Change In Police Shootings

and Oscar Grant, are just a few civilians who lost their life due to excessive force from a police officers. Eric Garner death was video tape by the media and posted all over the web; Eric was in New York City simply standing in front of a corner store, Police officer say he was selling cigarettes but that information isn’t shown in the video. The video shows the officer telling Eric he’s under arrest, Eric asked why and continue to plead his cases stating he was just standing in front of the store and didn’t do anything wrong. Before you know it 5 police officers are trying to take this man down to the ground, one officer in particular had his hand around his neck holding him in a choke hold position. Eric kept repeating he cannot breathe

several times, the officer heard the request and ignored, minutes later Eric had passed away due to the chokehold.
Michael Brown was an 18 year old high school student that was walking to the store with his friend in Ferguson, Missouri. He was fatally shot by Officer Darren Wilson, the officer believe Michael was a part of a robbery, Officer Wilson pursued Michael for several blocks than he began to run in fear, Wilson shot him several times no questions asked leaving his body out in the open for hours only for pictures of this dead man body to surface the internet. Freddie Gray was being transported in a police van on April 12, 2015; he was arrested for possessing an illegal switch blade. While being transported Freddie went into a coma and ended up dying in police custody. The autopsy came back reporting that Freddie died from a spinal cord injury. All 6 officers that arrested and transported Freddie were suspended and pending investigation.
Lastly, Oscar Grant, it was New Year’s Day and Oscar and some of his friend had got into a fight on the train. Once the train had stop police officer only gathered Oscar and his friend letting the other suspects go. The officers were able to hand cuff Oscar and four friends without a problem. The arrest was caught on video by witness; the officers start to mouth off to Oscar and his friend even though they were already detained. Oscar didn’t like it one bit and spoke on how he felt. The officers then turned Oscar on him back while in handcuffs, while the other one hand his knew on his neck yelling “stop resisting”. Shortly after you hear gun shots one of the officers shot Oscar in the back killing him. In all of these stories the officers used to much force, in cases like Garner once a suspect is crying for help the officers job is to provide safety no matter what. In Brown’s case the officer should have asked questions first instead of assuming. With Gray it shouldn’t have taken 6 officers to arrest him because he wasn’t resisting and Grant was already detained in handcuffs when he was shot so that was wrong doing on the officer’s end. The use of force by police officers has taken much life’s for petty crimes or situations that could have been handled better.
A consequence of police force is a decrease in police recruitment rates. The media has done a great job exposing police officers for abusing their power. The issue that has surfaced is police officers are being trained to use more force, the force is turning more into brutality to the public. Lately in the media we have been seeing a lot of officers beat on someone who isn't resisting arrest. Which such bad names that officers are given now not many people want to become one. The shortage is taken place in many states for many reasons. One of the major reasons is that law enforcement has a tarnished image due all the violence and misconduct. In the last 30 years this is the lowest recruitment rate that law enforcement has had. Another reason is the increasingly tougher standards that law enforcement has to live up to in order to get the job done. Lastly, the job is too dangerous for many, mostly people in states like Chicago feels as though their life is on the line more than them serving and protecting the community. Statics show that 10 years ago there were 3,000 applicants for 10 positions now there are 1000 applicants for 70 positions.
Lastly, civilians are boycotting against calling 911 for help for two major reasons. One reason is people have lost trust in police officers and refuse to call them because they don’t to become a victim of police brutality. There have been cases where a civilian has called 911 to protect the or the neighborhood and the ended up hurting people for no reason. The incident with the girl at the pool party that was all over the news would be a good example. The neighbor called the cops to find out why there are so many people in the neighbor and wanted to find out what was going on. When the police got to the scene they saw that a group of teenagers were having a pool party and instead of telling them to keep down the noise or speak to the adult, they started to handcuff teenagers for no reason, one officer was even fighting with a teenage girl to tackle her to the ground. In a situation like that force is unnecessary they were kids having fun and didn’t intend to hurt no one communication skills would have resolved that issue better rather than being physical. Secondly, the people are boycotting because police officers are committing crimes and getting away with it or doing less time for the same crime than a civilian would. For all the cases that listed above most of the officers got suspended with pay, and was able to return back to work. For others like the officers in Grants cases they did 11 months for involuntary manslaughter when in the real word involuntary manslaughter is a minimum of 12 to 16 months. Many didn’t agree with the officer being charged with involuntary manslaughter when the killing was caught on video the officer clearly targeted the suspect while in handcuff and killed him. In the real world that would be considered second degree murder.
“One of the key issues discussed was the need to rethink the training that police officers receive on de-escalation strategies and tactics.

Looking back at the most controversial police shooting incidents, sometimes finding that while the shooting may be legally justified, there were missed opportunities to ratchet down the encounter, to slow things down, to call in additional resources, in the minutes before the shooting occurred. (Wexler, 2015)” Our government initiative is to revamp police training once again. Many cases have influenced a change in police training such as Michael Brown Ferguson shooting case and the New York City death of Eric Garner. Our CEO and Chairman have sat down and came up with a blueprint to take police officers back to their essence of protecting and serving. This blueprint will teach officers to use force when it is necessary and to ask questions and make human decisions before jumping the gun. In certain states they are also raising the pay of police officers to spike recruitment. In different states their training consist on what they need to work on the most, For example, Missouri is getting more tactical training, Los Angeles is getting life preservation training, New York is going to use minimum force and more de-escalating by communication. In conclusion police force has gotten way out of control and if we are unable to contain it now then no one will have trust in our police officers. Revamping the training to use more communication and less force is a great idea. Many times conflicts gets resolved faster by understand a person instead of using force to create a bigger issue. The use of force in police training is insufficient because they are training the officer to use more force to subdue a suspect. Leaving room for a lot of civilians are ending up hurt or deceased in police custody. The plummet in police recruitment is due to the bad name they have been receiving because of unreasonable actions. Due to the rise of police

killings many civilians are afraid to call the police even if they need help because they no longer trust them to fulfill their job requirements of protecting and serving our nation.