no human involved

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Adjective

no human involved (not comparable)

1. (law enforcement slang) Describing crimes committed against people deemed undesirable or subhuman, those with criminal records, sex workers, drug addicts, transients, or people of color.

   Synonym: NHI (acronym)

   • 2003, John Lescroart, chapter 37, in The Oath:

     He was not working with what the police facetiously call a no-humans-involved case, where everyone involved whether as witness or suspect already has a substantial criminal record.

   • 2008, Linda Fairstein, Killer Heat, page 191:

     Cops closed them all with a code: NHI. The unsolved crimes had been back-burnered until a reporter revealed that the letters stamped on the police files were shorthand for No Human Involved.

   • 2010, Martha C. Lawrence, Pisces Rising, page 33:

     I remembered Ed's offensive remark—“No human involved in that first murder anyway”—and tried to keep the disdain off my face.

   • 2015, Jill Leovy, Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America, One World/Ballantine, →ISBN, page 6:

     “NHI-No Human Involved,” the cops used to say. It was only the newest shorthand for the idea that murders of blacks somehow didn't count. “Nigger life's cheap now,” a white Tennessean offered during Reconstruction, […]

   • 2020, Sara Smith, Political Geography: A Critical Introduction, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 63:

     Wynter's earlier example is a demonstration of the discourse of “no human involved” and shows that young Black men in zones of police surveillance are denied humanity in order to excuse the inexcusable violence enacted upon them.