The National Counter Terrorism Academy (NCTA) is a training center for U.S. state and local law enforcement officers. The Academy operates at the LAPD's Ahmanson Training Center, near the Los Angeles International Airport

Los Angeles International Airport

Los Angeles International Airport is the primary airport serving the Greater Los Angeles Area, the second-most populated metropolitan area in the United States. It is most often referred to by its IATA airport code LAX, with the letters pronounced individually...

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Creation

LAPD chief William Bratton founded the Academy in 2008, in partnership with the Center for Policing Terrorism

Center for Policing Terrorism

The Center for Policing Terrorism is a national-security think tank formed after 9/11 in New York City.-Founding Personalities:The Center's founders included former National Security Council Staffer RP Eddy and former White House Counter-Terrorism chief Richard A. Clarke. Policy analyst Mark...

. The academy began operation with a bricks-and-mortar location; a virtual, or online, academy; a digital library; and mobile academic teams.

Curriculum

The Academy's five-month course aims to teach trainees how to recognize terrorist cells and build regional intelligence networks. Topics of instruction include homegrown radicalization; methods for interdicting terrorism finance; case studies of significant terrorism plots; the historical roots of terrorism; religious extremism, homegrown terror groups; the evolution of al-Qaida; and culturally sensitive interviewing techniques.

Philosophy

The Academy advances a theory of intelligence-led policing

Intelligence-led policing

Intelligence-led policing is a policing model that has emerged in recent years which is “built around risk assessment and risk management.”...

. The doctrine fuses Israeli counter-terrorist tactics with the Fixing Broken Windows

Fixing Broken Windows

The broken windows theory is a criminological theory of the norm setting and signaling effect of urban disorder and vandalism on additional crime and anti-social behavior...

 theories advanced by criminologist George L. Kelling

George L. Kelling

George L. Kelling is an American criminologist, Professor at Rutgers University, a Research Fellow at Harvard University, and an Adjunct Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He previously taught at Northeastern University....

 and social scientist James Q. Wilson

James Q. Wilson

James Q. Wilson is an American academic political scientist and an authority on public administration. He is a professor and senior fellow at the Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy at Boston College....

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