Police Force

A detailed Summary of Police Force

Twenty-seven uniformed officers witnessed this incident from various law enforcement agencies. None of the officers (those individuals who are supposed to protect citizens) made any effort to stop this abuse.(LA Times March 19, 1991 p. A20). The level of escalation even went so far as to call in a police helicopter! (Ironically, the lights from the helicopter actually improved the lighting for the videotape.) The King beating brought complaints from the Mayor of Los Angeles Tom Bradley and national attention from civil rights leaders. Many believed the beating was racially motivated and extended from a pattern of abusive behavior by police towards blacks. (McDonald 1991) This act of violent behavior from police officers has brought many questions to the national table, such as: * Is police brutality on the rise? * Is the police hiding behind their badges? * How does the public view police brutality? * How can we raise public awareness? Is police brutality on the rise? This is an important question to ask ourselves and the police departments. A study in seventeen counties in Northern California indicated that in the past two years excessive force and neglect has resulted in at least seven deaths and fatal injury. (Saari, no date) I

n fact a nine-month period from August 26, 1996 to June 29, 1997 seven citizens died as a result of police brutality. Sonoma County California currently has the highest rate of custody deaths in the bay area (Saari). In many cases the situation (according to police accounts) has rapidly escalated to a point where police feel the need to use deadly force. Many of those committing crimes are mentally ill. The Sonoma County Alliance for the Mentally Ill advises that police officers in confrontations with people experiencing psychiatric episodes: * Speak calmly and quietly * Slow down the pace * Be willing to repeat yourself * Do not try to hurry a resolution This increase in violence is part of a toughened criminal justice system, which includes the war on drugs, the building of new prisons, and the garnering of federal habeas corpus rights. (Kerstetter, 1985 p.160) This rise in police brutality may come from a quick criminalization of people because the public wants safer streets and quick action by the police. (Rockwell, 1997) Pressure has been put on police to deal with the criminals, juveniles and other public problems, so it "reasons" that an overburdened police officer finds people or a group of people committing some kind of crime that they just beat the hell out of them to save time instead of arresting the assailants and filling out the proper paper work. (U.S. Department of Justice. (1994) An incident in the New York subway illustrates what (due to the public's level of fear) police officers are doing to suspicious albeit innocent citizens. July 1998 around 11 o'clock at night 18 year old Lani Soto was riding the New York subway train (Herbert, 1999). She had just left work and was on her way to Williamsburg, where she lives, when one of two officers came up to where she was sitting. The officer started asking her questions when one of them told her to stand up, she said no and the officer grabbed her by the hair and pushed her face into the train door. Then the police officer claimed to be frisking her. Instead of doing a routine frisk the officer put his hand in between her legs and then on

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Approximate Word count = 1425
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics