"On any given day, in any police department in the nation, 15 percent of officers will do the right thing no matter what is happening. Fifteen percent of officers will abuse their authority at every opportunity. The remaining 70 percent could go either way depending on whom they are working with.
More on police brutality
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Why do police so often see unarmed black men as threats?
When is it legal for a cop to kill you?
That remaining 70 percent of officers are highly susceptible to the culture in a given department. In the absence of any real effort to challenge department cultures, they become part of the problem. If their command ranks are racist or allow institutional racism to persist, or if a number of officers in their department are racist, they may end up doing terrible things.
It is not only white officers who abuse their authority. The effect of institutional racism is such that no matter what color the officer abusing the citizen is, in the vast majority of those cases of abuse that citizen will be black or brown. That is what is allowed.
And no matter what an officer has done to a black person, that officer can always cover himself in the running narrative of heroism, risk, and sacrifice that is available to a uniformed police officer by virtue of simply reporting for duty. Cleveland police officer Michael Brelo was recently acquitted of all charges against him in the shooting deaths of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams, both black and unarmed. Thirteen Cleveland police officers fired 137 shots at them. Brelo, having reloaded at some point during the shooting, fired 49 of the 137 shots. He took his final 15 shots at them after all the other officers stopped firing (122 shots at that point) and, "fearing for his life," he jumped onto the hood of the car and shot 15 times through the windshield.
About that 15 percent of officers who regularly abuse their power: they exert an outsize influence
Not only was this excessive, it was tactically asinine if Brelo believed they were armed and firing. But they weren't armed, and they weren't firing. Judge John O'Donnell acquitted Brelo under the rationale that because he couldn't determine which shots actually killed Russell and Williams, no one is guilty. Let's be clear: this is part of what the Department of Justice means when it describes a "pattern of unconstitutional policing and excessive force."
Nevertheless, many Americans believe that police officers are generally good, noble heroes. A Gallup poll from last year asked Americans to rate the honesty and ethical standards of people in various fields: police officers ranked in the top five, just above members of the clergy. The profession — the endeavor — is noble. But this myth about the general goodness of cops obscures the truth of what needs to be done to fix the system. It makes it look like all we need to do is hire good people, rather than fix the entire system. Institutional racism runs throughout our criminal justice system. Its presence in police culture, though often flatly denied by the many police apologists that appear in the media now, has been central to the breakdown in police-community relationships for decades in spite of good people doing police work.
Here's what I wish Americans understood about the men and women who serve in their police departments — and what needs to be done to make the system better for everyone.
1) There are officers who willfully violate the human rights of the people in the communities they serve
As a new officer with the St. Louis in the mid-1990s, I responded to a call for an "officer in need of aid." I was partnered that day with a white female officer. When we got to the scene, it turned out that the officer was fine, and the aid call was canceled. He'd been in a foot pursuit chasing a suspect in an armed robbery and lost him.The officer I was with asked him if he'd seen where the suspect went. The officer picked a house on the block we were on, and we went to it and knocked on the door. A young man about 18 years old answered the door, partially opening it and peering out at my partner and me. He was standing on crutches. My partner accused him of harboring a suspect. He denied it. He said that this was his family's home and he was home alone.
My partner then forced the door the rest of the way open, grabbed him by his throat, and snatched him out of the house onto the front porch. She took him to the ledge of the porch and, still holding him by the throat, punched him hard in the face and then in the groin. My partner that day snatched an 18-year-old kid off crutches and assaulted him, simply for stating the fact that he was home alone.
I got the officer off of him. But because an aid call had gone out, several other officers had arrived on the scene. One of those officers, who was black, ascended the stairs and asked what was going on. My partner pointed to the young man, still lying on the porch, and said, "That son of a bitch just assaulted me." The black officer then went up to the young man and told him to "get the fuck up, I'm taking you in for assaulting an officer." The young man looked up at the officer and said, "Man ... you see I can't go." His crutches lay not far from him.
The officer picked him up, cuffed him, and slammed him into the house, where he was able to prop himself up by leaning against it. The officer then told him again to get moving to the police car on the street because he was under arrest. The young man told him one last time, in a pleading tone that was somehow angry at the same time, "You see I can't go!" The officer reached down and grabbed both the young man's ankles and yanked up. This caused the young man to strike his head on the porch. The officer then dragged him to the police car. We then searched the house. No one was in it.
