Steering Members
Lt. Edwin Raymond (Ret.)
Edwin Raymond is a co-founder of the Justice Minded Alliance and a child of Haitian immigrants, born, raised, and currently still residing in the East Flatbush section of Brooklyn. He joined the New York City Police Department in 2008 to work from the inside to remedy some of the injustices he faced as a young man. Raymond is a retired NYPD Lieutenant and is dedicated to addressing issues of over-policing, improving schools, increasing affordable housing, supporting small businesses, and making quality healthcare accessible.
Dedicating his early life to activism, in 2014, he, along with his childhood friend, co-founded PLOT (Preparing Leaders of Tomorrow) which serves vulnerable youth by offering them mentors, resources, and support. A year later, he became an advocate for “Raise the Age,” an initiative that reformed the practice of automatically charging teenagers as adults no matter how minor the offense they committed.
Raymond has always sought out ways to advocate and strengthen the communities that he has been a part of. He is also the subject of the Hulu documentary that chronicled Raymond risking his life along with 11 NYPD officers, who blew the whistle on arrest quotas and racism within the NYPD.
Master Police Officer Dimitrios Mastoras (Ret.)
Dimitrios Mastoras is a co-founder and steering memeber of the Justice Minded Alliance. Dimitrios served as a Master Police Officer in Arlington County, Virginia, for almost twenty-four years, and was Arlington’s first nightlife liaison. Dimitrios' nightlife management model was recognized as a national model to reduce alcohol-related violence and harm by the U.S. Department of Justice COPS Office in a toolkit he authored, The Arlington Restaurant Initiative - A Nightlife Strategy to Improve Safety and Economic Viability.
Dimitrios is also a senior Proactive Alliance relationship-based policing instructor teaching police and collateral city agencies how to establish trustful relationships with community stakeholders to shift to collaborative problem-solving. The Proactive Alliance relationship-based approach has been used to address many complex community issues across the U.S., including alcohol-related violence, homelessness, and traffic safety and community engagement. He is also a nightlife safety and community engagement expert who regularly speaks at national conferences.
Dimitrios has authored or contributed to numerous articles and case studies for the National Policing Institute, Policing Insight, IACP Police Chief Magazine, NSA Sheriff & Deputy Magazine, and Observatory of Public Sector Innovation.
Advisory Group Members
Officer Michael Balioni
Mike Balioni started his law enforcement career with the New York Police Department as a foot patrol officer in 2007. Over the course of his career, Officer Balioni has received five medals for “Outstanding Police Work,” and received recognition as the “Cop of the Month” several times. For the past 14 years, Officer Balioni has proudly served his community on Coney Island in several capacities: as a Field Training Officer, Officer Balioni trained new officers. Working undercover as a plain clothes officer, he has assisted the Crime Prevention Unit.
As a liaison, Officer Balioni has also been involved in community outreach to assist residents through mental health and substance use disorder crises. Officer Balioni has completed courses in criminal investigation, homicide investigation, dignitary protection, and interrogation.
Investigator Joseph Ested (Ret.)
Joe Ested is a police enforcement analyst, former law enforcement officer and author of "Police Brutality Matters" which brings in-depth awareness to policing and the criminal justice system. Joe has many years of preeminent expertise in law enforcement with positions held as a Corrections Officer, Sheriff’s Deputy, Police Officer, and Police Investigator. He worked specialized units as an undercover officer.
He was also elected Vice President of the Police Union. Later in his career, Joe was chosen to serve in Afghanistan as a Police Advisor and Police Tactical Instructor for the Afghanistan Police Training Program to train forces aboard on police practices and police procedures.
Joe’s work has appeared in publications including the New York Times, New York Post, Fox News, Dallas Examiner, L’Express Magazine, and Brut Media. He has appeared on Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, OANN, Brut Media, Cheddar TV, Bold TV, Court TV, and The Face of America. You can listen to his podcast interviews on Fox Now Radio, Race Talk Radio, Black Agenda Report, Story Corps, and Newell Normand Radio. Joe brings a unique perspective to the discussion of social and racial injustice.
Lieutenant Jermaine Harris
Jermaine Harris is a 19-year veteran of the Chicago Police Department. He currently serves as a Community Policing Lieutenant, where he develops community-based strategies involving law enforcement and nonprofit partners. Jermaine is a Chicago native who was born on the city’s West Side where he still resides. He is a United States Marine Corps veteran.
Jermaine holds pride in his ability to explore nontraditional policing roles in predominately Black and Brown communities. At the heart of his philosophy to positively impact the lives of Chicagoans is a goal to employ social justice as a violence prevention strategy. Addressing issues of access and equity has yielded positive results in both reducing violence and improving the quality of life for residents in some of the city’s most under-resourced neighborhoods. While leading the community policing strategy in Chicago’s 15th District, Jermaine’s initiatives attributed to a 26% decrease in gun violence from 2017 to 2019. Upon assuming leadership in community policing strategies for Chicago’s Area Four which includes the 10th, 11th, and 15th police districts, Jermaine again created impact by helping Area Four reverse the nationwide violence surge and reduce homicides from 2020 to 2021.
