So I just finished accidentally watching the beginning of the news & caught the most recent beating of a minority at the hands of the LAPD (well, i've seen that clip like 10x now). Now, don't get me wrong, I'm sure that 99% of the force are upstanding crime-fighters who chose this career to help the communities they grew up in or as their little way of helping the world. However, we seem to see way too many of these cases on tv (need i remind you of the baby girl that was shot & killed in watts when officers, after a long standoff, took out the father- holding her as a hostage- & the baby as well)...clear cases of crossing the line when using excessive force. None of us were there, so we don't know the adrenaline that flows during those tenuous situations. What's more disturbing is this: if we're seeing this much on tv, there's got to be a sizable number of incidents that we don't even know about.
Everyone talks about "innocent until proven guilty" when officers aren't suspended (in this case, the 2 officers involved have "desk duty" now). I'm in full agreement with that but if that's the case, why is the "suspect" (William Cardenas, i think) still in jail (& will remain in jail as he can't afford bail) during this investigation? FBI's involved now too which is good because it seems the 2nd officer (not the 1 beating the suspect) changed his field report of the incident. We'll see what happens as Chief William Bratton has an internal task force looking into it as well.
I recall learning about government in high school & how our democracy was created as a checks & balances system (ie. house, senate vote but pres. also has veto power). Pretty complicated stuff but it's all for naught if everyone keeps looking the other way.
Labels: activism, civics, commentary
