According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, “to police” means “to control and keep order in an area by the use of police or military forces.“ In modern-day America, as evidenced by Merriam-Webster’s definition, police departments and the act of policing is often associated with violence and brutality. Additionally, issues of poor community-police relations and stop-and-frisk racial profiling have come front and center in recent times.
Police brutality and the injustices associated with it have been a newsworthy topic over the past few months with the Daniel Pantaleo (Eric Garner) and Darren Wilson (Michael Brown) verdicts both going in favor of the Caucasian officers despite civilian deaths seen in both cases. I have opted to steer clear of these instances as I’m sure that media worldwide has kept us well-informed of the gory details recorded on both dreadful days. Instead, I would like to turn my attention to the Peter Liang case. Peter Liang, a 27-year old Asian probation officer, was on the job going through the stairwell of a Brooklyn housing complex when he shot and killed Akai Gurley, an unarmed 28-year old black male. While he pleads that it was an accident, he has nonetheless taken the life of a man who posed no threat to the officer or the community. Rightfully so, he has been indicted on charges of second-degree manslaughter. Mistakes are going to occur over the course of time and lives will sometimes be lost. While the inevitability of this is certain, the way the justice system deals with similar cases to those stated above should be consistent. When the public eye senses inconsistency and possible injustice, it loses trust in authority and as a result, community-police relations can suffer.
For instance, after it was discovered that Daniel Pantaleo would not be indicted on charges in the death of Eric Garner, there was a “Millions March NYC” that took place in response to the decision. For more than ten days, protesters marched four miles a day before rallying outside the NYPD headquarters. A banner revealing the saying, “Black Lives Matter” led the march and chants such as, “’How do you spell murderer?’ ‘NYPD’” were muttered time and time again. From this sequence of events alone, it is clear that the public is having a difficult time placing its utmost trust in the men and women in blue. In order for a city to function successfully, the community and its police force must be a cohesive unit, not a divided pair. It is an area of concern that must be dealt with in the immediate future.
Another contributing factor to this weakened relationship between the police force and the public can be attributed to stop-and-frisk racial profiling. According to data published by the New York Civil Liberties Union, in 2013, the last full-year set of data available, 88% of people stopped and frisked in NYC were innocent. Of the 191,588 stops, 160,149 of these stop-and-frisks were on blacks or Latinos. In other words, 85% of stop-and-frisks were performed on minorities. While these minority groups make up 54.1% of New York City’s population, 85% of stop-and-frisks are being performed on them. Why is there such a disparity between population and stop-and-frisk percentages? Race and ethnicity should be a non-factor when determining whether or not to engage in enforcement. Racial profiling is a prevalent problem that needs to be addressed. Only through improvements in the areas of stop-and-frisk racial profiling and police brutality will the community-police relationship better itself and the people of this great city.
References
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/police
http://www.nyclu.org/content/stop-and-frisk-data
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0108570.html
I find your comments on policing issues quite interesting, and similar to the ones I stated in my own post. Police brutality and an over-reliance on guns is a very pressing issue in the police community. In my post, I mentioned the officer discretion laws, giving New York City officers the choice in using guns during emergency encounters based on their judgement. However, you took it a step further by mentioning the Peter Liang case, which I’ve heard about earlier. In my opinion it was an accident. I believe the firearm went off and struck a bystander further down the stairwell, whom the officers were unaware of. Unfortunately, he just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Despite being an accident, the question arises, why did officer Liang have his gun unholstered in the first place in a housing complex? There could be many bystanders who are in danger in that situation, and it is up to the officer’s discretion to use his firearm. This, however, just points to the police’s over dependence on firearms. Ideally, officer Liang should have had more training to deal with situations and learn not to depend on his firearm as much. He has many other tools at his disposal, but out of habit, he decided to use his firearm. I believe the only way to effectively reduce the over dependence on firearms is a yearly or monthly training session on firearm use, takedown use, and martial arts training. An officer with a larger skill set means more tools at his disposal in tense situations, meaning he may start to feel comfortable doing routine searches without his weapon drawn, and perform takedowns without chokeholds. Though this seems a big venture, an added training program to the NYPD doesn’t seem like to big an idea to handle.