I think the scariest thing about the victims in all of these accidental cop shootings, is how you see yourself in so many of them. Shem Walker came out on his stoop in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn to find a man sitting on it. He apparently asked the guy to move. The guy didn't respond. Walker apparently tried to move him with physical force. Turns out the guy was a cop. The cop shot and killed Walker.
Clinton Hill isn't what it was in the 80s, but I know the neighborhood, and I could easily see myself in exactly that same situation. The hood consensus, among responsible adults, is that if someone's sitting on your stoop who you don't know, they need to get moving. And quickly. Otherwise, you might find yourself mixed up in someone else's drug bust. It's the same thing when you see kids leaning on your car. They need to keep it moving, less you get tangled up in their business.
What continues to amaze me about these cops, is how they seem to, all at once, lack basic street sense and basic training. Why are you sitting on some dude's stoop, in Clinton Hill, in the first place? With earphones on, no less? You're just asking for beef. Why are you pulling out a gun and shooting someone over a fist fight? You're a cop, for God's sake. Why do you think pulling a gun and saying "Freeze, police!" but not showing any fucking ID, is gonna work? Don't they know that any drug dealer could do the same thing?
I don't understand it.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
"Something is happening here ... what it is ain't exactly clear ..." (Buffalo Springfield).
Senator Leahy has advocated for a hate crime bill that is overdue and has been pending for ten years.
Our national psyche has been damaged by the past 8 years and some of the infection is becoming epidemic.
It is incredibly lazy to be chalking this and other incidents up to Bush as a kind of infection in the water supply that turned everyone into reckless bigots.
It is incredibly lazy to be chalking this and other incidents up to Bush as a kind of infection in the water supply that turned everyone into reckless bigots.
Agreed, mostly.
The kind of "serve and protect myself before I give a damn about civilians" cop attitude is nothing new to the last eight, or twenty-eight years. However, I do believe the events of September 11th, 2001, would lead to a surge of young men joining the force in a fog of testosterone & machismo. I could be wrong, but, the Big Bad of that day seemed like a kind of infection in the water supply that turned a sizable portion of the populace (and nearly all of our representatives) into reckless bigots. How else does one explain Iraq (besides the PNAC/neocon agenda, I mean)?
If you believe that the events of 9/11 led to a surge in police enrollment, then give some info to back it up. Or better yet, show me how many of the cops involved in these killings joined after 9/11 or because of 9/11. What I`m saying is that I`m pretty sick of adults acting as if out of nowhere in 2000 George Bush invaded D.C. and now we get to blame everything wrong in ourselves and in our society on him. You cannot blame all of the events of 8 years on one day or one person. Also, don't contribute homocide and brutality to hormones, its like using "The Twinkie Defense", its tired, its dumb, and it doesn't apply.
Have to go with LCrawfty here, the police have been doing this for a long time, never heard of Amadou Diallo?
It's also a little premature to talk about bigotry when, according to the link, the police officer hasn't been identified yet. It may turn out that the cop was the same race as the victim.
One commenter on the site Coates linked to raised a good question though, I think: if you see a guy wearing headphones on your stoop, and he doesn't answer you when you tell him to leave, you should consider the possibility that he didn't hear you -- in which case, your next move might be to tap him on the shoulder to get his attention, instead of, say, kicking him.
Having spent ten years in predominantly black schools, I remember there being a tendency to escalate conflicts to an exchange of blows fairly quickly (I also spent a couple of years in predominantly white schools, so I have some basis for comparison). The stakes are too high for that nonsense today though, particularly if you live in an outer borough neighborhood like Clinton Hill, where the other guy could easily be packing heat and quick to use it.
It wouldn't matter if the cop were black or white; what matters is that the victim is black. As you know from being a regular commenter on this site, racism is societal and structural. That a black man would be automatically interpreted as a violent threat or danger -- and therefore shot before given any chance to explain himself -- is what matters here, and that is a result not of an individual cop's personal feelings or racial background, but a result of the fact that we live in a society that teaches us, even conditions us, to think of young black men as automatically threatening.
Also, instead of blaming the victim for getting shot because he kicked the cop off his stoop, why not ask why the cop was sitting on *someone else's private property*? Why should the property owner be blamed because the cop couldn't hear him ask him to get off his stoop?
Maya, lets stick to the facts. Walker was in fact being violent. He physically attacked someone for trespassing. That person happened to be a cop, who then shot him. His justification for shooting him looks pretty weak.
I'm not attacking your argument that this tragedy represents a societal problem or institutionalized racism. What I am saying is that twisting or ignoring facts, i.e., suggesting that Walker wasn't violent, doesn't help your argument.
