We're a mission-driven tech firm arming defenders with groundbreaking software to track law enforcement misconduct
Enformates Journey
2015
The First Defender Database
Techtivist founder Julie Ciccolini joined The Legal Aid Society under a first-of-its-kind initiative to track police misconduct called "The Cop Accountability Project."
Realizing the need for a technical solution, Julie built the first defender database of its kind.
2020
The Database Changes a State Law
The database inspired systemic changes culminating in the historic repeal of NY State law 50-A, making police personnel records public for the first time. The database has been a critical source of policing data, catalyzing five successful lawsuits that have improved policing practices and multiple new transparency laws.
The project continues as Law Enforcement Lookup (LELU) under LAS's Cop Accountability Project.
2020-2023
The Database Goes National
To bring the database to other defenders, Julie launched the NACDL's Full Disclosure Project, which expanded the underlying technology from the Cop Accountability Project into a software product for national use.
Under a three-year grant, the project established 5 statewide and 2 city-wide databases, tracked over 150,000 officers from 2,000 agencies, and collected over 17,000 records of police misconduct.
Learn more about the work in this NACDL report.
Our founder created the first-ever defender database to track police misconduct and consistently evolved it to become the transformational software we call Enformate.
Check out some key milestones on our journey:
About our Founder
Julie Ciccolini has dedicated her career to building technology to advance human rights. After a decade of fighting for police transparency and accountability, Julie founded Techtivist to fill a critical need in the defense community for innovative software solutions that drive meaningful change. In her prior role at The Legal Aid Society, Julie designed software to identify and expose police misconduct, preventing numerous wrongful convictions and sparking a movement to reform police secrecy. She co-launched a public database of misconduct in New York, which ignited a successful challenge to a statewide police secrecy law. Her work on criminal justice additionally contributed to the repeal of three discriminatory laws against people of color and queer individuals. Julie then joined Human Rights Watch as a Research Technologist and inaugural member of the Digital Investigations Lab — a first-of-its-kind initiative to apply emerging technology to bolster remote investigations into human rights abuses in over 90 countries. There, she investigated the failures of police accountability systems in New York City. Her reporting contributed to the largest per-person settlement for a mass arrest in the city's history. From 2020-2023, Julie was the Director of Law Enforcement Accountability at the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. She created and directed The Full Disclosure Project to expand her software nationwide. The project established seven statewide databases of misconduct, collectively tracking records on over 150,000 officers from nearly 2,000 agencies. A sought-after subject matter expert on police accountability, Julie has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, New Yorker, NPR, and CNN. In 2022, she was named Columbia University Graduate School's "Most Outstanding Recent Alumni."
RELEVANT PUBLICATIONS
This report demonstrates why every defender should track law enforcement misconduct. It examines how defense lawyers have pioneered the movement to track police misconduct, the impact of their work, and recommendations for other defenders looking to join the movement.
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF CRIMINAL DEFENSE LAWYERS
SEPTEMBER 2023
This report shares key principles, tensions, and practices discussed at a convening that brought together practitioners to discuss the benefits and harms of collecting policing data and connect efforts with organizing aimed at effecting change. The report is intended to guide ongoing conversations and development of best practices and inform future project planning and funding decisions.
NACDL, WITNESS, & INVISIBLE INSTITUTE
FEBRUARY 2023
This report provides a detailed account of the unjustified police response to a peaceful protest in New York to highlight the city’s ineffectual accountability systems that protect abusive police officers, show the shortcomings of incremental reforms, and makes the case for structural change. It contributed to the largest per-person settlement for a mass arrest in NY history.
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
SEPTEMBER 2020