Statistics Regarding The Use Of Tasers In The Chicago Police Department

In the summer of 2014, 18-year-old Michael Brown was fatally shot by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. After the shooting, there had been conflicting reports by police and eyewitnesses about what exactly happened. Officer Wilson insist Brown was confrontational throughout the encounter, while eyewitnesses say Brown has his hands up trying to surrender before he was shot and killed. Following the Grand jury’s decision not to indict officer Wilson over the shooting of Michael Brown and similar cases of officer-involved shootings and brutality such as the death of Eric Garden in Staten Island, New York, politicians, family advocates, civil rights activists, and law enforcement officials have called for police across the country to adopt the use of body-worm cameras. Although there are many who feel police body cameras present a challenge to privacy and safety issues for both cops and civilians, by recording police-citizen encounters, it increases transparency and accountability of officers and the video recorded by body cams protect any false accusations, police misconduct, officials can get clear evidence of what happened instead of relying on hearsay.

Police shootings are unfortunate events but whenever there is a shooting, the topic of race emerges. Police shootings have always been the highlights on news channels and there is always the racially biased narrative that keeps repeating itself yet no one seems to dispute this narrative. However, did you know that studies show a police officer is eighteen and a half times more likely to be killed by a African American male than an unarmed African American male is to be killed by a police officer? In fact, a recent “deadly force” study by Washington State University researcher Lois James found that police officers were actually less likely to shoot an unarmed black suspect than unarmed Caucasian or Hispanic suspect in simulated threat scenarios. Some would argue that there are still police shootings all over America and they occur when police officers

Many say that black people hold 26% of the shootings but are only 10% of the total population. This is invalid as many will know that in the inner cities and poor neighborhoods like the streets of chicago many are involved in violent crimes, resulting in a heart-breaking death. Many will put in that statistic and rely on it with no further information. The millions that see this are influenced, and many people mostly youth begin to believe the false stereotype amongst white cops in particular. “ The second piece of evidence is another statistic showing rates of Police on Black Violence to Black on Police. “The article by the wall street journal says “Officers are killed by blacks at a rate 2.5 times higher than the rate at which blacks are killed by police” As many say cops kill black males unproportionally the FBI says otherwise. The third piece of evidence is also from the Wall Street Journal.“Officers’ use of lethal force following an arrest for a violent felony is more than twice the rate for white as for black arrestees, according to one study” If their was an existing bias it would be in favor of blacks over whites. In many cases in poor neighborhoods where a vast majority of the inhabitants are blacks or hispanic, the crime is higher, and there still continues to be less violence against

CHICAGO- Since our social media has been shedding more and more light on police brutality, the kind people of the Windy City shared their feelings and experiences about their unkind law enforcement. Those feelings and experiences shared were negative, and expressed with fear and dissatisfaction. These same feelings that have persisted throughout the years and especially today. These Chicagoans also express their agreement with Chicago’s Mayor, Rahm Amanuel, and his idea of recruiting more minorities for law enforcement.

It is unfair to be biased and quick to misjudge minorities in America based on the actions of others who fall under the same ethnic or religious background. However these misjudgments occur countless times every day resulting in either physical or verbal abuse against these minorities, as well as encouraging stereotypical views. As odd as it may seem, many members of the police force target these minorities simply because they are not of the same race, gender, or religion. To be more specific African Americans, Muslims, and women are being abused both physically and mentally by intolerant individuals and the police force. Although in some cases an arrest is necessary, the excessive use of force against a person is not and is considered inhumane. Justice is still being sought for the people who have been mistreated and their stories will not be forgotten.

Michael Brown was an unarmed black man while Darren Wilson is a white police officer. Cases where police officers shoot citizens has happened before, yet this case has drawn attention from the world because the officer is white, and the victim is a black man. Brown’s supporters believe that Wilson shot Brown because he is black, but police have different stories about the shooting accident. People in Ferguson protests and demand the truth when there is not enough evidence to confirm which side is true. In the case of Michael Brown’s shooting accident, there was no racial discrimination in the case because Wilson was doing his job as a police officer and has not violated any of the laws.

Since these events, however, law enforcement body cameras have been the talk of the nation. With regards to the case concerning the death of Michael Brown, many individuals across the country sternly believe that if there had been actual footage of the shooting that day, Officer Wilson would have been indicted for his actions. With that said, since this specific incident, 30 out of 54 Ferguson police officers have actually began wearing body cameras (Ponsi). Some proponents argue that body cameras will not help to indict officers or even hold them accountable for their actions. These individuals, of course, refer to the death of Eric Garner as an example of this.

On Saturday August 9, 2014 in the town of Ferguson, Missouri, an 18 year old man named Michael Brown was shot ten times and killed by a police officer. The police officer’s name is Darren Wilson. He was 28 years old at the time this tragic even took place. Many Americans, both black and white believe that officer Wilson is guilty of first degree murder when he shot Michael Brown, and other Americans believe he acted in self-defense. Because of the fact that the officer is white and Michael Brown was black, the case has stirred up plenty of controversy and differences in opinions nationwide.

