Tracing the Past Final Version 1.edited
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Tracing the Past, Creating the Future: An In-depth Analysis of Law Enforcement
Practices
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Tracing the Past, Creating the Future: An In-depth Analysis of Law Enforcement
Practices
Police are the protectors of the society. Law enforcement should be the defenders of
the weak and voiceless. However, what happens when the protectors become the oppressors?
According to the Law Enforcement Epidemiology Project, every year, over two hundred
thousand people are injured by law enforcement officers in the United States [CITATION
Law23 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. An annual average of six hundred such encounters are fatal. The
numbers paint a heartbreaking, often gut-wrenching picture of the relationship between
society and law enforcement agencies.
It is easy to get lost in the statistics. The numbers do not provide an accurate picture
of the severity of the problem. They may even serve to dehumanize the situation. Victims of
police brutality were members of society. They were family members, co-workers, neighbors,
children, and parents in some cases.
A poignant example is the murder of Philando Castile. On July 6
th,
2016, Philando, his
girlfriend, and her daughter were pulled over by the police because he matched a description
of a robbery suspect. Less than one minute later, Philando was dead [ CITATION Ram16 \l
2057 ].
Addressing police brutality is a complex challenge that necessitates a multifaceted
approach. The solution involves understanding the underlying causes, establishing effective
penalties for police misconduct, evaluating the impact of body-worn cameras on officer
conduct, and examining the racial disparities in its victims.
The society became cognizant of police brutality during the Civil Rights Movement in
the mid-20
th
Century. Despite slavery having ended, American society remained segregated
for all intents and purposes. The Civil Rights Movement was a collection of advocacy groups
that rose to combat different facets of racial injustices. Among the greatest injustices was
police brutality.
According to a report by the Human Rights Watch, in the 1990s, there were numerous
notable cases of police brutality [ CITATION Col98 \l 2057 ]. These cases garnered
widespread attention, including international condemnation. Because of the technological
evolution, more visual recordings of police misconduct exist. These recordings increased the
number of advocacy groups and their geographical reach while galvanizing their message and
providing context to the struggles of the victims they represented. The most notable
movement is the Black Lives Matter. Black Lives Matter started on social media as an activist
hashtag in response to the acquittal of a neighborhood watch volunteer who had killed an
unarmed 17-year-old boy. The movement gained traction as more and more innocent people
lost their lives at the hands of law enforcement.
As a consequence of organizations like Black Lives Matter, there is more awareness
of the lack of accountability that police departments nationwide seem to display. Despite the
increased attention, the number of cases of police brutality reported continued to rise, which
demonstrates the ingrained cultural and societal constructs that play a fundamental role as
motivators of police brutality. It is more than just a bad attitude, poor training, or plain hatred.
According to Towns, one of the reasons why police brutality is such a complex
problem to stop is the fact that at inception, law enforcement was instituted to exert control
over the masses [CITATION Tow151 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. During the slave era, white volunteers
would form slave patrols to catch runaway slaves. These patrols were empowered to use
violence in the enforcement of their mandate. When slavery ended, much of the hostility
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toward the slave population, which was predominantly colored, continued. The slaves were
finally free, but they did not have their freedom.
In modern America, cases of police brutality have racial undertones [ CITATION
Sch201 \l 2057 ]. Tracing from the Civil Rights Movement, the hostile attitude towards the
former slave population can be seen in the disproportionality of police brutality cases. African
Americans represent only 13% of the US inhabitants but account for 31% of police shooting
cases [ CITATION Lyl16 \l 2057 ]. This disproportion means that despite being a minority
population, African Americans are targeted, a spillover effect from their days as enslaved
people and the law enforcement's days as slave paddy rollers. African Americans are more
likely to be victims of police brutality than white populations. Law enforcement demonstrates
a tailored hostility towards people of color. The uniform may be blue, but their vision is black
and white.
Philando’s death was caught on camera. More accurately, two cameras. The officer
who killed him had a vehicle equipped with a camera that recorded the fatal encounter.
Philando’s girlfriend also had a camera, which she used to livestream the encounter.
Ultimately, as Towns suggests, body cameras only play witness to the misconduct of police
[ CITATION Tow151 \l 2057 ]. They are neither authoritative nor provide countermeasures to
stop the misconduct.