If I have misinterpreted your intent, I apologize. If you just want to say that this shit happens way too often to people of color, then I agree completely.
"Maya, lets stick to the facts. Walker was in fact being violent."
What Marcus said.
Another thought though, as this incident mixes in my mind with an incident that happened near me earlier this week. I blogged about this elsewhere yesterday, but the first Sonic drive-in opened up in North Jersey a few weeks ago, on a busy highway, and the place has been so jammed that the Sonic has had to hire a couple of off-duty cops to handle the traffic. They can't let cars idle on the highway, so they wave people off when the lot is full. Tuesday night, one driver cursed out one of the cops, and when the cop reached inside the guys car for his ID, the driver hit the gas and swerved out on the road, and ended up smashing the cop against another car.
The cop ended up in the hospital with a broken leg and ankle, and the driver (who turned out to be a 23 year old Asian American with no license) was arrested. No shots were fired. Would shots have been fired if the driver were black? I don't think so. Not here.
Cops seem less likely to pull the trigger here. That might be because, with higher salaries, fewer spots, and more competition for each one, we get a better quality of cop, on average, than NYC does, I don't know. But everything can't be reduced to race, and when you try to do that, you miss out on other factors.
Dave,
The situation you describe at the Sonic is ripe for humorous racial stereotypes (and if I was counsel for the defendant, I might try to work that angle). (IANAL, but if I was, I'm sure I'd be shameless.)
Marcos,
I'd be lying if certain aspects of "The Fast and the Furious" movies didn't pop in my head when I saw perp's photo and name in the paper...
@LCrawfty: Ah, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say it was one day, or one president. I certainly don't have any links to back up increased enrollment in military or law enforcement. I was just remembering what it was like to be a stupid kid, a male, and wanting to belong to something bigger than myself. For better or worse, there was no calling, no mission, as I hit the skids between 17 and... uh, what's my age, now? I hope you noted my first sentence. In that, I wanted to imply that often enough, the kind of man who wants a career in law enforcement is exactly the kind of man I don't want as a police officer. Along with that, I wanted to note the attitude of some police that civilians are expendable whenever there's a question that harm may come to an officer. I think other comments have been more articulate & succinct at making this last point.
@FOARP: I haven't forgotten Amadou Diallo. I also remember Gregory Sevier. He was two years younger than me when police assisted his suicide, and yep, I believe it was easier for them to shoot him 6 times because he wasn't white, unlike themselves.
I don't have a clue to who the officer is, how long he's been with law enforcement, or how old he is, but I do know that taser abuse is rampant. I know that I generally don't trust the police as much as I'd like, and I find that a bit sad.
I guess I just wanted to point out that everything is connected, as corny as that sounds. It makes a difference who's president. Growing up in Kansas, as Reagan took office, I heard a fuck of a lot more racist terminology bandied about. It matters.
Does anyone else cringe when they read Sharpton is getting involved. I know he's doing the right thing, but his presence seems to have the exact opposite effect as far as public opinion goes throughout the country. I know his involvement along brings a lot of attention to the case, but a lot of people will look at it as the boy who cried wolf.
Yes, I do find it annoying. I don't necessarily question's Al's motives but I question his constant availability for THIS type of thing. Apparently though these families and inviduals usually call HIM, so I guess we can't blame him for going when he's called. But really, his appearance at these types of things is getting a little old at this point. Aren't there any other community activists out there? (A rhetorical question of course..)
Some of it may be a lack of knowledge on how to deal with the media attention. A family minding their own business one day and in the middle of a headline grabbing tragedy the next may have no clue how to respond when NBC comes calling. The Rev. Al definitely knows how to step up to a mic and he knows something about fighting against police brutality. That is a subject most people don't really study until something happens.
Your analysis of the abilities of Rev Sharpton are well noted. Unfortunately, many cases of suspicious police actions pass unnoticed unless someone with his visibility and ability to get political action is involved.
Some people may look may look at it as the boy who cried wolf, but the alternative is probably along the lines of most people never really looking at what happened at all. Unfortunately, I don't know of anyone else out there doing Al's job that has anywhere near his reach or pull.
No, I agree with you. It's just unfortunate because there are a large amount of people out there who view Sharpton so negatively, that his involvement alone is enough to make the plight seem illegitimate.
totally agree
The boy who cried WOLF?
tell that to the family who is about to BURY their LOVED one who was shot AT THEIR OWN HOUSE.
Now, folks always don't want it to be ' racial', but damn.
I still ask.
Give me 25 of these involving WHITE PEOPLE ACROSS AMERICA.
