[ Golden Gater Online - October 2, 1997 ]
George Lee
Biology major
To Serve and Protect, But Who?
The police department has been getting a lot of bad press, but who can you blame?
Imagine being in a parade and observing an officer hit a woman trying to go under a barricade. You then tell the officer that it wasn't necessary. The next thing you know, you're on the ground being hit yourself. Your shirt rips apart, exposing your breast, and then you are taken down to the station. While in jail, other officers are making comments about your chest and to top it off, a prisoner fondles himself while looking at you. The next morning you're charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. This recapitulation occurred to one of my friends in New York. The charges were dismissed and she settled for $50,000. Is this settlement trying to buy silence or justice? It's a sad fact that we have to resort to lawsuits when citizens are being abused. Settling for money is not enough for this kind of inappropriate behavior.
Abner Louima, a Haitian immigrant, was sodomized with a toilet-plunger handle by New York police. His story was supposed to be confined to a station-house bathroom, but his injuries landed him in the hospital -- and in the public eye. There was outrage that eventually made it to the front pages of many newspapers. How far must we go to protect the citizens from being harmed? Are officers trained to be aggressive at police academy, or is it simply that they deal with so much crime everyday? Whatever the answer is, there has to be some form of control.
This disease of police brutality is not only occurring in New York but also in other parts of the nation. In Santa Rosa, the police department has the highest rate of killing and shooting citizens per capita of any major city. In Santa Rosa, many police have the idea of "kill or be killed." A Santa Rosa officer was confronted by a mentally disturbed man. He was paranoid that the Mafia was after him. His sleeping pattern was erratic and he was constantly rearranging his furniture. One night he demanded that his brother loan him the keys to his truck. His brother refused. This led to him breaking through the truck's window and hot-wiring it. Soon after, his brother called the police.
An officer caught up with the driver and both ended up in a muddy field of weeds. Both cars were stuck and the officer drew his handgun. As he got closer to the truck he re-holstered his gun and drew out his baton. The driver reached for a table leg and swung it toward the officer. The officer responded by hitting him on the knee with his baton, which forced the driver to come out of his truck. The officer fell backward into the mud and saw the driver above him with the table leg raised. Stevens reached for his gun and shot him three times.
Was this defense by the policeman or was it not using common sense? The officer did not wait for backup and decided to take action on his own. The driver was desperately in need of help but it shouldn't have meant his life. In addition, district attorneys do not like the idea of prosecuting police. Why? Most of the evidence come from the police department and there has to be a mutual relationship. So who wins?
On the brighter side, the Los Angeles Police Department has incorporated "custom-tailored apprehension techniques" in which officers are required to get a refresher course every 18 months. In addition, its revising the training curriculum, gearing it toward a more effective approach to situations. These changes occurred after the infamous Rodney King beating. The realization seems to be that citizens have to be beat up or dead before action can be taken to protect the community. That sounds ironic but in most cases it's the sad truth.
In short, police officers should be servants to the community and not soldiers. This has damaged the credibility of most and perhaps all police departments. Money should not be substituted for justice or as repercussions for their inappropriate actions, but should serve as a sign of a problem. Though the outlook on controlling police brutality is bleak, the citizens must form their own measures to start policing the police.
[ Golden Gater - October 02, 1997 ]