Body Cameras Use Unnecessary Force

Blood oozed out of the fresh wounds of a young boy, creating a pool of blood that soaked the streets of Ferguson, Missouri. Knowing it was his hands that dealt this execution, Officer Darren Wilson stood just as motionless as the boy that was laying face-down in the pool of his blood. Who was the young boy? He could have been any of the 300 million people that lived in the United States, but he was Michael Brown, an 18-year-old boy from Ferguson, Missouri. Like Michael Brown, many American citizens suffer from police officers using unnecessary force, which demonstrates the recurring issue that plagues the United States. Can the use of unnecessary force by police officers be combated? A movement for body cameras emerges from the shadows after …show more content…
Illustrating the effects of body cameras on police officers, a study conducted by Barak Ariel, a professor at Cambridge University, William Farrar, another professor at Cambridge University, and Alex Sutherland, the Rialto police chief analyzed the implementation of body cameras in the first year that it was in use in Rialto, California. It concluded, “[the] use of force by officers fell 60 percent, while citizen complaints against police plunged 88 percent” (Volz). With time, it is clear that there is a relationship between body cameras and the reduction of incidents of unnecessary force because there was a decrease in the usage of force by sixty percent in the first year of the implementation of body cameras. Furthermore, the correlation between the number of complaints and the number of police officers using unnecessary force is present in the study when the study concluded with a reduction in the number of complaints after the use of force dropped. Similarly, San Jose, a bigger city compared to Rialto, experienced the same effects. San Jose’s Public Safety and Livable Neighborhoods Committee reported, “Complaints have fallen 40.5% and use of ‘personal body’ force by officers has been reduced by 46.5%...” (Perry). Like the Rialto study, it is clear that body cameras will set a chain of events that will lead to the reduction in the usage of force by police officers. Furthermore, as the number of complaints drop, it clearly establishes how the public is reducing their accusations about police officers using unnecessary force, which enables police officers to do their duty without being falsely accused of a crime. By establishing a relationship between body cameras and the reduction of police officers using unnecessary force in two different cities, it provides evidence that body