We're a country of 300 million.
You think you could find 25 of these incidents involving WHITE people as the victims.
But, somehow, that never happens.
Hmmmmmmm....
Yup, I don't think you can avoid being racial with this one. This story is so sad, and I think "how could it change," and unfortunately I come to the conclusion that it can only change if people find it ABSOLUTELY UNACCEPTABLE. And, there are just too many people who do not find it absolutely unacceptable that these black men are getting killed by police.
Oh and P.S. - that's why I respect Al Sharpton for being there on this. I don't cringe, I nod. Of course he's there. Now, if someone else wants to take the reigns on decrying police murders of innocent black men and being there for the families, more power to em. But I haven't noticed anyone trying to take over from the Reverend.
Well, I think it's clearly easier for the media to go to Sharpton when something like this happens. But as long as it continues to be Sharpton, the majority of Americans will continue not to give a shit.
I think you misunderstood me. I wasn't suggesting he was crying wolf. I'm simply saying that a lot of people look at him that way. I'm not saying he's not doing the right thing, but a lot of people DO look at him that way. For a lot of Americans, the very fact that Sharpton is involved will make them take the side of the police. That's real.
The news reports indicate the NYPD were conducting some sort of drug bust in the neighborhood, but Walker's home was not a target.
I don't live in the hood, but I can guarantee you that some unknown person on my porch, driveway or yard would be encouraged to move along, immediately.
This is literally too close to home for me. I grew up in Clinton Hill, just a block away from Lafayette and Classon; my mother still lives there, and I have too many childhood friends who could've been on the receiving end of that bullet.
It makes my head ache that NYPD seems to have absolutely no learning curve on this issue. Are they all really that dim (which is cause for deep concern)? Or do they just not care to learn how to keep from killing innocent citizens (which is cause for deeper concern)?
I respect the job, and the life and death challenges of doing the job, but part of doing any job is getting better at it. The police don't seem to be getting better at this part of it, and that's beyond tragic--it's insulting.
It makes my head ache that NYPD seems to have absolutely no learning curve on this issue.
Well, what sort of consequences do you think the officer in this case will face? Probably a couple weeks of paid vacation while a sham surrounded by people telling him he did everything right until a review clears him of wrongdoing and then he's back on the street. So, how would he learn? And how would the NYPD as a whole learn?
Ugh typing in the morning. That should read:
Well, what sort of consequences do you think the officer in this case will face? Probably a couple weeks of paid vacation surrounded by people telling him he did everything right until a sham review clears him of wrongdoing and then he's back on the street. So, how would he learn? And how would the NYPD as a whole learn?
And that's why it's insulting. The paid vacation, the sham review and the "shocked--shocked to find gambling at Rick's" response that these killings frequently generate all mean that there's no reason for the police to change or to grow.
The public at large seems to either accept it as the cost of doing business (collateral damage, or whatever you choose to call it), or ignore it as a fluke, since it doesn't affect them personally. As a result, we don't do our job of holding the police accountable to the community they're being paid to protect and serve.
To very poorly paraphrase Fannie Lou Hamer, until the violent death of a civilian matters as much as the violent death of a police officer, we won't have justice.
How the individual officer's punishment is handled is almost not relevant. There's a systemic problem in the NYPD. This shit happens far too often.
My home town, Los Angeles, had a similar problem. It took a consent decree and bringing in Bill Bratton to turn things around, and it hasn't been easy along the way. I'm not saying that the problem is solved, but L.A. does seem to have turned a corner.
I grew up here during the bad old days, when you wanted to have your hands empty and clearly visible whenever the police were around, especially if you looked "ethnic". And my bad old days were nothing in comparison to those of the generations before.
I think it is relevant. As you say, this shit happens far too often. My point is just that law enforcement personnel at all levels are insulated well against the consequences of their own fuck-ups.
Unfortunately, a lot of people are blinded to these issues at best by their faith in "law and order" and at worst by the vicarious thrill they get in seeing Authority visit violence upon an easily scapegoated Other.
Perhaps I didn't put that the right way. It is certainly relevant, in that if the cop gets off scott free it would be a horrible miscarriage of justice (at least based on what we know at this point). But the larger issue looms: WTF is up with NYPD? WTF is up with so many PDs across the country? There is something wrong systemically, institutionally, and culturally with enough police departments that it can't just be pinned on NYPD, either.
Nor should we say that the problem is the "cop mentality". There are other large cities that don't seem to have these problems repeatedly. Most police are good people that do very difficult jobs. (I'm very pro-police, if you can't tell.) But we cannot blame a problem that crops up with such frequency to the proverbial few bad apples. Something is broken. Irish Pirate has the idea that it is the War on Drugs that has broken policing in the U.S., and maybe he is right. Certainly he is at least partially right.