These kinds of scenes play themselves out everyday all over our country in black and brown communities. Beyond the many unarmed blacks killed by police, including recently Freddie Gray in Baltimore, other police abuses that don't result in death foment resentment, distrust, and malice toward police in black and brown communities all over the country. Long before Darren Wilson shot and killed unarmed Michael Brown last August, there was a poisonous relationship between the Ferguson, Missouri, department and the community it claimed to serve. For example, in 2009 Henry Davis was stopped unlawfully in Ferguson, taken to the police station, and brutally beaten while in handcuffs. He was then charged for bleeding on the officers' uniforms after they beat him.
2) The bad officers corrupt the departments they work for
About that 15 percent of officers who regularly abuse their power: a major problem is they exert an outsize influence on department culture and find support for their actions from ranking officers and police unions. Chicago is a prime example of this: the city has created a reparations fund for the hundreds of victims who were tortured by former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge and officers under his command from the 1970s to the early ‘90s.
The victims were electrically shocked, suffocated, and beaten into false confessions that resulted in many of them being convicted and serving time for crimes they didn't commit. One man, Darrell Cannon, spent 24 years in prison for a crime he confessed to but didn't commit. He confessed when officers repeatedly appeared to load a shotgun and after doing so each time put it in his mouth and pulled the trigger. Other men received electric shocks until they confessed." [Read more]
Because the more you know.......
Well Field, thanks to the Obama/Holder campaign against local policing, black neighborhoods will see a significant drawback of the authority that enforces the standards of white civilization. Should be an interesting summer.
ReplyDeleteIf things get out of hand as much as Obama hopes they do, maybe we'll see a new National Police Force established. Probably have a whole lot more powers than the local police do, probably make arrests based on racial quotas, probably be used to harass political opponents. Should be an interesting rest of the decade.
@ Fundamental Change
ReplyDeleteBoy, do you have some interesting fantasies. I bet you spend half your waking moments worrying if "they" are coming to put you in "the reeducation camp."
So what other Alex Jones crank conspiracy theories do you foolishly believe?
The president controls the weather?
His wife is secretly a man who bosses him around?
Shape-shifting lizard people are infiltrating the government?
Jade Helm was a plan to put Texas under federal control?
9/11 was an inside job?
The Sandy Hook shootings were a false flag operation to take your guns?
Juice boxes contain chemicals that will turn your kids gay?
Chemtrails? Ebola-infected terrorists? American shariah law?
Damn, those Freemasons/Bilderbergers/The New World Order sure are scary!
Boogedy boogedy.
Gosh, I do hope that sneaky Obama isn't doing anything to our precious bodily fluids!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1KvgtEnABY
Black criminality is the problem, yet Field blames the police.
ReplyDeleteGo Figure.
I bear a lingering affection for Baltimore because it mirrors in many ways the Philadelphia of my youth. Both towns are so fundamentally shitty, the residents have developed a crass, resigned sense of humor unmatched anywhere else in the USA. Philly and Baltimore are a scant 100 miles away from one another and thus share that wretchedly mangled mid-Atlantic accent where every hard “o” sound is murdered. It’s impossible to sound intelligent when you have that accent. Both Philly and Baltimore are the only American metro areas I know of where restaurants regularly feature the culinary monstrosity known as scrapple on the breakfast menu. (I like to tell people that scrapple is made from the parts of the pig that were too disgusting to be made into sausage.) And once you get past the tourist spots, both towns are as hard as cement, mainly due to some of the most blighted and hostile black ghettos in the country. To me, Baltimore has always seemed like Philly’s little brother, but with a nasty case of the crabs.
ReplyDeleteFreddie Gray, like Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin before him, appears to have been a blundering fuckup. But as with the others, the blurry circumstances of his death were used by hordes of other blundering fuckups as an excuse to loot and beat and smash and destroy.
To those who’d refer to last week’s Baltimore riots as “unrest” or even an “uprising,” the sort of urban ne’er-do-wells who punched reporters and smashed police cars and looted grocery stores and burned buildings were merely reacting to the economic exploitation that capitalism had foisted upon them and the relentless brain-bludgeoning racism that has forced generations of them to squirm in pain under white supremacy’s pale, unforgiving thumb.
No one could be bothered to explain how the walking dead who occupy a terrifying quotient of Baltimore’s no-go zones were being economically exploited. Unless I’m missing something, such people typically don’t have many belongings worth stealing nor any job skills worth exploiting. Unlike feelings, dollars can be measured, and such types tend to drain more dollars from the public till than they provide.
