Police Brutality

-By definition the term police brutality is “applied in the context of causing physical harm, it may also involve psychological harm through the use of intimidation tactics beyond the scope of officially sanctioned police procedure.” In today’s society we have police known as riot police, who are known throughout the world to use extreme force. Statistics show almost every time the riot police are involved in crowd control, there is at least one fatality and multiple injured. This is why I believe this is one of the most important issues in the World today. Police are there to protect us but from April 2009 to June 2010 in the United States there were 5986 reports of misconduct from police officers. Police brutality has today’s citizens doubting the police department, and how they go about their arrest. Police brutality is an everyday occurrence, especially in cities where there are large communities of Blacks, Latinos and Asians.

Police brutality is defined as “excessive and/or unnecessary force by police when dealing with civilians,” and this has become more prominent within the United States throughout the years (Danilina). There has many cases where police brutality has been seen via news channels, and it has dismantled the unity of trust between the civilians of the United States and the law enforcement who are supposed to protect the everyday people from harm. The issue is if the law enforcement is actually right within their means of protection, or have they gone too far with using excessive force in any situation that may or may not be harmful to them. There is, also, the question of whether racial profiling is the biggest contributor to police brutality.

There is no question that police brutality, when it occurs, is one of the most egregious violations of public trust that a public servant can commit. Police officers, those individuals taxed with protecting the public from danger, should never be in a situation where they pose a threat to the public. Furthermore, there is no question that police brutality occurs. Moreover, generally when there are allegations of police brutality, there has been some type of underlying violent incident. In addition, while issues of brutality may seem clear-cut to a disinterested observer, it is critical to keep in mind that law enforcement officers are not presented with textbook examples of the appropriate or inappropriate use of force, but real-life scenarios involving quick decisions. There are many arrest and non-arrest scenarios where officers need to use force to protect self or others; and the degree of force required may be greater than what a disinterested observer would assume. Another recurrent issue in debates about police brutality is that racial bias appears to be a motive behind police brutality. When one considers that minorities are disproportionately likely to be arrested and convicted of crimes, one would expect to find a disproportionate number of minorities among those alleging police brutality. Therefore, while acknowledging that police brutality, when it occurs, is a serious problem, the reality is that most

Although I should know by now, I cannot help but think that there has been an overwhelming amount of police brutality in recent years. Police brutality can be defined as, when a police officer uses more force than necessary. This issue has spread throughout the United States of America, and is putting the lives of our citizens in great danger. Police brutality is not only physical, but it can also be verbal attacks; and, in most cases, it is caused by false arrest and racial profiling due to police corruption. Police brutality has been and continues to be a major concern in society and it is used very loosely to any and all forms of police misconduct. Whereas, in reality, excessive force of police misconduct is what defines police brutality. The jobs of a police officer are too calmly resolve public disturbance and disputes. Police officers are supposed to protect citizens; instead they are hurting and using excessive force. It is not right and it is unjust for a police officer to hurt a citizen due to an assumption without any actual proof of criminal activity.

Police brutality is a controversial issue that has recently been in the news, but seems to have always been an issue in America. Police brutality refers to the intentional use of verbal or physical attacks directed towards individuals by the police force that result in false arrests, sexual abuse, or death. (Dudley, William 13.) Most of these actions are linked to racial profiling: the targeting of individuals for suspicion of crime based solely on the individual’s race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin. (Dudley, William 13.) Statistics about how often racial profiling and police brutality occurs, movements such as Black Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter, and police reform efforts are just a few points as to why this topic is so controversial today.

Many statistics show the way police brutality has changed over the years. Police claim that brutality has risen 35% since September 11th 2001. Statistics show the in 1982, out of twelve thousand randomly selected citizens 13% had been victims of police brutality. Approximately 422 people that were sixteen years old or older claimed to have had contact with police in which force or threat was used on either side in 1999. In the years 2002 and 2003, 90% of the citizens shot by police were either African American or of Hispanic background(“Law”). The number of police officers killed by brutality from citizens jumped up 13% from 2010 to 2011(Bond).