"WTF is up with NYPD?"
After the Steven Lawrence affair in the UK they labelled the London Metropolitan Police "institutionally racist", a phrase which has stuck. It means that while plenty of people within the organisation do not discriminate, the tactics and structure of the organisation have an effect that is indistinguishable from racism.
Damn, didn't know that "Institutionally racist" was originally a Stokely Carmichael rif:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_racism
Another death because of the insanity of the "drug war".
Sometimes it's like this where a cop shoots someone who was innocent or more often it is thug killing thug or thug killing innocent.
In the end it is just needless death.
I saw this story a few days ago.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/07/14/2009-07-14_earphone_snafu_lead_to_mans_death_at_the_hands_of_undercover_cop.html#ixzz0LFSObDXk&D
It seems to me that the situation got out of hand quickly because of all involved.
I can understand this guy wanting the cop off his stoop. I don't condone him allegedly kicking the cop in the back of the head, but I've punched a drunk trying to force his way into my building so I can understand. Sometimes adrenaline and anger is a very bad thing.
As I read the article I was mumbling to myself "please don't let that cop be black - please don't let that cop be black."
I don't know that neighborhood, but most likely, the cop was black, right? They probably wouldn't have a white undercover officer in that neighborhood for fear of sticking out, but again, I don't know enough about the area.
Theres' a fair amount of gentrification going on around there, so seeing white people is far from uncommon. In fact, there's a pretty popular little cafe about 2 blocks up Lafayatte from where this happened that has a mostly white yuppie, gentrifier clientele.
I was just pointing to the fact that we have this monolith thing in our heads so much that when one black person does something bad, many of us feel the sting a little on the inside, like we're responsible for one another's actions.
Because white people don't buy drugs? Clinton Hill is a nice historic neighborhood with some beautiful homes and some less than hot blocks. Some people say it's gentrifying but that doesn't really take into account it's full 170 year history. Walt Whitman lived there but so did Biggie. Google map 370 Lafayette, Clinton Hill, click street view and look around.
I think I understand Teknontheou's point. Police brutality is a problem beyond race though, yes? Does the Sharpton element turn people off who would otherwise be receptive to the message? Rev. Al was saying there was nothing strange about Michael Jackson last week.
NY Post reports the cops are saying this guy cracked the cop in the head with something. The family is saying he was in town visiting and stepping out for a pack of smokes. How did these two guys not sort this out?
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/07/12/2009-07-12_handyman_shot_dead_by_undercover_drug_officer_in_buy_and_bust_deal_gone_wrong.html
No, because I was working under the assumption that it was a predominatly black neighborhood. It would make more sense to have a black undercover cop. Like I said, I don't know the neighborhood. I'm white, and I buy drugs all the time.
Why? I think I might understand, but I don't want to make unwarranted assumption. Why were you hoping that the officer that killed Shem Walker was not black?
But, as in just about every case like this, the cop is a terrible, terrible cop.
This is not the first time a NYC plainclothesman has chosen to take someone's life rather than identify himself as a law officer or, heaven forbid, actually back down in a fight. Remember, Patrick Dorismund got killed after tangling with a plainclothesman who had two backup officers standing nearby to help.
Question
If the second nearby undercover officer clearlt heard the first yell "freeze" then how did he not hear Mr Walker yell for the first to get of off his stoop before he removed him himself?
There is a long, long chain of violent, paranoid tribal weirdness in cop behavior in this country going back the last couple of decades. Cops shooting people dead instead of IDing themselves? Cops throwing old ladies to the floor after a noise complaint at a suburban political fundraiser? Groups of cops riddling a Chicago speeder with bullets because the poor woman was too scared to hold still when ordered? Lines of cops assaulting peaceful demonstrators because they think they're all deadly anarchists? Cops assaulting groups of senior citizens because they happen to be on the same street as a demonstration? Cops making mass drug raids in junior high schools and threating 13 year olds with weapons and dogs?
Sounds like something the Atlantic should do a long, long series of articles on. There is a sickness in cop sub-culture and someone needs to put it out in the opening.
http://jezebel.com/5114260/report-police-targeted-preteen-in-prostitution-raid
Or cops who arrest a 12 year old girl in her yard for being a prostitute.
This story never fails to bother me.
