Racism and police brutality goes hand in hand, and causes a major concern in today's society, in the United States. On March 3, 1991 in California, Rodney King an African American, was pulled over after a high-speed chase, and after stopping was beaten by four white police officers (Worsnop 635). Tracy Brock also an African American was arrested in Manhattan in November of 1986. An officer smashed his head through a plate glass window, when Brock refused to go into the officer’s lunchroom (Police Brutality and Excessive Force in the New York City Police Department 14). Ki Tae Kim a Korean grocer was assaulted when he was accused of passing a counterfeit bill. He was punched in the face, his head was slammed into the counter, and the officer also subjected him to racial slurs (Police Brutality and Excessive Force in the New York City Police Department 17). Marcos Maldonado a Latino grocer was mistaken for a suspect after an armed robbery to his store. He was handcuffed, thrown to the floor, repeatedly kicked, and beaten with the officer’s nightstick (Police Brutality and Excessive Force in the New York City Police Department 17). Abner Louima a Haitian immigrant was arrested outside a dance club in Brooklyn, and was brutally assaulted when he arrived at the police station. Volpe a long time police officer was accused of shoving a plunger into Louima's rectum so far that his bladder and intestines were lacerated. Then he shoved the plunger into Louima's mouth and broke his teeth (Steinback 8). These are just a few examples of the people who were affected of police brutality, and racism.
There are five stages through which force can progress and lead to brutality: Verbal persuasion, unarmed physical force, force using non-lethal ...
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...d, “We were naive to think the Rodney King case would solve the problem of police abuse. It’s a much bigger problem than one case.... You have to take these issues very seriously.”(Goldman A1+). Rita Leitner whose son was a victim of police brutality speaks out, and is very active in preventing police brutality. She stands strong because her son was permanently injured in the hands of those who are supposed to protect. The players that are mentioned here are all against police brutality. It was pretty difficult to find players that thought brutality was not important and was not an issue. The prince analysis done on this issue shows an eighty three percent chance of being implemented. This is a highly likely rate of implementation. Police Brutality in the United States and around the world needs to be totally abolished to protect the citizens, and the police officers.
Early in the 17th century was when the first modern day policing was expected to have begun. Ever since the 18th century begun, incidences of police using excess force by abusing their power have been quite common. As time progressed, these wrongful actions by police have been entitled as police brutality. Police brutality is defined as" the use of excessive force used by police dealing with public... excessive force can be either physical, verbal, and/or psychological". According to this definition, whether it be arresting someone with too much force or even uttering certain statements, can all be classified as police brutality. No individual should be victimized by police officers who use excess force that in no way deters crimes. It does nothing but bring a dire unjust society in which innocent people can feel afraid; and give those officers who are correctly doing their duties a bad reputation. Due to the dispensable, unscrupulous nature of police brutality; several measures including disciplining police officers, stricter laws(and stringent penalties), integration, as well as educating the general public about their rights, must be applied in order to extirpate the misconduct citizens should not have to face.
Many cases of police brutality where the victim is of different ethnicity can be highlighted more significantly. According to the book “Continuing the Struggle for Justice” (p.216), many people believe that the issue of race and police brutality should be treated as one and that on occasion police officers do...
When hearing the phrase “police brutality,” many people imagine batons cracking skulls, tasers electrocuting bodies and bullets penetrating innocent teens. While police officers have been known to use violence, police brutality does not occur as often as many believe. In many situations, officers have to act on impulse and curiosity, despite the backlash the media may create.
