University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Balancing the Uses of Force

Police Brutality

Austin Ames and John Partin

LBST 2101 400
Phil Rutledge
October 16th, 2015

When is it considered too excessive force? Today there many cases of

police brutality. One can easily go onto the internet and find hundreds of
cases of someone being treated unfairly. But who actually determines when a
police officer has used excessive force upon the victim? According to a study
on police behavior, 23.3% of all misconduct reports of police officers are on
excessive force. But what does this number actually mean? There are two
ways you can look at excessive force, either the officer did what was
necessary or that they over stepped the required amount deemed necessary.
For a police officer to ensure the safety of the public, the officer may have to
use force to subdue the criminal at hand. With the use of force, the overall
crime rate will go down creating a safer environment for all who inhabit it.
With a safer environment, there will in turn be less criminal activity. While on
the other hand, the line of how much force deemed necessary can be easily
crossed. This line becomes tricky if the target is a minority and the officer is
racist. Police brutality is also becoming normalized and will only escalate
to worse situations where citizens and criminals are brutalized. There is
always a fine line which can be easily crossed in the eyes of the public. A
properly trained officer can determine that line and know how to handle the
situations. All of these can be processed easily under perfect conditions, but
rarely do we see perfect conditions. When an officer is under high stress
levels because of a high speed chase or if they have come under fire, their
training can become blurred and they might not make the correct judgement
on what they should do. We have to remember that police officers are people

and live just like anyone else. They can make mistakes like any other
person, but the allowance of more force or restrictions on force can change
how they process situations and handle the levels of stress they could be
going through on calls.
Police brutality is beginning to become a term that describes any force
used by an officer. When a police officer has to subdue a fugitive, they must
use force. If no force is used, the fugitive can easily be able to escape and
continue to be a threat to the general public. This situation can easily be
avoidable if the officer uses force to subdue and remove that threat from the
general public. If the threat at hand becomes unruly, then force is required
or else the criminal could injure themselves, the officer, or bystanders.
There are multiple cases where an officer had to use force to prevent the
fugitive from injuring any people in the area. In Plumhoff v. Rickard, Rickard
and an accomplice were driving at dangerous speeds weaving in and out of
traffic. This was creating a very dangerous situation for the officers and
threatened the safety of the public. Sometime later the fugitives car was
pinned down by the officers and when they got out of their cars to subdue
him, he sped off again nearly hitting an officer. Twelve shots were fired into
the vehicle hitting both Rickard and his accomplice. These shots are what
finally ended the chase and the officers apprehended the suspects. The
suspects unfortunately perished afterward being shot. Rickards daughter
claimed that the officers had used excessive force shooting her father when
a safer outcome could have been reached. The court ruled in favor of the

officers because Rickard had created an unsafe environment by weaving in

and out of traffic and almost hitting an officer when trying to flee. The
officers had deemed the situation highly dangerous and had to end the
chase before anyone was injured. This was accordance to the law and the
officers had avoided a potential disaster by using force to end the situation
at that time. This situation makes you think that if the officers had used
more force at the beginning of the chase, that two lives could have actually
been saved. The officers could have implemented a pit maneuver and pinned
the car down either using a wall or other officers cruisers. Then they could
have pulled the suspects out of the car stopping the chase instantly. Rickard
was going up to speeds of one hundred miles per hour and the officers were
apprehensive about using force because of a possible accident. But would
Rickard being injured in a high speed chase be worse than being shot?
Sometimes force needs to be implemented faster before the situation can
unfold, and stop it from ever even happening by using necessary force from
the beginning. The courts made the correct determination by saying that
under all these circumstances, the number of shots fired was necessary by
not having the knowledge to know what could have happened.
Force can be seen as having a negative effect on those it is forced
upon, but these are usually only short term affects if they happen at all. Most
people only see the use of force as being negative and only creates
problems, while it is found to be useful in multiple situations involving police
interactions. If a more forceful approach to a lot police calls were used the

surrounding area would become a safer place. People would trust the police
more and this would in turn create a stronger community with their local
department. Police offers are people just like us, they are our neighbors and
our families. Sometimes we forget this when we begin to look at them and
their actions on situations that unfold in front of them. There needs to be a
realization that sometimes police need to instill a sense of safety on the
citizens that they protect. This will require more force in places where the
crime rate is higher. In low crime rate neighbor hoods there isnt a need for
police offers to ride through to make sure things are going well. While in high
crime rate areas police will ride through regularly to determine situations in
it. In these high crime rate situations all police do is scan, and when there is
a crime they dont respond effective enough. To ensure that safety is instilled
a higher use of force is needed. These neighborhoods are inherently a
higher threat to police officers. These officers come into these places with a
thought in the back of their mind that they are being targeted. This would
not be the case if more force was applied by these same officers. To know
that one has power, means that one will walk more confidently in oneself.
These officers need confidence in themselves to better determine what is
needed in these situations. The way they get this confidence is to give them
more ability to use force. To know everything that they can do, they will
better determine whats necessary. Once these high crime rate areas know
that if they break the law they will be punished more than just a slap on the
wrist, they will start to correct themselves. This will create a safer