Jermaine served on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s transition team for Public Safety and Accountability. He is a Policing Fellow with the National Police Foundation, a University of Chicago Civic Leadership Academy alum, a Leadership Greater Chicago Signature Fellow, and a member of the Executive’s Club of Chicago. Jermaine has also co-founded two premier community organizations: Chicago Westside Police & Youth Sports Conference, a sports-based youth development program that serves 1,000 youth annually, and Community Leadership Fellows, a grassroots leadership development program for emerging leaders.
Jermaine holds a Bachelors degree in Criminal Justice from Kaplan University and a Masters degree in Public Safety Administration from Calumet College of St Joseph.
Molly C. Mastoras, MA, LPC
Molly C. Mastoras is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) in Virginia and Connecticut. She has worked as an assistant program director and probation counselor for the Fairfax County Juvenile & Domestic Relations District Court and as a social worker for the Fairfax County Office for Women and Arlington County Child Protective Services (CPS). Molly has worked extensively with survivors of sexual assault throughout her career.
Molly developed the Proactive Alliance relationship-based approach, which teaches police and enforcement agencies to develop relationships to enhance problem-solving with the community using adapted counseling therapy concepts. She co-authored several articles, including Proactive Alliance in IACP Police Chief Magazine and Productive and Proactive in Sheriff & Deputy Magazine and Proactive Alliance: Combining Policing and Counselling Psychology in the Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being with Dr. Charlotte Gill.
Molly has presented the Proactive Alliance concept at the American Society of Evidenced-Based Policing (ASEBP) conference, the Problem-Oriented Policing (POP) Conference, and the International Conference on Law Enforcement & Public Health (LEPH).
Dr. Nicola (Nikki) Smith-Kea
Nicola “Dr. Nikki” Smith-Kea, PhD defines herself as a boundary spanner and scholar-practitioner with deep experience in policing, community engagement, policy, research, and analysis at the international, national, and local levels. She is the founder and principal of Smith-Kea Consulting, focused on exploring strategies that improve outcomes, drive transformative solutions and policy change, and cultivate trust between communities and police. She has expertise in gender equity in policing; policing at the intersection of mental health, substance use, and homelessness; community policing; violent crime reduction; and policing reform.
Dr. Nikki most recently, served as a Stoneleigh Fellow and Executive in Residence with the Philadelphia Police Department (PPD) where she worked towards promoting and developing internal accountability, officer safety and wellness practices, and focused on healthy police-community engagement. In this position she was embedded on the PPD Executive Team and worked on developing/implementing a number of reform efforts including an Early Intervention System (EIS), Active Bystandership for Law Enforcement (ABLE), Place Network Investigation (PNI), 30x30 Initiative, a Racial Equity Plan, and more.
She also served as the Criminal Justice Manager on the Policing team at Arnold Ventures, overseeing a diverse portfolio and managing a variety of stakeholders including law enforcement practitioners, policymakers, research institutes, national membership organizations, and advocates. Previously, she served as a project manager and senior policy analyst and technical assistance manager at the Council of State Governments Justice Center, where she worked closely with a broad spectrum of law enforcement agencies across the U.S, helping to promote healthy police/mental health collaborations.
Dr. Nikki holds a bachelor's degree in psychology and sociology, and a master’s degree in sociology from the University of the West Indies, a master’s degree in criminology and criminal justice from the University of Maryland, and a master’s and PhD in leadership and change from Antioch University.
Dr. Zoe Spencer-Harris
Dr. Spencer-Harris, a sociology professor at Virginia State University (VSU), is also a social activist who educates the community on civil rights and advocates for forward progress. Under Dr. Spencer-Harris’ innovative direction, VSU established the Center of Policing Leadership and Social Justice (The Center), the first of its kind among Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Her collaborative work at The Center facilitates dialogue between diverse communities and law enforcement to promote understanding and transparency.
Throughout 2022, Dr. Spencer-Harris led numerous student, community, and law enforcement roundtables on civil rights, hate crimes, and color of law issues. Dr. Spencer-Harris’ vision has helped develop strategies for addressing crime in a way that prioritizes civil rights.
Captain Derby St. Fort
Captain Derby St. Fort is a native New Yorker with over 18 years in law enforcement. He began his career as a police officer in 2005, and has since risen to the executive level. Captain St.Fort is a proponent of alternative crime reduction strategies rooted in public health, and has demonstrated success by creating innovative approaches that address youth related issues through collaboration with community-based organizations, service providers, city agencies, and institutions. Captain St. Fort continues to seek and develop strategies that are responsive to communities and address the core issues experienced by young people who are most impacted by violence.