Perhaps some part of it is a consequence of the greater voice citizens have nowadays in protesting bad cop behavior, and the greater transparency with community relations board investigations and such. Forces have reacted defensively, rather than using these investigations as lessons in future training of officers. I remember being so shocked about Diallo - not that it happened, but that the officers showed so little intelligence/training in the situation.
I think most police force reaction to the increased scrutiny has been very defensive - "we're doing a dangerous, difficult job, you don't understand it, you just criticize." I expect there is some self-examination in plenty of forces, but if the main reaction is defensive, which I think it has been in the NYPD, there will be less of a well-intentioned, good-faith effort to really prevent innocent civilians from losing their lives.
I'm not sure what the alternative could be if a police department were to get rid of that structure, but perhaps it's worth contemplating at least.
More cops on the beat instead of in their cars. Cars should be for quick responses to disturbances and back-up, while beat cops are for crime prevention. Plains clothes officers should also have vastly different rules of engagement than full uniform. It's ridiculous to think that anybody can shout "Freeze Police" while brandishing a gun and expect somebody to not run etc.
And seriously, you couldn't hear somebody yelling two feet away from you? I'm calling BS, as that sounds extremely dangerous to be on the street as a cop and not be able to hear.
I swear I hit reply under silent beeps comment 10 or so down.
"There is a sickness in cop sub-culture and someone needs to put it out in the opening."
This above sentence reminds me of a pretty fascinating book on the "sickness of cop culture" from a former cop. Breaking Rank: A Top Cop's Expose of the Dark Side of American Policing by Norm Stamper. Just a suggestion.
@Coates-it's not that the cops lose their street sense and understanding of the dynamics of the hood, it's that they could give a f***. It's the arrogance of knowing I can kill another person under the protections of NYPD standard operating procedures and the paranoid acquiescence of the War on Drugs and NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.
As Matt D said
"Well, what sort of consequences do you think the officer in this case will face? Probably a couple weeks of paid vacation surrounded by people telling him he did everything right until a sham review clears him of wrongdoing and then he's back on the street. So, how would he learn? And how would the NYPD as a whole learn?" I would add, "why" should they learn.
It may then be similar to the bizarre behavior that led to the recent supreme court strip search case. The actions of the people doing the search showed no sane sense of proportion (to anyone but Clarence Thomas) but did suggest that a sub-culture of school officials now regard students and parents as a demonic "enemy" rather than the human beings who they work with and for.
The problem with the NYPD, and the reason the cop had "no street smarts", is that a TON of the cops are not native to NYC. They're Long Islanders. I grew up in suburban Suffolk County, and a huge number of people I went to high school with joined the NYPD. City police jobs are much easier to get than Suffolk County police jobs, so suburban kids join the city force. They have NO idea about the neighborhoods or proper city behavior, and respond as such. I think that plays a major role in a lot of these cases.
That is actually a similar problem in Oakland or at least it was until recently when the city passed an ordinance stating that police officers had to be from within three miles of the city. It's that whole neighborhood policing thing which is important.
NYC doesn't have enough folks that want to be cops? Seriously?
I'm not sure it's that NYC doesn't have enough people who want to be cops, but that Suffolk County has TOO many people who want to be cops. Suffolk pays something like $90,000 to cops (with overtime) and it's not a high crime area, so it's a very lucrative job, and one of the only ways to get onto the force is with prior experience, like a city police job. I guess NYC doesn't put the pressure on the "neighborhood policing" aspect, so kids with good grades and high test scores from LI are eagerly accepted.
That's a shame. I forgot how low NYC cops are paid so even if you wanted to be a cop you couldn't afford to do so and live in the city.
Oakland pays its cops starting at 70K+ benefits which is okay given how much it now costs to live in the city. From what I have seen it appears that NYC doesn't care about neighborhood policing because if it really did, I'm sure shit like this wouldn't have happened.
2009 starting salary + benefits for most recent NYC 2009 Police class: $49,000
And, sadly, this salary is a big win for the Police department since, a year or so prior, starting salary was in the mid $20,0000 range.
Yeah, the jealous NYPD joke that if you see someone speeding in Suffolk County, it's a cop on his way to cash his paycheck. And as for the NYPD living outside the 5 boroughs, the “CPR” logo on their patrol cars is supposed to stand for Courtesy, Professionalism and Respect; but they say it actually refers to Copiague, Patchogue and Ronkonkoma.
Isn't "hate crime" redundant? Anyone ever commit a crime with love and compassion? I think that if you commit a crime, you should get jailed for as much time as you deserve, period.
Well, at the risk of total thread-jacking, I'd bring up mercy killings. Say what you will about them, but the perpetrators certainly don't believe they're acting on hate.