environment for those who live there and the officers will feel safer
themselves to enter those areas. When an officer can calmly asses a
situation they will almost always choose the right course of action and in turn
this will start to build a trust with the officers and the citizens. All of these
things will create a chain reaction that will keep building upon each other
and they will continue to improve.
Police brutality is a problem in the United States. It is becoming more
common and more normalized. While people should be enraged that it is
happening, they are becoming numb to it and paying less attention when
they hear about it in the media. The police system that we have is the root
of the problem as well as the thing blocking justice from being served. The
police that are brutal in their acts of policing are protected by their own
corrupt system. When major brutality occurs, the public officials deny the
act entirely or explain why the think the act was fair and just. These brutal
officers are then let go free of charges or penalties and are likely to repeat
their wrongdoing. The media is one of the greatest tools in fighting this
corrupt system because it allows the masses of people to see the problem
and hopefully take a stand to help. Too many people are being affected by
this and not doing anything about it.
Many of these brutal acts are found to be racially motivated and the public
have just recently begun to notice. Police officers are supposed to be a
citizens first line of defense and help in emergency but are now causing fear
because of racism. This racism is hidden deep down in many officers and

their true colors are not shown until the chance of abuse arises. Racial
profiling was implemented to prevent these racist tendencies but has not
proven to be effective enough. Last year in Ferguson, Missouri an unarmed
black teenager was shot by a police officer and this officer was released free
of criminal charges. This shooting quickly caused many riots and protests.
Blacks make up about 67 per cent of Ferguson's population, but 88 per cent
of documented uses of force by Ferguson police from 2010 to 2014 were
against African Americans. In all cases of police dog use and bites, the
person was black. In traffic violation stops, the most common ways to raise
funds through fines, 85 per cent of people stopped, 90 per cent of those who
received a ticket and 93 per cent of people arrested were black. The
previous quote is directly from an article about United States police force and
racism. The statistics cannot be denied and only support the claim that
American police have racist tendencies. Ferguson was one of the first major
police brutality cases that was shown in the media and since then, there has
been many more cases. The following is a timeline acquired from an article
in The Telegraph, a current events website. Timeline of major police attacks
of recent years in the United States: Kelly Thomas (Died on July 10, 2011 but
police officers beat him on July 5), Gil Collar (Died on October 6, 2012), Andy
Lopez Cruz (Died on October 22, 2013), Eric Garner (Died on July 17, 2014),
Michael Brown (Died on August 9, 2014), Ezell Ford (Died on August 11,
2014), Tamir Rice (Shot on November 22, 2014 but died on Sunday,
November 23), Antonio Martin (Died on December 23, 2014), Sureshbhai

Patel (Attacked on February 6, 2015 and left partially paralyzed.) These are
just some of the many occurrences of police wrongdoing of citizens with little
to no punishment.
Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the
best, is a quote from an American author and essayist, Edward Abbey. This
quote is a great reference for describing the police brutality problems
currently in the United States. Police are supposed to be the best line of
defense for the average citizen in daily life. Although this was the original
intentions, society is seeing many people with some bad intentions becoming
officers and abusing power. Also with these brutality occurrences happening
more often, this probably means that even the best are being corrupted.
Although there are many negative affects being seen, power and force are
necessary for police to do their job. While some abuse their power, most do
not and should be recognized for the good work they do serving their
communities.

The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse. -Edmund Burke

"Use of Force to Effectuate Arrest and to Prevent Crime." Use of Force to Effectuate Arrest and
to Prevent Crime. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Oct. 2015.
"Use of Force to Effectuate Arrest and to Prevent Crime." Use of Force to Effectuate
Arrest and to Prevent Crime. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Oct. 2015.
"Use of Force to Effectuate Arrest and to Prevent Crime." Use of Force to Effectuate
Arrest and to Prevent Crime. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2015.

Cox, John Woodrow. "Ferguson Shooting Case Renews Debate over Police Officer's Leeway in
Use of Deadly Force." Washington Post. The Washington Post, n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2015.
"Police Brutality Statistics | Cop Block." Cop Block. N.p., 13 Apr. 2011. Web. 15 Oct. 2015.
"The Shocking Racism at the Heart of One US Police Force." The Telegraph. Telegraph Media
Group, n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2015.