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.
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LAPD chief William Bratton founded the Academy in 2008, in partnership with the Center for Policing Terrorism. The academy began operation with a bricks-and-mortar location; a virtual, or online, academy; a digital library; and mobile academic teams.[1]
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.[2]
The Academy advances a theory of intelligence-led policing. The doctrine fuses Israeli counter-terrorist tactics with the Fixing Broken Windows theories advanced by criminologist George L. Kelling and social scientist James Q. Wilson.[3]