There's also a distinction between 1st degree murder, 2nd degree, manslaughter, etc. [Is manslaughter when you kill someone with no hate?] If you kill someone with your car on purpose, society thinks you "deserve" more time than if you did it by accident. So intention does play a role in sentencing...
I guess the other question is, if you beat someone up because you have a beef with them, you've pretty much affected one person. If you beat someone up in order to show other people what you are going to do to them... is that the same? Obviously, that's very tricky, and showing in a court of law what someone's intention is in that case is even trickier. But I would say that it does have a broader impact, and that's part of the intent, and therefore isn't completely irrelevant to sentencing.
Good point. I think you've summarized part of the purpose of hate crime legislation there - to address crimes meant to "send a message" to a wider community, beyond the individual victim.
If Walker bumrushed/blindsided this cop and was whipping the mess right out of him before lunging for his gun, it's a different story. Cop might not have had time to pull his badge. On the other hand, if Walker was shot after saying "no don't," or there was no lunge for his weapon, that's problematic, to say the least.
It seems Walker might have gone to his death thinking the cop was a vagrant/pusher who was about to shoot him.
Pretty clear there was a tragedy there. So going back and doing it over again, how would I fix it? A couple things seem pretty obvious to me. If a cop uses somebody's private property for use in a bust - particularly if the cop is plainclothes - they ought to make some sort of an effort to identify themselves as a cop before they start using it. Realize that anybody wearing plainclothes can pretend to be a cop, and that unless you've got your badge out and uniform on, people might not believe you. (And even then, criminals can buy fake uniforms and badges). If it's a concern for that particular bust, get a warrant that says you can call in some uniformed officers to the residence to make sure the folks indoors don't tip off the suspects. Seriously, it's a planned bust, not a beat cop getting randomly threatened. You have no excuse not to make a reasonable effort at protecting the lives and security of bystanders. Finally, if you're on duty in a hazardous job, you always, always have to be aware of what's going on around you. That's as true for a cop as it is for a construction worker. You got your earphones on and can't hear behind you? You better have a partner two feet away who can let you know if something's up.
Speaking as someone who has had his house used by the police on a couple of occasions (they gave us a box of biscuits afterwards, which was nice) I totally second this. It's only when they start viewing everyone in the neighbourhood as potentially hostile that you get this kind of thing happening.
Perhaps some of this "paranoid" cop sub-cutlture, at least, partially derives from the para-military structure of police departments. This very foundation of how the police is organized, is in a war paradigm. A war against whom? The people the people have sworn to protect? In the book I mentioned above, Norm Stamper, a former Seattle police chief, advocates getting rid of this military structure, because in part, it too easily leads into a mindset that creates a war mentality, which creates an "us vs. them" kill-or-be killed mentality (as opposed to emphasizing protecting people in the community). I'm not sure what the alternative could be if a police department were to get rid of that structure, but perhaps it's worth contemplating at least.
The alternative is called "Community Policing", and it's harder to do in general, and much harder to do in a place like Los Angeles. (Am I remembering correctly that you are a fellow Angeleno?) The general idea is that police officers are members of the community and not set apart.
Alternative might be a misleading word. You still need some aspects of paramilitary structure to run an effective PD, such as hierarchical military command structure, discipline, and professionalism. Also, the paramilitary structure arose in response to corruption, incompetence, and unprofessionalism in PDs. LAPD Chief Parker, who served from 1950 to 1966, was credited with professionalizing LAPD, although he has been accused of racism or condoning racism, especially in recent years. Anyway, the history of the LAPD is pretty fascinating.
Right, I knew a little bit about community policing, not much though. I couldn't wrap my brain around that concept working for a large city like L.A. or N.Y. since what little I knew of it, it just seemed quite difficult to accomplish. Yes, I am a fellow Angeleno.
Well, even if a police department were to evolve into some type of hyprid with "community policing" and military command it would still be an alternative, no? Perhaps the world "alternative" sounds too radical for political purposes though. I'm sure some people would roll their eyes over the idea of having of "alt-police" around! ;)
LOL @ alt-police. Indie Police and College Oriented Police sound even worse.
I think Chief Bratton has worked towards the sort of hybrid we're discussing. Some of the change involves changing the culture within the LAPD which is surely an uphill battle. Others have to do with creating policy and altering practices.
Remember the May Day Police Riot in 2007 in MacArthur Park? A huge black eye for the department, but Bratton handled the aftermath really well. The key thing is that the commanding officer responsible for the police response at MacArthur Park was forced to resign. Bratton didn't scapegoat the rank and file.