The 1990s is arguably the most controversial, clamorous, and dangerous times in the United states for race. The beating of Rodney King and the Los Angeles riots were only some contributions to what would lead to the change in the landscape of race relations in the early 1990s. Rodney King would be hit 56 times by 4 white policemen causing him to suffer through a broken leg, his skull being shattered in 11 places, permanent brain damage, and both of his knees injured (Whitman, David). Within hours of the jury's verdict, the riots began. Los Angeles was in turmoil with what it has witnessed. What was most surprising was that this was the first time
The day of March 3rd, Rodney King sped away from the police officers while intoxicated. The day of March 3rd, Rodney King was roughly taken from his vehicle.The day of March 3rd, Rodney King was brutally bashed and beaten close to sixty times by Los Angeles, California police officers (Boyd 1). The Rodney King Legacy Lives states, “The sickening tape, shot by a neighborhood resident, clearly shows the man on the ground offering no resistance as the cops pummeled him reportedly fifty-six times in the body and face,” (Carter 2). From the tape, the member’s of the jury had the opportunity to see, for themselves, the acts of brutality that took place. Some of the damages caused “skull fractures, nerve damage, a crushed cheekbone, a broken ankle and possible brain damage” (Brady 1).With this information, the members ...
A great deal of society views law enforcement officers as heroic and honorable individuals, whose main purpose is to protect and serve the community. For many officers, this description is accurate, however for others; violence and brutality against innocent citizens is part of getting the job done. For years, minorities have fallen victim to police brutality based on racial profiling, stereotypes and other unjustifiable reasons that has cost innocent lives. The involvement of officers in police brutality against minority groups causes tainted and negative views on policing. This reduces their ability to protect and serve the community. Police brutality is a violent incident involving an officer and a victim, usually including excessive force, unnecessary violence and sometimes resulting in a senseless fatality. Minority groups such as African Americans and Hispanics have often been the victims of this form of abuse by officers, however little justice has been done in order to protect these individuals from this form of cruelty by the hands of those with the most power.
In America, police brutality affects and victimizes people of color mentally and socially. Social injustice has become a major issue, which involved the principle of white supremacy vs minorities. The current police brutality that has been occurring is culturally disconnecting ethnicities from one another. According to Cincinnati Police Chief Jeffrey Blackwell, “…the cultural disconnect is very real; you have the weight of generations of abuse on African Americans,” (Flatow, 2016). For example, over the past four years, there have been countless acts of police brutality. The three key deaths of Eric Garner, Philando Castile, and Alton Sterling have become the face of police brutality in the year 2016. People knew that it was unequal treatment of black people by police in the United States and they made it known by creating #BlackLivesMatter.
An officer may use deadly force in only five circumstances. The five circumstances go like this: self defense, defense of others, to prevent the theft from using nuclear weapons or explosives, special nuclear devices, and to prevent a suspect from escaping, but only if the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect has committed any offenses that are listed above. Sixty nine percent of the victims of police brutality in the United States who are African-American/Black were suspected of a non-violent crime and were unarmed. People who are unarmed pose NO threat. “Police departments across the country too often use excessive force, injuring and occasionally killing people who pose little threat”
It is one of the several forms of police misconduct, which include: false arrest, intimidation, racial profiling, political repression, surveillance abuse, sexual abuse, and police corruption. Although illegal, it can be performed under the color of law. The term "police brutality" was in use in the American press as early as 1872, when the Chicago Tribune reported on the beating of a civilian under arrest at the Harrison Street Police Station. The origin of 'modern ' policing based on the authority of the nation state is commonly traced back to developments in seventeenth and 18th century France, with modern police departments being established in most nations by the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Cases of police brutality appear to have been frequent than, with the routine beating of citizens by patrolmen armed with nightsticks or blackjacks. Large-scale incidents of brutality were associated with labor strikes, such as the Great Railroad Strike of 1877, the Pullman Strike of 1894, the Lawrence textile strike of 1912, the Ludlow massacre of 1914, the Steel strike of 1919, and the Hanapepe massacre of 1924. Portions of the population may recognize the police to be persecutors. Also, there is a view that victims of police brutality often belong to relatively powerless groups, such as minorities, the disabled, the young, and the poor. In March 1991, members of the Los Angeles Police Department harshly beat an African American suspect, Rodney King, while a white civilian videotaped the incident, leading to extensive media coverage and criminal charges against several of the officers involved. In April 1992, hours after the four police officers involved were cleared at trial, the Los Angeles riots of 1992 commenced, causing 53 deaths, 2,383 injuries, more than 7,000 fires, damage to 3,100 businesses, and nearly $1 billion in financial losses. After facing federal trial, two of the
Police brutality remains one of the most serious and divisive human rights violations in the United States. The excessive use of force by police officers persists because of overwhelming barriers to accountability. This fact makes it possible for officers who commit human rights violations to escape due punishment and often to repeat their offenses. Police or public officials greet each new report of brutality with denials or explain that the act was an aberration, while the administrative and criminal systems that should deter these abuses by holding officers accountable instead virtually guarantee them impunity (Williams 45).
