Police departments too often use excessive force, injuring people suspected of crimes and occasionally killing them. People of minority groups and the poor or the homeless are often the victims of police brutality. Law enforcement agencies repeatedly try to cover it up. This has become a controversial issue among many countries and communities that have seen police brutality take place in their own neighborhood. Police officers are challenged with dangerous situations every single day, which forces them to make immediate decisions. They are given the power to take away any citizens rights and even their lives. Having this kind of power also comes with huge responsibility. A major concern with the amount of discretion officers have is when to
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Questionable shootings by officers across the nation have led to many doubts. Some incidents include a police officer in Connecticut shot a motorist he believed was reaching for a gun, which turned out to be a cell phone. Four Riverside, California, officers and a sergeant have been fired after fatally shooting a young African American woman dozing in her locked car with a gun on her lap. Two Los Angeles officers are under investigation for shooting a 105-pound homeless woman to death. In this context, public concern about police shootings is understandable. It is wrong, however, to decide that there are an established number of times that cops can shoot people and then condemn officers for exceeding some quota. Although even one unnecessary shooting is too many, police officers have no way of controlling the number of life-threatening incidents to which they respond (Aggressive Policing Encourages …show more content…
Opponents of aggressive policing believe that police brutality is a real, harmful, and overly common problem. It is said that many police departments cover up allegations of abuse and brutality in order to protect their officers. Supporters of assertive policing insist that many allegations of police brutality are false or exaggerated. Assertive tactics used by police departments, they argue, are responsible for the drastic fall in crime rates over the last two decades. Aggressive behavior is something that police must be held accountable for their actions through civilian review boards and other measures intended to investigate misconduct ("Police
Questionable shootings by officers across the nation have led to many doubts. Some incidents include a police officer in Connecticut shot a motorist he believed was reaching for a gun, which turned out to be a cell phone. Four Riverside, California, officers and a sergeant have been fired after fatally shooting a young African American woman dozing in her locked car with a gun on her lap. Two Los Angeles officers are under investigation for shooting a 105-pound homeless woman to death. In this context, public concern about police shootings is understandable. It is wrong, however, to decide that there are an established number of times that cops can shoot people and then condemn officers for exceeding some quota. Although even one unnecessary shooting is too many, police officers have no way of controlling the number of life-threatening incidents to which they respond (Aggressive Policing Encourages …show more content…
Opponents of aggressive policing believe that police brutality is a real, harmful, and overly common problem. It is said that many police departments cover up allegations of abuse and brutality in order to protect their officers. Supporters of assertive policing insist that many allegations of police brutality are false or exaggerated. Assertive tactics used by police departments, they argue, are responsible for the drastic fall in crime rates over the last two decades. Aggressive behavior is something that police must be held accountable for their actions through civilian review boards and other measures intended to investigate misconduct ("Police