Police Brutality Against African American

So far in the year of 2015, 66 unarmed African Americans have been killed by police authorities. Ever since the death Michael Brown in August 2014, the world has become much more aware of police brutality. According to wisegeek.org, police brutality is “a form of police misconduct in which officers engage in an excessive use of force.” Police brutality against African Americans is an issue that has been causing a lot of controversy in the past year. This issue needs much more awareness than ever before, since there have been many startling cases during and after the Ferguson protest. While there are many solutions to ending police brutality, most of them are difficult to accomplish individually. However, as a community, there are a couple solutions

The use of body cameras would be beneficial, since studies show that it has led to a dramatic decrease in police brutalities in certain areas. Body cameras would capture any abuse that occurs between a police officer and a civilian. “Body cameras will help provide documentation and accountability.” (Tweney, D) Because police officers would be aware that they are being recorded, they are less likely to commit any cruelty. Not only would body cameras help prevent violence, it would help the community feel much safer. Since African Americans are twice as likely to be unarmed when killed by law enforcement, this could give them some form of reassurance. In May of 2015, the Orlando Police Department did a trial of using body cameras on their officers. During this time they found that there was a 53% drop of “use-of-force-incidents” and most officers did not feel hampered from wearing the camera. Body cameras will not stop police brutality instantaneously, but it will definitely help over

Police are trained mainly on how to handle a situation physically, rather than verbally. If they feel threatened, they will take action. “They learn that every encounter, with an individual is a potential threat.” (Stoughton, S) Because they are trained this way, a racist officer can take this opportunity to kill any African American, because they feel “threatened”, even if they are unarmed. Police officers must be trained in a way to prevent any unnecessary deaths on African Americans. Many officers use racial profiling to an excessive degree and use it as their defense for killing a defenseless African American. According to mic.com, white officers kill black suspects twice a week in the United States. It is the unfortunate truth that black people are more likely to be killed by the police than any other race. In order to properly train law enforcements, they must be taught to not discriminate against someone because of their skin color. Killing someone based off their race is a terrible way of