Police Brutality Pros and Cons: Critical Essay

On August 9, 2014, Unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown's life was taken by cops. He was shot multiple times, the last shot to the back of his head is the thing that took this youngster's life. He was a youthful unarmed dark male. Just in 2014, more than 1,000 individuals were murdered on account of cops. Be that as it may, despite the fact that police say they are simply carrying out their responsibility, police ought not to have the option to mishandle their capacity, since more instances of police severity are being caught on mobile phones and blameless individuals are being executed. (2014)

How you become an official is by getting the Necessary Education. A secondary school confirmation or a GED is regularly the base level of instruction expected to turn into a cop, Submit an Application to a Police Department, Graduate from a Police Academy Training Program, and Actively Work to Obtain Promotions. A cop, as per the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the basic obligations of a cop incorporate watching assigned regions, upholding laws, noting calls for help, capturing people associated with carrying out violations, giving references, affirming in court, and leading traffic stops. Each Officer needs to make a vow before starting their profession in law implementation to set a decent structure of what they are there to do. (2014)

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Michael Brown was a youthful African American that lived in Ferguson. He was with one of his companions at a nearby market where he snatched a few cigarettes and exited without paying for them. Official Darren Wilson at that point shot dark colored and his companion, left with just one shot. The official saw Brown at 12:01 and by 12:04 Michael was lying face down dead with 7 shots through his body remembering the two for his head.

Officer Wilson was later found not guilty. This is a great example to show how law enforcement doesn't have to pay for the actions they take while on duty. People ask what is police brutality, it's an act of misconduct done by sworn law enforcement to physically, mentally, or emotionally attack a group of people or a single individual. Law enforcement takes an oath to protect and serve, but these same officers take advantage of their power to physically and even sometimes emotionally harm us. In some of the more severe cases, innocent citizens are killed by police officers like Michael Brown was. Police brutality is not a new problem is just one that has grown through the years These offices have abused the power they detain. (ABC News, 2014) The abuse used by police officers is a serious offense that violates a person's human and civil rights. They feel like they are above the law , because they carry a badge and a gun.

Racial profiling is one of the biggest problems. 'Racial Profiling' refers to the discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual's race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin. A civil rights case states “ In Newark, New Jersey, on the night of June 14, 2008, two youths aged 15 and 13 were riding in a car driven by their football coach, Kelvin Lamar James. All were African American. Newark police officers stopped their car in the rain, pulled the three out, and held them at gunpoint while the car was searched. James stated that the search violated his rights. One officer replied in abusive language that the three African Americans didn’t have rights and that the police 'had no rules.' The search of the car found no contraband, only football equipment.” This civil rights case is insisting that those officers racially profiled these innocent citizens violated their rights and invaded private property. It’s very difficult to prove racial profiling, in a majority of cases there is no evidence and the police officers can claim the stop to be a routine traffic stop. (Katel, 2016)

In the United States in 2012 statistics by the FBI, show that the population was 313,910,000 people, but there were only 670,438 sworn peace officers so if you do the math only about 2 ½ officers for every 1,000 people. So people might say that law enforcement is highly outnumbered. When you see police brutality going on, most response by officers is that “We are just doing our job.” You are starting to see more and more cases of police brutality being reported to the public.

In September 2015, 703 people have been killed by on-duty police officers. This is almost double the highest amount of police shootings ever reported by the FBI for an entire year. Out of the 703 people killed, about 65 of them were unarmed. People unarmed are being killed by officers who are sworn to protect them. (Lowery, 2019)

You are seeing more and more cases being reported of police brutality. We live in a world where there is probably a camera on every corner. Technology has helped numerous times with reporting the abuse by having digital evidence to back up your report. Almost every cell phone is equipped with a camera. You as a citizen have the right to record any encounter with law enforcement. Most of the time an officer would tell you that you can't record them, which is a lie, and are only trying to protect yourself from getting caught. If you as a citizen see an officer abusing the law and violating human rights, you have the legal right to record and report the situation. (Lowery, 2019)