I went to an anti-war demo in Hollywood about a year previous*, and I saw the police doing it right, which made the MacArthur Park thing such a shock to me. The visible police presence was mostly bicycle cops, who have good mobility in a crowd of marchers, but are less threatening/provocative than, say, riot police. However, the riot police were very nearby on standby. I hadn't particpated in the march, but had parked near the end of the march rally point, where there was music and speeches. Walking down an alley to Hollywood Blvd., I saw the command post with a contingent of riot Cops and then 2 blocks further down the alley, another unit of riot cops. Fortunately, they weren't needed, but it was good they were there. Whoever was commanding the police was smart to tuck them away where their very presence wouldn't antagonize the more militant lefties.
*I'm not a demo kind of guy. I went at the behest of my best and oldest friend, who is a flaming liberal. To be honest, I find demos to be a waste of time at best, or at worst, a putrid pool of diseased rhetoric, like the Tea Parties.
There was something in the paper a few months ago about how Ray Kelly wanted all his police to be trained to use AR-15s. Just in case Fallujah breaks out in Times Square I guess.
Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1499 (AH).
Basically the cop brought a gun to a fistfight, and killed someone as a result.
There's a reason for the British policing system.
Policing strategies need to evolve. I mean, what was the point of this undercover being there, other than to stir shit up? Police need to defuse situations, not start situations.
I guess more facts will come out in time, but these cases happen every year and in most of of them, it could have been solved by the cop avoiding a physical confrontation: backing away, showing a badge, trying to clarify the situation.
I write this knowing that last night, 2 cops were shot and seriously injured in Jersey City. They tried to bust a guy who was wanted in several armed robberies, he shot at them and grazed them with a shotgun, the backup arrived and chased him into an apartment, and two police were shot coming through the front door.
I think, every cop goes into a situation thinking that getting killed is a possible outcome and they take every possible precaution to avoid that possibility. Meanwhile, I'm thinking, why in the hell did the cops originally try to bust him without waiting for backup first? Why didn't they put themselves in a winning situation?
What I'm getting at is, I'd rather my police be smart, than be heroes. It's better for the cop, and it's better for the community.
Shem Walker wasn't the target of the bust. The cop was part of an undercover operation in the neighborhood and someone elsewhere on the street was the target.
I don't think Walker is faultless in his own tragedy. Where did he get off kicking a stranger in the head to get the stranger's attention? Whether justified because of the trespass or not, Walker attacked someone who happened to have a gun.
Still, the brunt of the blame is on both the individual officer and the department. No question about that. A policeman has a special responsibility to use deadly force only when necessary, and getting punched and kicked doesn't justify killing a man, especially when fellow officers were coming to his aid.
I also don't completely buy the excuse that the cop didn't hear Walker's demand that he get off of Walker's stoop. The excuse is that the cop didn't hear him because he was wearing earphones so that he could monitor the operation. If this is true, it means he was wearing in-ear headphones or (less likely) cans that cover the entire ear. From a tactical standpoint this is incredibly stupid as it drastically reduces your situational awareness. This is a worse than rookie mistake. Mistakes like this get people killed, as happened here. This points to real problems with NYPD training that have nothing to do with cultural sensitivities and everything to do with competence and tactical preparedness.
Awesome that the police press release notes that both the officer and victim were black. Classy.
Are you saying that the information is not pertinent?
When I was in college, a NYC police officer spoke during one of my criminal justice classes. After his speech, during the Q&A session, he was asked, why police officers did not make every effort not to lethally injure a perpetrator (or alleged perpetrator)by shooting them in the leg or arm instead of areas of the body (chest, head, etc.) that would cause more severe harm? His response: "Police Officers are trained to shoot to kill."
Police officers are trained to shoot for "center mass". The idea of "shooting to wound" is not realistic.
During my long ago military days I fired a variety of weapons. Three different types of handguns, two different types of rifles, and my personal favorite the LAW(light anti tank weapon) rocket. Oops, I forgot the shotgun. That was fun. Point and shoot and you are almost guaranteed to hit something at close range.
It's very difficult even for a trained shooter to fire a handgun accurately. Very few people can do it. It's not like on TV or in the movies where some guy can shoot the wings off a fly while riding a horse backwards through Central Park.
I'll have more to say on this general topic later. First, an early dinner beckons.
I have absolutely no love for cops but this is the one area where I think they're in the right. If you're going to shoot someone, you aim for the middle of them. The last thing we need is for a bunch of low-grade marksmen tossing shots off into the neighborhood while trying to hit somebody's moving arm. That's a great way to kill some innocent bystanders.
There are many silly comments on this thread. Which is amazing since I've only commented twice.