Over the last few year there have been many cases involving the death of a young African Americans being killed in ways that fellow black people would describe as vicious unreasonable manslaughter. The case involving Michael Brown occurred on August 9, 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri. Brown was eighteen years old, and was shot to death by Darren Wilson, a white Ferguson police officer. (Bucanan par. 1) After the trial, Wilson was set free as the jury saw him as innocent for his actions. Due to this, and other cases where white police officers were let go after fatally shooting a black man, riots began to arise in different cities. (Bucanan par. 5) The most note-able of these riots would be the Ferguson riots where stores were looted and destroyed and police militarization was required to help settle the protests. (BBC News) The whole reason of the occurrence of these riots is because the black community feels the injustice of law enforcement and that the police force abuse the power bestowed upon them behind the badge on their chest. More specifically there is the issue of racism among the men and some women in the police force. And this is what people of other ethnic background leads to believe is the reason behind the unnecessary manslaughter and police brutality on black people. Like all debates there are always two sides to perspective. For the black community, the main point of view is that policemen are being overly and unnecessarily brutal with their arrests. And men

On September 20th, 2016 in Charlotte, North Carolina, Keith Lamont Scott was fatally shot by police. Not an hour after he was shot, the story of the shooting spread like wildfire across the media and even though no investigation had occurred, the public came to a consensus that Keith Scott was killed due to him being African American. This consensus came from a livestreamed video by Scott’s wife in which she claims he was unarmed, followed police orders, and was simply reading a book. This belief led to three days of rioting which caused injury to over twenty police officers, nine civilians, and according to a Charlotte observer article written by Steve Harrison, the riots caused 4.6 million dollars in damages to the city. All this was done as a form of protest against “racism”. The truth came out after the investigation and trial that

Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, and Eric Garner are a few of the victims of police brutality. All of them died in the hands of policemen because they posed a “threat” and due to the color of their skin, they were seen as dangerous. Even when they pleaded for their lives, the police did not care and continued to murder them. Rice, a 12-year-old boy, was shot because two police officers received a dispatch, “of a black male sitting on a swing and pointing a gun at people,” but instead of handling the situation correctly, as soon as they arrived they shot him. By the time they realized the gun was a toy gun, it was too late. Rice had no time to react, let alone offer an explanation. Tamir Rice died at the hospital the following day. Furthermore, as of May 2017, “at least 492 people have lost their lives at the hands of American police… At least three different unarmed 15-year-old black boys have been shot and killed by law enforcement in this past month alone” (Daily News). The fact that 492 people have lost their lives due to police brutality is outrageous especially when among them are young people of color. A study published by the American Journal of Public Health revealed that “black men are nearly three times as likely to be killed by legal intervention than white men” (CNN). Instead of feeling a sense of protection from officers, many people of color become terrified when encountered with an officer. To make matters worse, most of the guilty officers never receive a conviction. In fact “the odds of an officer being convicted for murder in a police shooting is approaching lottery ticket levels” (Daily News). It is unbelievable to know that an officer has the same chance of getting convicted as he does winning the lottery. The lack of convictions allows for other officers to do the same because they

In recent years the on-going clash between the Chicago Police Department and the city’s black youth have epitomized in the shooting of Laquan McDonald by a Chicago police officer seventeen times. Since, the city has witnessed large and violent protests and further endured racial out lashes and anti-police sentiment. As a baseline for understanding, this violence too is subject to only a few Chicago neighborhoods mostly on the city’s south and west sides where poverty is high and opportunity is slim. Some startling statistics involving race and the Chicago police verified by Chicago’s police accountability task force has concluded that in Chicago, African-Americans are shot nine times more than whites. In addition, blacks are stopped eight times more frequently than any other race (Johnson, 2016). Further, according to the study almost 300 African-Americans were shot by Chicago cops between 2008 and 2015, compared with 55 Hispanics and 13 whites. Since the McDonald shooting and the police scrutiny that has followed, violence in Chicago have risen astronautically in the year 2016 to date with 1,587 shot and 270 dead in only six

Police violence is a reoccurring issue in today’s world especially in America. It seems as though we live in a society where Police officers target minorities practically young African American men. On October 20, 2014, Laquan McDonald was roaming around a neighborhood in Chicago who happened to be “holding a knife” (Good). Jason Van Dyke as well as a few other officers responded to the calls and spotted McDonald wandering in the middle of the street. After a few seconds of the police officers ordering McDonald to release the knife and surrender himself to them, Van Dyke stepped out of his vehicle and released 16 shots into McDonald within thirteen seconds.

Officers are trained to use certain measures to prevent an incident from escalating to brutal or deadly force and due to the environment of most minority communities, officers frequently have to resort to use-of-force. In a study by the Center for Policing Equity, which took three years to conduct, reviewed 19,000 cases of use-of-force by officers representing 11 cities between 2010 and 2015. They found that officers only employ use-of-force in 2 percent of all the police-citizen interactions, however African Americans were subjected to use-of-force 3 times the number of Caucasians, showing a disproportionality high difference (Williams, 2016). When interviewing police officer James, I asked, “When you have to pull your gun on a subject, what race is the individual, most

The shooting of the young teenager Michael Brown earlier this week was an event that should cause everyone to feel sadness and remorse for both him as well as his family and friends. Although the reports of the killing give varied stories of what actually happened, this entire situation has led many people to call both race and stereotyping into question. Police reports say that Brown was violent and shouted before running at the police officer in question, who then fired at least six shots at Brown. Other accounts as well as the official autopsy found that some of the shots had occurred while Brown had his back turned towards the officer.