This incident would have produced nothing more than another report for resisting arrest had a bystander, George Holliday, not videotaped the altercation. Holliday then released the footage to the media. LAPD Officers Lawrence Powell, Stacey Koon, Timothy Wind and Theodore Brisino were indicted and charged with assaulting King. Superior Court Judge Stanley Weisberg ordered a change of venue to suburban Simi Valley, which is a predominantly white suburb of Los Angeles. All officers were subsequently acquitted by a jury comprised of 10 whites, one Hispanic and one Asian, and the African American community responded in a manner far worse than the Watts Riots of 1965. ?While the King beating was tragic, it was just the trigger that released the rage of a community in economic strife and a police department in serious dec...
On the morning of March 3rd, 1991 an African-American man led police on a high-speed chase through the city of Los Angeles. Approximately eight miles later police swarmed around the car and confronted the driver, who went by the name Rodney King. During the confrontation, officers tortured King until the point he was forced to seek medical care. A case was opened and the police officers were acquitted. This angered many people, specifically Blacks and led to the historical “L.A. Riots’’ , where they felt race had something to do with the case.
Police brutality is one of the most serious human rights violations in the United States and it occurs everywhere. The reason why I chose this topic is because police brutality happens all the time in the United States and still remains unrecognized by many. Additionally, the public should be knowledgeable about this topic because of how serious this crime can be and the serious outcomes that police brutality can have on other police officers and the public. The job of police officers is to maintain public order, prevent, and detect crimes. They are involved in very dangerous and stressful occupations that can involve violent situations that must be stopped and controlled by any means. In many confrontations with people, police may find it necessary to use excessive force to take control of a certain situation. Sometimes this makes an officer fight with a suspect who resists being arrested. Not all cops in communities are great cops. At least once a year, the news covers a story about a person being beat by an officer. The article “Minority Threat and Police Brutality: Determinants of Civil Rights Criminal Complaints in U.S. Municipalities” by Malcolm D. Holmes from the University of Wyoming, uses the conflict theory to explain why officers go after minorities sometimes causing police brutality. It explains the police’s tension with African American and Latino males. Those minorities are the ones that retaliate more against police officers which causes the officer to use violent force to defend themselves.
Chaney and Robertson, (2013) stated that “The Department of Justice office of Civil Rights has investigated more than a dozen police departments in major cities across the country on allegations of racial discrimination or police brutality”. Police brutality is defined as the use of excessive physical force or verbal assault and psychological intimidation. White police officers who grew up in the south and were raised to see African Americans in a negative way have a lower opinion of them. However, not all white police officers are from the south, some say that police officers are just abusing their power. When we look at what is going on around the country, it appears racism plays a part in police brutality. Even during this new digital age, there are video cameras in police cars facing the front of the vehicle, but that still does not hinder police using excessive
Police brutality is an act that often goes unnoticed by the vast majority of white Americans. This is the intentional use of “excessive force by an authority figure, which oftentimes ends with bruises, broken bones, bloodshed, and sometimes even death” (Harmon). While law-abiding citizens worry about protecting themselves from criminals, it has now been revealed that they must also keep an eye on those who are supposed to protect and serve.