First, Al Sharpton would show up at the opening of an envelope if there were TV cameras around.
Second, you can view this incident on a macro and micro level.
On the macro level you'll find that most of the incidents where cops fire their weapons, whether justifiably or not, are somehow drug related.
End the stupidity of the "drug war" and the number of these incidents will go down drastically. I'm hoping President Obama's new "drug czar", a former police chief in Seattle, can bring some sanity to how we deal with drugs. Treat it as a public health problem. Not a freaking "war".
On a micro level the undercover cop wearing headphones was stupid. Sitting on someone's "stoop" without their permission was also stupid. I don't know what exactly happened, but those decisions obviously contributed to this death.
As for Rikyrah's comment:
Give me 25 of these involving WHITE PEOPLE ACROSS AMERICA.
We're a country of 300 million.
You think you could find 25 of these incidents involving
WHITE people as the victims.
But, somehow, that never happens.
Hmmmmmmm...."
Cops shoot white folks too. Although, whether they wrongly shoot white folks at the rate they shoot black folks is probably your point.
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_01.html
Justifiable Homicides Committed by Police Officers, by Race of Decedent, as Reported in the SHR and NVSS: United States, 1976–1998
Race SHR, No. (%) NVSS, No. (%) Ratio: SHR to NVSS
White 4832 (56) 4148 (62) 1.2
Black 3592 (41) 2359 (35) 1.5
Other 173 (2) 179 (3) 1.0
Unknown 61 (1) 0 (0) 0
Total 8658 (100) 6686 (100) 1.29
There was a recent shooting, non fatal, of a white college student in his dorm in Michigan. Some tipster told the cops the kid has a large amount of illegal drugs in his possession. Thankfully the student lived and the police confiscated nearly enough marijuana to make 1/2 a joint or so. Clearly an unjustified shooting. Kid didn't resist.
There was also a recent case out east where police conducted a raid on the house of a local Mayor. Killed his dog I believe. Found nothing. Cops were not municipal and had a bad tip.
Stupid cop tricks are not just limited to happening to the black community. Do they occur more frequently to blacks? Certainly.
Which brings me back to my argument against the drug war.........it's time to go all Lee at Appomattox and surrender.
IP, in these statistics, do they mention how they determine "justifiable homicide"? I do wonder if that would change the racial percentages.
That's a legal definition, means it was in self-defence, defence of another, or otherwise justifiable. Basically any killing by on-duty policemen which wasn't murder/manslaughter/unlawful or accidental killing.
Jennifer,
trying to figure out those stats is difficult.
Unless you believe that there is some massive conspiracy to hide police shootings then police kill about 500 people a year in this country. Roughly 40 percent of the dead are black.
What percentage of those roughly 200 dead blacks folks were shot "unjustifiably"? I have no idea because people are going to disagree on what is justifiable.
The Oakland BART shooting was clearly unjustifiable. My guess is that the percentage of such shootings that are truly unjustified is low double digits or maybe single digits. This shooting should not have happened
Generally the people who cops shoot are shooting at the cops or trying to shoot at the cops. Mistakes do happen. Innocents do get killed by the police.
I do know that most of the police involved shootings that happen in Chicago, where I rule and those of you who live elsewhere drool, are somehow drug related.
Which brings me back to the "drug war" argument. Ending the drug war would probably result in 300 or more fewer deaths each year at the hands of the police and also fewer cops killed by thugs.
Please double check, but I believe the police office may have also been black - so maybe no hate crime. However, drub busts can go bad and do - and the record of accomplishment for the 'war on drugs', the way it has been fought for 3 decades, may be an abysmal failure. Maybe we finally need to realize that the antiquated 'prohibition' approach to stopping drugs is not working...and do something radically different. The War on Drugs is another example of a multi-billion dollar'War Machine' that 'crime fighting bureaucracies' get rich on.
Gah. I am seriously disturbed that I have only heard about this here. Has the MSM just bailed? Yeah, thought so.....
I'm sorry, Ta-Nehisi, but as Glenn Reynolds, Mickey Kaus, and perhaps even your "friend" and colleague Megan McArdle will take pains to inform you, YOU are the real racist here for even bringing this up. Shame on you.
As an elementary school teacher, it is my responsibility to teach my students about community leaders...that includes police officers. While what happened took place on the East Coast, it could have happened in East Oakland, CA where I teach as well. It is a tragedy every way you look at it. A young man lost his life for no reason. A young man's first response was physical. A police officer shows no respect for one's home by not informing them of his presence. A police officer's first response was to pull a gun. How do I tell my students that you have to respect a police officer when this happens?