Race and Police Brutality
What causes police brutality, and why are minority citizens the primary victims? The U.S. History Encyclopedia defines police brutality as the use of any force exceeding that reasonably necessary to accomplish a lawful police purpose. Most brutality began during strikes in the late 1800’s, early 1900’s. The strikes involved African Americans speaking out for their rights as citizens of the United States. Police brutality is one of the seven forms of police misconduct, the others being: false arrest, intimidation, political repression, surveillance abuse, sexual abuse and police corruption. Reasonable force is any action that is fair, proper, just, moderate or suitable under the circumstances. Some police officers will go beyond reasonable force when they are dealing with African American criminals and that is when it becomes a situation. Another term used when describing policed brutality is deadly force. Deadly force is defined as “when an actor with the purpose of causing, or that the actor should reasonably know creates a substantial risk of causing, death or great bodily harm. Police have a rule they have to follow called the use of force continuum. It sets the level of force considered to be appropriate in direct response to a subject’s behavior. The level of force may still be seen as excessive to bystanders even though it is not. Police brutality occurs for a number of reasons: the most common is racial discrimination. 89% of the people who died in NYPD custody between the years 1990 and 1994 were African American or Hispanic.A study was conducted that proved that minority citizens are stopped by the police more than white citizens but minority driven vehicles are no more likely to have drug paraphernalia than whites’ vehicles. Racial discrimination is the main cause of police brutality.
Racial profiling is the more common form of police brutality. This is the most frequent violation of the fourth amendment. It is the tactic of stopping someone because
Racial profiling is the more common form of police brutality. This is the most frequent violation of the fourth amendment. It is the tactic of stopping someone because