speaks to where we are as a department amongst 18,000 other law enforcement agencies in the nation.”
— Marilyn McMahon
