Sunil Dutta is a police sergeant with the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).  Prior to joining the LAPD, Sunil was a scientist with specialization in biochemistry (host-pathogen interactions, plant hormones, carbohydrate metabolism, and regulation of dormancy).  He is a published author and amateur musician.  Besides English, he speaks Urdu, Hindi, and Punjabi.  An unusual police officer, Sunil has published several articles criticizing capital punishment, fallibility of eyewitnesses, and asked for radical reforms of the criminal justice system.

Sunil was born and raised in a refugee family in India and came to the United States when twenty-two years old.  Sunil received his B.S. in India, Master’s degree at the University of Florida, and Ph.D. at the University of California at Davis.  Sunil’s Masters and Doctorate were in biology and he worked as a biologist at the University of California, Davis.  In March 2012, Sunil earned his Master’s degree in Homeland Security from the Naval Postgraduate School, Center for Homeland Defense and Security (NPS/CHDS) and was awarded the prestigious Curtis H. “Butch” Straub Award, for exemplary academic achievement and leadership by the NPS/CHDS.

Sunil has taught at-risk students in the inner city of Los Angeles at the high school level.  At the graduate level, he has taught biology, ecology, criminal justice, and human trafficking.  

Sunil was awarded the Police Medal for bravery by the LAPD, for saving the life of a distraught man at great risk to his own life.

Sunil studied an ancient Indian classical music, dhrupad, in the traditional way with a master artist in India.  He is also a founder and president of a non-profit corporation through which he has organized classical music concerts in the United States by great Indian musicians.  He has also produced some rare recordings of dhrupad music.

Sunil has been published in The Nation, Newsweek, Christian Science Monitor, Hope, Tikkun, World and I, American Poetry Review, Sufi, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Pakistan Daily Times, Hindustan Times, Sacramento Bee, Daily News, Ventura County Star, India Currents, India West, and elsewhere.  He has published a book of poetry with Robert Bly (Harper-Collins/Ecco Press), The Lightning Should Have Fallen on Ghalib (ISBN 0-88001-686-8.) and is working on a book on how the colonial history of South Asia impacted the extant terrorism in the region.