And the already threadbare “white supremacy” narrative crumbles—at least to those who are willing to listen—when one considers that half of Baltimore’s 3,000 cops are black. It falls apart even more disastrously seeing as how the city’s mayor is a black woman. Baltimore’s police chief and city council president are also black. The Baltimore City State’s Attorney is a black woman, and last week when she filed criminal charges against six police officers that were in some way involved in Gray’s death, three of those officers turned out to be black. The most serious charge—that of “second-degree depraved-heart murder”—was filed against a black male officer.
Seriously, do blacks ever look within their own communities and people and try to figure out problems, or is it always just blame everything and everybody else?
ReplyDeleteOne thing is certain, if you don’t think that blacks are intelligent and hard-working, if you don’t “admire” black people, and if you don’t think that blacks are regularly “held back” by “racism” – you’re a racist.
ReplyDeleteActually, if you were to say, “black people are intelligent, hard-working and I admire them” – you’d probably be accused of “hipster racism” – it’s like saying you “have a black friend.” A white person having a black friend is not only not a defense against “racism” – merely bringing it up is somewhat suspicious. Maybe you are only friends with him because you don’t want to appear “racist” – thus making you racist?
We all know that “anti-racist is a code word for anti-white.” The corollary is that “racist" is a code word for "white person.” Chances are, if the term “hipster” is used in the media, it’s likely to be followed by hysterical accusations of racism.
ReplyDeleteTo hear the “anti-racists” tell it, “hipster” is a code word for “racist white person in denial about their vicious racism.” Hipsters are, in fact, as racist as Ku Klux Klansmen lynching Negroes, just with better taste in music.
Anonymous' reply to Fundamental Change's comment does say some things about how easy it is to control people's minds. There are people who see that one Alex Jones type of conspiracy is true and they become suspicious of everything. I wouldn't put Fundamental Change in that category based on one comment about Obama wanting a police state though. But if Obama really did want a police state he probably would have ended net neutrality. Then they could move toward people only having access to mainstream media type propaganda on the internet.
ReplyDeleteCategorizing beliefs together under the derogatory term "conspiracy theory" is a mind manipulation technique in itself. 9/11 being an inside job is a "conspiracy theory" but it is acceptable to believe that it was a conspiracy by 19 hijackers with box cutters led by a guy in a cave on a dialysis machine. It is acceptable to believe that a 757 airliner disappeared in to a hole in the Pentagon the size of a garage door. That there was no debris from the plane in Shanksville because that plane sunk into an old mining hole. That a terrorist's passport flew out of an exploding plane in a twin tower and landed undamaged on the sidewalk. We can see an obvious controlled demolition in broad daylight and believe that it was caused by burning carpet melting more than 80 steel columns at the same time. We can believe that when the owner said on TV that they decided to "pull it", he meant to pull out the firefighters who weren't even in that building. We can believe that instead of gravity pulling things down, large steel beams of the two towers shot up and out hundreds of yards away without explosives being used. They can tell us anything.
The estimate that 15% of the police think for themselves and always do the right thing might be high. We are sheep. The concept of how susceptible we are to suggestion probably does explain a lot of the police brutality and racism. When there are black cops abusing black citizens, it isn't surprising that white cops do it. I used to attribute the "blue wall" to a fraternity mentality, but susceptibility to psychological manipulation (intentional or not) is a better explanation. And the article does make me think that training is a more viable solution to the problem than I did before.
Anonymous Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteOne thing is certain, if you don’t think that blacks are intelligent and hard-working, if you don’t “admire” black people, and if you don’t think that blacks are regularly “held back” by “racism” – you’re a racist.
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Your comment describes JOSH to a "t".
I'm still shaking my head over the fact the West Baltimore was burned over a DRUG DEALER (Scumbag Freddie Gray). Goggle Mr. Gray's rap sheet and see what you come up with. He was human filth. And so was his heroin addicted "mother". She's the reason her son turned out so scummy.
ReplyDelete""TO ALL YOU PALEFACE WHITE MOTHERFUCKERS: YOU DIRTY, SAVAGE, DISGUSTING, FLAT-ASSED, LITTLE DICK, WEAK, DOG FUCKING, METH MAKING, SERIAL KILLERS, INCEST CHILDREN, PEDOPHILES, COLONIAL, MUTANT DNA,"
ReplyDeleteGive it a rest white boy, you're convincing nobody.
"To hear the “anti-racists” tell it, “hipster” is a code word for “racist white person in denial about their vicious racism.” Hipsters are, in fact, as racist as Ku Klux Klansmen lynching Negroes, just with better taste in music."
