The senseless and brutal murders of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd brought millions of Americans of all backgrounds and races to the streets demanding justice and reigniting the national debate on policing, public safety, and racial justice.
While communities of color, and particularly Black Americans, have long decried racial disparities in policing and the murder of unarmed Black men and women by police officers, the recent killings of Black Americans have awoken the consciousness of the broad spectrum of Americans. Brady joins the renewed calls for systemic change and racial justice.
The rate of police violence in America far exceeds that in similar industrialized countries. Interactions with an American police officer are 6 six times more likely to end in death than police encounters in the U.K.
Brady takes an evidence-based approach to gun violence prevention rooted in public health and safety. That same approach, informed by the work of organizations, coalitions, activists, researchers, and public health and safety experts, leads us as we explore how to achieve effective and lasting transformative changes to policing.
Changes to policing must include each of these four elements:
As there is increased discussion to defund the police, we understand that these calls are focused on a necessary reallocation and reassessment of funding and authority away from law enforcement. We agree.
Currently, $115 billion is spent annually on policing in the United States and yet, the majority of situations for which police are called on could likely be more effectively handled by other public safety or social service professionals, without armed police intervention. Law enforcement is often not best situated to address medical, substance misuse, psychological, and social problems, or the systemic racism that often causes them. The addition of firearms, and the authority to use them, into these situations can unnecessarily lead to violence and death.
As part of a broad reassessment of the situations where law enforcement is called, there must also be a refocus of the role law enforcement plays in reducing and preventing violence. Over-policing doesn't work to reduce serious crime.
"Being over-policed for the small stuff, and under policed for the important stuff, alienates the community, undercuts cooperation and fuels private violence: which itself often then drives even more intrusive policing, more alienation, lower clearance rates, and still more violence." - Professor David Kennedy
If the goal is to reduce crime, a refocus in policing should account for the reality that a number of historical approaches to criminal justice have contributed to cycles of violence rather than having interrupted them. For example, too often law enforcement is singularly focused on incarcerating individuals who pull the trigger of a firearm, but ignores other contributors to that gun violence, including the gun companies that routinely supply the criminal gun market.
There must be a commitment to reallocating and refocusing resources and authority away from law enforcement, as follows:
Mechanisms for effective oversight will require reporting that informs accountability on the part of individual officers, government actors, and communities to comply with, enforce, and amend the law as needed to ensure that the reforms have the intended outcomes.
Currently, there are large gaps in available data due to the lack of compulsory reporting requirements and standardizations of how police departments collect and maintain their data. Without this basic information, it is impossible to know if and to what extent current laws are being followed, if there is accountability when they are broken, and if training or policies need to change.
This lack of transparency frequently creates a mistrust in the police as an institution and creates a shield for police that perpetuates misconduct. Requiring that this data be both reported and publicly available and accessible is a first step on the long road to rebuilding trust between the public and police.
At a minimum, we must:
Reforming policing will require numerous changes that include, improving hiring and training practices and establishing clear standards for what is proper policing, what constitutes misconduct, and appropriate and inappropriate uses of force, and policing tactics and tools.
These policies will lay a framework for better, safer policing. However, it should be noted that they will only result in meaningful change when coupled with increased mandated transparency and systems of accountability.
At a minimum, effective policy and legislation aimed at reforming police practices will implement these basic elements:
For police reform to be effective, there must be mechanisms in place to ensure that police are held accountable for misconduct. This will require neutral oversight for all police and the repeal of special protections that encourage and foster misconduct.
We can no longer allow a law enforcement function that too often acts with impunity and simultaneously “over-polices” and “under-polices” in ways that undermine trust, confidence and safety in the very communities they are charged to protect.
In order to start the long process of rebuilding community trust and establishing greater police accountability, Brady offers the following points:
Brady makes these calls for changes to policing while remaining committed to broader gun violence prevention laws and policy, understanding that, for example, demilitarization of law enforcement via the removal of military weaponry and hardware must be complemented with the demilitarization of American communities and policy, law, and action to reduce the gun violence epidemic.
Above all, we understand that improving policing cannot be discussed without first admitting that the American policing system has a foundation rooted in white supremacy and racism.
When Dante Barry, Executive Director and Founder of Brighter Days for Justice, first stated that police violence was gun violence, it was not immediately embraced by traditional gun violence prevention groups, including Brady. We have since taken this call for justice to heart.
The presence of a firearm heightens tensions and exacerbates confrontations. This is particularly relevant within police interactions, in which there is already an inherently unequal power dynamic between officers and civilians.
And because police violence, in all of its forms, is facilitated by the direct use, threat, or perceived threat of firearms, police violence is gun violence. In 2022, 97% of fatal interactions with law enforcement in the U.S. were shootings. Between 2019-2022, the number of fatal police shootings increased by nearly 10%. In 2022, there were only 15 days without an incident in which police officers shot and killed a civilian.
America’s extraordinary police shooting rate is, in part, a product of our extraordinary civilian firearm carry rate. A 2022 study found that states adopt permitless concealed carry laws, the rate of fatal police shootings increases by 12.9%. Research shows that racism and “implicit bias" cause officers to mistakenly perceive that unarmed Black and Latino civilians are carrying guns more than white people.
The prevalence of police violence is exacerbated by deeply-rooted racism that, in American culture, the shocking militarization of police, the insufficient training and dangerous policing tactics and policies, including, for example, warrior training, and extreme barriers to transparency and accountability. As we work to tackle the gun violence epidemic in America, we cannot ignore police violence or its devastating effects.
People of color, especially Black and Latinx people, are much more likely to be killed by police than white people. Black men are 2.6 times more likely to be the victims of deadly police shootings. This number also does not account for the daily injuries and instances of harassment, abuse, and threatening behavior, otherwise known as “over-policing” suffered by Black and Latinx communities. Black and Latinx citizens are three times as likely to be searched by police when stopped, and are twice as likely to have force used or threatened whenever they're approached by police. A key example of this is in policies like “stop and frisk” that are rooted in discriminatory policing. Such strategies unfairly target communities of color and make even well-intentioned attempts at policing problematic.
The overall quality of life is significantly impacted and diminished by over-policing in Black and Latinx neighborhoods. High rates of law enforcement presence in these communities do not translate into effective or equitable policing or public safety, rather it creates mistrust and fear between Black and Latinx communities and law enforcement. The daily aggressions and systemic oppression communities of color have faced since the inception of our country are not solely a product of policing, but they are perpetuated by law enforcement practices.
Police violence is gun violence. The lives ended by police violence are too many to name. The lives forever changed and traumatized by police violence are too many to name. The impact of police violence on generations of entire communities is incomprehensible. Like all gun violence, there is no easy solution, no simple panacea, or one piece of legislation that will break the cycle of racist policing and violence overnight and establish the essential reform, transparency, and accountability needed in communities across the country. But there are steps forward. Classifying police violence as gun violence is merely the first step that Brady needs to take to lend our voice and resources to the chorus working to end the plague of law enforcement violence.
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