Anti-Police Brutality Bill Named After Eric Garner Would Set National Standard for Excessive Force

[SummerMadness]

Anti-Police Brutality Bill Named After Eric Garner Would Set National Standard for Excessive Force

When Gwen Carr testified at a congressional hearing on police misconduct on Thursday, she said there has been no accountability for her son's choke hold death by an NYPD officer on Staten Island over five years ago − and she pushed for congress members to vote for a bill that would make choke holds illegal under federal civil rights law.

The Excessive use of Force Prevention Act will be dubbed the "Eric Garner Anti-Chokehold" Bill, after Carr's son whose last words "I can't breathe" became a national rallying cry for activists fighting against police misconduct and brutality.

 

[John P. Alexander]

The American police force needs to be cleaned up from the top down.

 

[Goonie]

National standards for excessive force? Does this mean they get punished for not being excessive enough? (Might have misunderstood)

 

[Ken-1122]

I find it interesting they like to call it a "choke hold" death", but the reality is, if your throat were compressed in a choke hold, you would be unable to say that you can't breath.

 

[SummerMadness]

I find it interesting they like to call it a "choke hold" death", but the reality is, if your throat were compressed in a choke hold, you would be unable to say that you can't breath.

An illegal choke hold was used. That the a victim can speak speaks more for whether their airway is completely obstructed, but a choke hold was still done. Seriously, the lengths people go to defend the indefensible.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

It's a shame that people have to die in order for there to be a call for accountability in the police departments in our country.

List of killings by law enforcement officers by countries - Wikipedia


No matter which data point you look at, even if you control for our higher numbers of firearm ownership and completely eliminate the cases where the suspect was armed, the US police forces still kill more citizens per capita than any other first world country.

We have a real issue with lack of training and screening in our country. 6 months and a cursory psych eval is pretty much all it takes to become a cop in the US.

 

[usexpat97]

I find it interesting they like to call it a "choke hold" death", but the reality is, if your throat were compressed in a choke hold, you would be unable to say that you can't breath.

You will say you can't breathe if your heart is giving out. A literal choke hold might not necessarily do it, but all forms of excessive police force can. A choke hold can also do it, if you have two police officers lying on top of you.

 

[Ken-1122]

An illegal choke hold was used. That the a victim can speak speaks more for whether their airway is completely obstructed, but a choke hold was still done. Seriously, the lengths people go to defend the indefensible.

.

 

[Ken-1122]

An illegal choke hold was used. That the a victim can speak speaks more for whether their airway is completely obstructed, but a choke hold was still done. Seriously, the lengths people go to defend the indefensible.

Yeah a choke hold was used for a few seconds, but when he was saying that he couldn't breath, he wasn't being choked at that time, and he wasn't being choked when he died so it wouldn't be accurate to say he was choked to death.

 

[SummerMadness]

Yeah a choke hold was used for a few seconds, but when he was saying that he couldn't breath, he wasn't being choked at that time, and he wasn't being choked when he died so it wouldn't be accurate to say he was choked to death.

Still trying your best to ignore police killing civilians...

 

[Kaon]

Anti-Police Brutality Bill Named After Eric Garner Would Set National Standard for Excessive Force

This is to satiate the public that actually cares about this. Nothing will actually be done; if the current laws can be bent to acquit every cop that shoots an unarmed civilian (especially when it pertains to hyphenated Americans) then this means nothing. The American juries are acquitting these cops, and American prosecutors are purposefully indicting them on the wrong charges.

The police are a fraternal order: they protect their own first, then us when it comes to their questionable activity. So, hooray for another distrsction; in 20 years they will find a novel way to murder more hyphenated Americans in the street... on camera... In front of witnesses - until there are none left (getting away with it, and then carry on.) When there are no Hyphenated Americans left to subjugate, Americans that matter are next.

 

[Ana the Ist]

This is to satiate the public that actually cares about this. Nothing will actually be done; if the current laws can be bent to acquit every cop that shoots an unarmed civilian (especially when it pertains to hyphenated Americans) then this means nothing. The American juries are acquitting these cops, and American prosecutors are purposefully indicting them on the wrong charges.

The police are a fraternal order: they protect their own first, then us when it comes to their questionable activity. So, hooray for another distrsction; in 20 years they will find a novel way to murder more hyphenated Americans in the street... on camera... In front of witnesses - until there are none left (getting away with it, and then carry on.) When there are no Hyphenated Americans left to subjugate, Americans that matter are next.

Oooohhh....scary.

 

[Kaon]

It's a shame that people have to die in order for there to be a call for accountability in the police departments in our country.

List of killings by law enforcement officers by countries - Wikipedia


No matter which data point you look at, even if you control for our higher numbers of firearm ownership and completely eliminate the cases where the suspect was armed, the US police forces still kill more citizens per capita than any other first world country.