In addition to this, the footage recorded off police body cameras does not always lead
to convictions of the offending officers, as seen in Philando's case when the officer was
acquitted of all charges and released. Philando's story echoes many similar cases, as Towns
[CITATION Tow151 \n
\t
\l 2057 ] documented. Despite being a form of evidence, video is
not tamper-proof. The camera lens may not provide the context needed to understand the
situation. Law enforcement officers can easily justify their actions by providing falsification;
history often belongs to the oppressors.
Barak postulates that more research should be done into using body-worn cameras
[CITATION Bar161 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. This notion is further supported by Human Rights Watch,
which suggests that the information used to assess police brutality cases is not standard
[CITATION Col98 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. Different police departments report police misconduct
cases differently. What passes for a hostile encounter may be procedural for other police
departments. Ultimately, this compounds the problem for researchers as the findings of any
research activity are skewed and biased. Lack of accurate data means that the true scope of
the problem may not be known. These gaps allow dishonorable law enforcement officers to
slip through and leave a destruction trail in their communities.
Despite the challenges facing the United States in combating police brutality, body
cameras worn by law enforcement remain a crucial component in addressing the issue. The
deterrence theory states that the threat of punishment is a deterrent against crime. Law
enforcement officers who would otherwise remain unobserved have to contend with the
deterrent nature of surveillance during their activities [ CITATION Bar161 \l 2057 ].
Chapman provides evidence that there are indeed advantages to the use of police body
cameras [CITATION Cha191 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. Even though the cameras may not stop a law
enforcement officer from misconduct, the discovery of this misconduct and the aftermath will
deter other police officers who would not like to be subject to investigations, court cases, and
public outcry.
Change is constant, even for law enforcement. As Jonsson suggests, we are likely to
see a steady increase in the use of body cameras among law enforcement [CITATION
Jon19 \n
\t
\l 2057 ]. Though cameras are not a silver magic bullet, they can be harnessed to
provide a better picture of the multifaceted world of law enforcement. The police inevitably
come face to face with the worst that humanity has to offer. This hazard preconditions their
approach to society as preserving their lives becomes paramount. However, camera footage
can help further research into the social dynamics surrounding the interactions of law
enforcement and civilian populations. We may not be able to escape the inevitability of police
cameras. However, we do have an opportunity to harness the chance that they provide us to
improve law enforcement service delivery.
Police brutality is a reality in the United States. It cannot be denied, and it should not
be ignored. The genesis of the problem is as complex as the problem itself. However, society
has made significant progress in bringing the matter into the limelight. This attention has
resulted in corrective responses such as deploying police-worn body cameras. The little
research that exists into the impact of these cameras shows that they do have the potential to
play a vital role in law enforcement reform. The solutions should be as multipronged as the
problem for the change to be effective.
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References
Barak, A. (2016). Police Body Cameras in Large Police Departments.
The Journal of
Criminal Law and Criminology
, pp. 729–768.
Chapman, B. (2019). Body-Worn Cameras: What the Evidence Tells Us.
National Institute of
Justice Journal
, pp. 1–5.
Collins, A. (1998).
Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United
States.
Human Rights Watch.
Jonsson, P. (2019, August 9).
The Body Cam Revolution: What It Has, and Hasn't
Accomplished.
Retrieved from The Christian Science Monitor:
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2019/0809/The-body-cam-revolution-What-
it-has-and-hasn-t-accomplished#:~:text=Indeed%2C%20studies%20show%20the
%20body,policing%2C%20if%20in%20subtle%20ways.
Law Enforcement Epidemiology Project. (2023).
U.S. Data on Police Shootings and
Violence
. Retrieved from Law Enforcement Epidemiology Project:
https://policeepi.uic.edu/u-s-data-on-police-shootings-and-violence/
Lyle, P., & Esmail, A. (2016). Sworn to Protect: Police Brutality- A Dilemma for America's
Police.
Race, Gender and Class
, pp. 155–185.
Ramsey County. (2016).
Traffic Stop Transcript.
Ramsey County.
Schwartz, S. (2020). Police brutality and racism in America.
Explore
, pp. 280–282.
Towns, A. (2015). That Camera Won't Save You! The Spectacular Consumption of Police
Violence.
Present Tense
, 1-9.