Law Enforcement agencies are considering or are already making their police officers wear body cameras to record their everyday encounters. Many will argue that making an officer wear a body camera would invade the privacy of an officer on a daily basis and make it unfair to the officers. To argue with what many would say is that officers will actually do a better job because they know someone could see how they handled the situation from the beginning. To add to that they wouldn't just take the officer's word there would actually be evidence to back up his statement. Police would actually think twice to do something because they are being recorded. Body cameras are like keeping an eye on things and having a different point of view. That different point of view would not pick a side and would be what happened during the encounter between the officer and citizen. (Katel, 2016)

Redditt Hudson grew up hating the police because they would routinely rough up his friends and family for no good reason. He hated the way the police treated them, but he knew they weren't all that bad. One of his father's close friends was a cop, who later went on to become his mentor. Redditt, later on, joined the St. Louis Police Department and quickly realized that not all, but most of his peers were very racist. His fellow officers who took an oath considered people of color “thugs” no matter if they were the victim or just a bystander.

They saw young black and brown men as targets, therefore they would respond with force to even minor offenses. Cops are rarely held accountable for their actions so they didn't really have to think twice about the consequence. Redditt reported this to his sergeant and was told to get back to work and drop the report. Reddit states, “I was participating in a profoundly corrupt criminal justice system. I could not, in good conscience, participate in a system that was so intentionally unfair and racist. so after five years on the job, I quit.” In other words, Redditt is saying that he couldn't take how cops can abuse their power and violate their rights.

31-year-old Corey Jones “a well-known area musician, was carrying a gun he had purchased legally just three days earlier when he was shot and killed by a police officer early Sunday morning.” Jones was waiting for a tow truck after his vehicle broke down on Interstate 95 after a Saturday night gig. Jones was encountered by police officer Nouman Raja around 3:15 am in his unmarked car and in plain clothes. Police say “that Raja believed he was investigating an abandoned vehicle.” Jones's death seems to add a new twist to such cases, police shooting a black male legally carrying a firearm.

A South Carolina Police officer was caught on camera throwing an African American teenage girl into a classroom at Spring Valley High School. She was asked to stand up before he snatched her and tossed her from her chair which was captured on multiple cell phones and video recorders. This video was quickly spread through social media humiliating her even after she has already been physically abused. The actions he took were unnecessary and could have been handled in a different situation and wouldn't have happened how this happened. Lott said, “What she does is not what I’m looking at; What I’m looking at is what our student resource officer did.” “He was wrong in his actions and it was not what I expect of my deputies.” “Deputy Fields did not follow proper training or procedures when he threw the student across the room. It continues to upset me that he picked the student up and threw her.” What Lott was saying is that this was totally out of hand and should have never happened to a student he was trained better than this. He was suspended without pay and banned from school. Later that week the officer Ben Fields was fired from his department. (Harris, 2010)

This has been cases where even young teen have had their civil rights violated and some have even paid with their lives. A 17-year-old Michigan teen was pulled over on state highway 43 on his way home from his girlfriend's house by Sheriff Jonathan Frost after he flashed his light to the sheriff because he had his high beams on. The officer was very rude to the young teen and was harassing him. The sheriff denied he had his high beams on to the young teen, but clearly, in the video, you can see the officer has his high beams on. The young teen and sheriff are arguing about the situation and got out of control. Then the officer pulled him out of his car and was stun gun and then the situation got violent. Frost then pulled out his gun and shot the young teen dead, the teen was unarmed on had a cell phone with him to record the encounter. A young man lost his life because a sheriff didn't want to admit he was driving with his high beams and took a situation that could have highly been avoided and should have never ended how it did.

You hear about it on the news almost every week about how another life was taken by an officer on duty. Year after year more and more cases of police brutality or” misconduct” are being reported to the public. Police officers should get more training to learn how to handle an encounter that gets out of control. Police should not judge an individual on their face or how they look. Police should have to use lethal force so lease people have to pay with their lives and cops can keep the respect they are given by the community. (Harris, 2010)