We have a real issue with lack of training and screening in our country. 6 months and a cursory psych eval is pretty much all it takes to become a cop in the US.

The problem isn't training.

But, I am not saying the problem, even though most of us already know it (but choose to ignore it). It is too late to fix anything anyway; a solution would be provided only for the same thing to happen in a nuanced way - particularly and specifically because we allow it to happen.

 

[usexpat97]

The problem isn't training.

Amen. You cannot "train" people not to be corrupt.

What also bothers me is that the solution constantly being sold to us is to just federalize everything. As if that is somehow better.

 

[Kaon]

Amen. You cannot "train" people not to be corrupt.

What also bothers me is that the solution constantly being sold to us is to just federalize everything. As if that is somehow better.

If it is a federal or training problem, people don't have to care about the human that was gunned down or brutalized by police. It is a nice deflection from guilt of doing nothing but benefiting from the system that allows the justification and execution these actions.

 

[Ken-1122]

Still trying your best to ignore police killing civilians...

Absurd! The choke hold didn’t kill him, and if they had taken him down the legal way; wrestled him to the ground, and cuff him; he likely would have suffered the same heart attack and died anyway; this bill wouldn’t have changed the outcome. This bill is just an attempt to appease those who are tired of seeing black men killed by police officers. It ain’t gonna work because nothing is going to change.

 

[John P. Alexander]

In this country, trained police officers can panic and "fear for their lives" and act on impulse and shoot civilians and almost always get away with it due to that clause (fear for life), but untrained civilians must remain calm with a gun pointed at them. Police the police!

 

[ThatRobGuy]

The problem isn't training.

Amen. You cannot "train" people not to be corrupt.

The corruption aspect is a problem, but that's not what I was referring to in this particular instance.

The corruption tends to show up in the form of planting evidence, turning a blind eye to "beat downs", letting other cops off the hook when they pull them over and they're intoxicated, etc... There are obviously the instances like the Shaver case we see where it was just a blatantly corrupt cop gunning someone down (because he appeared to enjoy it), but I don't think that's the majority of police shootings.

With the unarmed suspects getting shot, the training is a huge factor. When you review the tapes, in a lot of cases, the police appear to be reacting out of fear, and a police officer shouldn't be so afraid of an unarmed suspect that they reach for the gun first before other means of subduing. That's clearly someone who's not confident in their abilities to handle themselves.

If you look at the types of training most police departments use, it's basically a kids' karate class with adults, combined with the fact that the physical fitness requirements apparently go away once a cop graduates from the academy.... and yet people seem to be shocked that they try to resort to weapon use to subdue a suspect.

There are videos (can't link them here because they involve shootings) on YouTube that compare and contrast how police take downs are done in European countries vs. here.

 

[Kaon]

The corruption aspect is a problem, but that's not what I was referring to in this particular instance.

The corruption tends to show up in the form of planting evidence, turning a blind eye to "beat downs", letting other cops off the hook when they pull them over and they're intoxicated, etc... There are obviously the instances like the Shaver case we see where it was just a blatantly corrupt cop gunning someone down (because he appeared to enjoy it), but I don't think that's the majority of police shootings.

With the unarmed suspects getting shot, the training is a huge factor. When you review the tapes, in a lot of cases, the police appear to be reacting out of fear, and a police officer shouldn't be so afraid of an unarmed suspect that they reach for the gun first before other means of subduing. That's clearly someone who's not confident in their abilities to handle themselves.

If you look at the types of training most police departments use, it's basically a kids' karate class with adults, combined with the fact that the physical fitness requirements apparently go away once a cop graduates from the academy.... and yet people seem to be shocked that they try to resort to weapon use to subdue a suspect.

There are videos (can't link them here because they involve shootings) on YouTube that compare and contrast how police take downs are done in European countries vs. here.

It is a corruption problem also, but that isn't the problem either. American police are a fraternal order that will protect its brothers in blue before the civilian should anything happen to the officer. But, even this isn't the major problem.

Ask yourself this: what would happen if police killed unarmed Korean-American men with the same frequency, precision and method they do African-America men? What about if they were German-America, or even Nigerian-American (African-Americans with a nation to claim them)?

Do you think American Police would get away with what they do then? Would those nations let it slide, or would they be incensed that America is killing their people? Remember what happened when the Australian woman was killed by an American cop? The problem is deep-rooted, and it is the real reason why the nation has always been divided (it just took a demagogue to polarize the nation).

 

[Ken-1122]

Ask yourself this: what would happen if police killed unarmed Korean-American men with the same frequency, precision and method they do African-America men? What about if they were German-America, or even Nigerian-American (African-Americans with a nation to claim them)?

Do you think American Police would get away with what they do then?

What frequency, precision and method, do police kill unarmed African-American men, and how does this compare to how they kill all the other unarmed American men?