Police Brutality

American citizens know the job of any police officers in the United States, protect and serve, but in order to do that some force is needed. The real question is: What is “excessive” force, when has this force gone too far? There are several cities, such as New York, San Francisco, and Detroit, that thought that they had enough of this brutality, and they started their own organization to try to stop the seemingly endless stream of police brutality. So “Shielded from Justice” was created. Some of these cities include New York, San Francisco, and Chicago. All of these cities had their problems, and some felt that things were not getting any better and they needed to take matters into their own hands (Shielded From Justice). Of course, this caused problems among the police force too. New York and Providence had some problems some of their officers, but not all acted in a defensive way. Detroit and Washington, D.C. for example, agreed that there was a problem and wanted to change (Shielded From Justice). There are actions that we can take help to stop these acts of brutality, by contacting Shielded from Justice.

When thinking of police brutality, most people associate it with big cities; however, it happens in rural, suburban, and urban areas. Also, it happens at all levels of law enforcement, even up to the federal level (Shielded Form Justice). This terrible crime has no boundaries. All over the country there is someone being involved in unjustified shootings, severe beatings, fatal choking, or simply bad treatments. It is defiantly unfortunate that these crimes happen, but what makes this situation worse is the fact that nothing is being done about it within the police force. It is not uncommon for these acts to go unpunished, and even less is done to try to prevent more attacks (Shielded From Justice). The main reason for this is the brutality doesn’t end with just the officers, but the superior officers also are involved. With the chain of command corrupt as well, the justice system looks to be hard pressed to straighten itself out.

Now for a few examples, and be assured that there is not a shortage of them. All over the country people get abused by police officers. In 1996 the NYPD was charged for violating the human rights by Amnesty International. On August 9th of 1996 Abner Louima was tortured by the 70th Precinct of the NYPD. Skipping the gory details, Mr. Louima was short one plunger, and gained one punctured small intestine (Refuse & Resist). The officers involved called Abner a “nigger” and told him if they were reported then he would surely die. This is not uncommon, most victims of police brutality are poor and part of a minority (Refuse & Resist). A more resent incident happened on March 14, 2002. Another victim of the NYPD 70th precinct, Raja Aftab Iqbal, was assaulted by multiple officers. Before anything happened Mr. Iqbal heard one officer say one, and only one, word “Taliban” (Refuse & Resist). The defense of the officers was that Raja had disobeyed orders to not cross the street, of course Raja denied this. The officers kept Iqbal for an hour at the precinct for “disorderly conduct”. After this he went to a doctor to get treated for his cuts and bruises. That Tuesday a group of Pakistanis got together on Coney Island to discuss the matters at hand (Refuse & Resist). As anyone can see this is happening all the time and has not stopped or shown any signs of slowing down. Again, what is most upsetting about this situation is that nothing is being