"Police brutality is an officer that uses excessive/ unnecessary force when dealing with civilians" (what is police brutality). Police killed 964 people in 2015. Black people were 25% (242) of those that died in the hands of police officers. (Chaney) Black people are two times more likely to be killed than white. Also, in 2015, 70% of those that were killed was unarmed(Chaney). The U.S. Department of Justice shows that 61% of officers do not always report such violence. (The United States Department of Justice)

Police brutality has occurred all across the world and is still a major amongst society and police organization. This brutality arranges from assaults, death as a result, of use of force, harassment, Etc. It takes two forms which is physical brutality which includes assaults, and non-physical brutality which includes use of verbal language. Police officers have been granted the privilege of using “non-negotiable force” (Bittner 1970) to control citizens’ behavior and ensure public order. Police use of excessive force is also called police brutality. This term refer to any unnecessary use of force by police. There are many different definitions to what police brutality is considered to be. “Police brutality is the use of excessive and/or unnecessary force by police when dealing with civilians” (Danilina, 2014). Police brutality occurs when officers use more force than is necessary when making arrests or controlling people. Police brutality is categorized as an excessive use of force. Danilina from Law Dictionary states that, “Excessive use of force means a force well beyond what would be necessary in order to handle a situation. These claims of police brutality are made when someone is injured or killed during the course of a search or an arrest. Throughout history there has been many incidents where police officers have used unnecessary force to handle a situation. One of history’s most nationally known incidents of police brutality took place March 3, 1991, in Chicago, when

Police brutality is abuse of power in the form of excessive force committed by the police. Examples of this range from physical assault to psychological intimidation. Contrary to popular belief, many forms of police brutality include emotional and psychological aspects on top of physical. It can also take the form of false arrests, verbal abuse, and racial profiling. In countless accumulating cases across the country, police brutality has proved lethal (Danalina 1).

A police force is an organized body of people empowered by the state to enforce the law, protect property, and limit civil disorder. In today’s society, it is often questioned if policeman’s purpose in society is fulfilled. Since 2015, police have killed 964 people in the U.S. Despite being only 13% of the population, black people were 25% (242) of those killed. (MappingPoliceViolence.org) These killings are often identified as police brutality. Police brutality is the use of any force exceeding reasonably necessary to accomplish a lawful police purpose. Police brutality is a rising but yet unsolved issue that remains relevant in today’s society. Differences between African Americans and police officers often affect interaction amongst each other. When police officers aren’t representative of the people they are supposed to protect, they often use cultural differences, racial tensions, and bias to target or view these communities as dangerous.

Police brutality is a problem in our society mainly because there are police officers that are getting away with not only physically hurting innocent people, but murder as well. In the past year, there have been between 865-939 cases of people being shot and/or killed by cops (Calacal 1). Racial profiling is one of the main factors in this problem. African Americans and Latinos are the people we see being abused by police on the daily. So far this year, 215 African-Americans and 94 Latinos have been killed by police. Data shows that a black person is 3 times more likely to be killed by a police than a white person. Several officers

Police brutality is a phenomenon that is occurring more and more frequently. Because of the current police crisis happening in our country today, officers are becoming more violent and untrustworthy. We the people have to have some sort of enforcement for society to work and without it, chaos could ensue.

The two common opposing views towards police officers is a supper cop who saves the day and a violent officer who harms civilians. As a society we tend to zoom in on every blemish and mistake law enforcement makes and the media often encourages these views. In news outlets when police positively contribute to the community it usually only makes headlines for a day or two, but when a crisis occurs it receives high media coverage for weeks at a time. Recently there have been controversial cases surrounding police brutality which have fed the belief that police using excessive and deadly force is a the most common reflex. In reality it’s not as common as portrayed. In 2010 the New York Police Department received over 206,000 calls involving weapons and of those calls only 33 ended in officers firing their weapons (Anthony, 294). Home videos and pictures showing confrontation between law enforcement and offenders are causing wide spread misconception about police brutality.

Cato Institute’s National Police Misconduct Reporting Project conducted a research and reported their statistics on police misconduct which confirm that only around 1% of all officers commit misconduct in a given year (Police Misconduct, 2016). The statistics from this research contains all kinds of misconduct that may have have occurred in any way or form that falls under the given definition. In recognizing this it can be concluded that police brutality itself would fall even lower on that scale, below the 1% mark (Police Misconduct, 2016).

What is police brutality? It is the use of excessive or unnecessary force by law enforcement when dealing with civilians (The Law Dictionary). The term “excessive use of force” is described as a force well beyond what would be necessary in order to handle a situation. Police brutality can be seen in a number of ways. Physical is the most obvious form of the police brutality. Police officers can use equipment such as nerve gas, batons, pepper spray, and guns in order to physically intimidate or even hurt civilians. Bernstein (2016) described that another form of police brutality is false arrests, sexual abuse, psychological intimidation, police corruption, verbal abuse, racial profiling, and the improper use of Tasers.