ReplyDeleteOh I dunno about that. There are only ten things in life I hate and Country and western music is two of them. But hipster music pushes 'em damn close.
I mean 'Mumford & Sons'??? Really??? Who needs that shit???
birds of feather flock together all them bad until they start doing like this man did.. fuck all police they must be up rooted
ReplyDeleteGoad, where do u live now?
ReplyDeleteClearly u haven't been to Philly, lately. "Fundamentally shitty"? I think not.
Although that describes to a tee quite a few one-light towns I have visited in Westen Pa and parts of the South.
Carry on
Fundamental Change, that sound u are hearing outside is a lawnmower : not a black helicopter coming to get u.
ReplyDeleteAnd u might want to start eating some of the food u have packed away for the apocalypse. Your family will thank u for it.
"A white person having a black friend is not only not a defense against “racism” – merely bringing it up is somewhat suspicious. Maybe you are only friends with him because you don’t want to appear “racist” – thus making you racist?"
ReplyDeleteIt doesn’t matter what your liberal credentials are. It doesn’t matter if you support Gay Marriage, Saving the Whales, Abortion on Demand, and Obamacare. You’re white, therefore a racist. If you did, in fact, send your kids to a ghetto public school, you’d probably still be accused of “cultural appropriation” anyway. Hell, you could marry a Black woman and still be accused of “sexualizing black bodies.”
You can’t win.
"You can’t win".
ReplyDelete11:31 AM
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America's people are all losers when it comes to racism. The only way to win is to eradicate it. This arguing, blaming and attacking makes everybody a loser...Black or White.
It is so sad to see America spiraling downward. However, the country started with racism and it will probably die because of it. There is no solution to this problem....it's an uncurable American disease that has reached epidemic proportions of hate and mistrust.
No one wins.
Anonymous Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteBlack criminality is the problem, yet Field blames the police.
Go Figure.
10:40 PM
You stupid fuckin' asshat, what does your racist dribble have to do with the fact that an innocent young man was tortured and kidnapped for absolutely no reason other than he was Black and those pig-face motherfuckas knew they would get away with it? I wish I knew you so I could repaint your ceiling with your brain matter. You pasty toothless cunts are the cancer of the earth. I pray if there is a God to wipe all of you out. You are demonic devils, and have no empathy, morals, or a soul. That's why you demons have blue/grey/green eyes you devil.
^^^^^^^This is why Baltimore is the way it is^^^^^^^^^
ReplyDeleteBTW, the cop charged with the most serious offense is black. Don't know what color his eyes are, though.
His eyes are brown. But he wears a house suit.
ReplyDeleteIn ANY environment where Blacks work around Whooteemoos (ALL of America), they'll be forced to 'sell out' to survive. When you're a cop, that survival is figurative AND literal.
ReplyDeleteGreat post Field!!!
Anonymous Yisheng said...
ReplyDeleteIn ANY environment where Blacks work around Whooteemoos (ALL of America), they'll be forced to 'sell out' to survive. When you're a cop, that survival is figurative AND literal.
Great post Field!!!
6:30 PM
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No one is forced to do anything unless they lack balls. Many sell-outs are corruptible cowards who will do 'anything' out of fear. That is the MAIN reason racism continues on because Whites can find as many uncle toms in the black race as they need.
Yisheng said...
ReplyDeleteIn ANY environment where Blacks work around Whooteemoos (ALL of America), they'll be forced to 'sell out' to survive.
Yisheng is a sell-out.
Go figure.
And Jon Burge is still getting his pension. This kind of stuff must keep you busy Field. Makes me think I should have gone to law school to help with this kind of shit.
ReplyDelete"No one is forced to do anything unless they lack balls. Many sell-outs are corruptible cowards who will do 'anything' out of fear. That is the MAIN reason racism continues on because Whites can find as many uncle toms in the black race as they need."
ReplyDeleteBullshit!!!
If you work for or under white people you HAVE to do what they say if you want to keep your job. They will fire your black ass in a heartbeat if you challenge them in any way. Or make you so miserable you will either have some sort of a mental breakdown or resign. I have seen this happen. I know this from PERSONAL EXPERIENCE. White people have a "system" in place and they are fundamentally ruthless especially in their dealings with blacks. All smart black people who work for or under white people and want to keep their jobs know this.
That's great advice Sybil but until you join the rest of us as a business owner you need to STFU.
ReplyDeletei guess this is a typical bad cop:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.liveleak.com/view?i=471_1433180660