Since the shootings in Dallas,
the media have been filled with hot air about how the police put themselves in
harm's way to protect all of us. Derek Wright begs to differ.
July 12, 2016
THE POLICE in the U.S. kill someone every eight hours on average.
Early in the morning of July 5
in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, that someone was Alton Sterling. A pair of cops--for
now unidentified and currently on paid vacation--tackled Sterling, who was
selling CDs outside a convenience store, and pinned him facedown on the ground.
Then, at least one and maybe both opened fire, shooting him four to six times
at point-blank range in the back and chest. An ambulance showed up about 10
minutes later, and paramedics pronounced him dead.
According to the store owner
who was standing "two feet away" during the altercation, Alton wasn't
holding a weapon and didn't reach for anything. Perhaps his body was still
involuntarily twitching from the Taser shot he had already received, but he
made no motion that could be construed as threatening.
The police have already seized
the store surveillance system and all of the footage. They claim the body cams
they were wearing "fell off" during the scuffle, and don't show what
happened.
However, part of the incident
was captured by another witness on a cell phone. Watching the footage
reminded me of seeing the multiple videos showing the BART police murdering
Oscar Grant in an Oakland, California, transit station during the early morning
hours of New Years Day in 2009--and then leaving him to die, while they showed
more interest in seizing cell phones from the dozens of witnesses than in
calling an ambulance.
This time, it's someone trying
to sell CDs to get by--something I'm about to start doing myself!--who was
murdered by two hyper-aggressive cops. Selling music (while Black) is not a
capital crime.
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WHILE THE cops are busy
murdering someone every eight hours on average, someone in the U.S. is killed
on the job almost every hour and a half--16 people per day in 2006, for
example. If you rank occupations by the number of workplace fatalities per
100,000 workers--the so-called "fatal work injury rate"--you're far
more likely to be killed on the job working as a farmer than as a police
officer.
We're told that the police
"put their lives on the line every day"--and we hear that tired old
line all the more often since the killing of five officers by an army veteran
in Dallas last week.
What the police do every day
is take the attitude that they're an armed force that operates above the rest
of society and is constantly at war with everyone else--or at least the vast
majority that isn't wealthy.
Being a cop would be an
extremely safe job if police weren't regularly escalating situations everywhere
they go. "Escalating situations" isn't a strong enough way to put it
when you show up at a scene and start shooting in under two seconds--like
Timothy Loehmann, the officer who killed Tamir Rice in Cleveland in 2014.
On average, the police spend
upwards of 60 hours training to use a gun--yet they still seem to have trouble
distinguishing firearms from Tasers, the excuse used to justify Oscar Grant's
murder. By contrast, the cops spend less than eight hours being trained on
conflict resolution or how to de-escalate a tense situation.
We need an entirely different
institution to ensure public safety. Having trigger-happy racists with
unlimited access to military gear who are sworn to protect the sanctity of
private property isn't working. This isn't a new problem, but we're finally
being forced to see it for what it is.
To put this in perspective: In
2014, 126 police officers died on the job--the release of this statistic was
accompanied by many headlines about how that represented a 24 percent increase
from 102 in 2013. The FBI's stats say there were 627,949 total sworn officers
in 2014. That's a fatal work injury rate of exactly 20.0 for every 100,000
full-time employees.
How does that compare to other
industries? According to the
Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2014, police officers had a slightly higher
rate of on-the-job fatalities than taxi drivers (18.0 per 100,000 full-time
drivers) and electrical power line installers (19.2). The cops fell well below
the statistics for driver/sales workers and truck drivers (24.7), structural
iron/steel workers (25.2), farmers (26.7), sanitation workers (35.8), roofers
(47.4), aircraft pilots and flight engineers (64.0), fishing workers (80.8)
and, with the highest rate, logging workers (110.9).
So it's a little more
dangerous to be a cop than to work with power lines--but it's far more deadly
to be a truck driver or sanitation worker.
What's more, a large number of
on-the-job police fatalities are the result of traffic accidents, which
confirms the wider point that any occupation involving driving has greater
dangers. And the reality behind this statistic is that many of the fatal
accidents take place during high-speed chases initiated by officers who put
larger numbers of people at risk to pursue suspects accused of minor crimes.
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ALTON STERLING is dead because
of racism, both systemic/institutional and personal--and because the American
state funds, arms and trains a militarized police force that can kill with
almost total impunity, especially the poor and people of color.
Alton Sterling, may you rest
in peace, but may the rest of us not be passive and "peaceful." As
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, "True peace...is the presence of
justice." As Mother Jones said, "Mourn for the dead, fight like hell
for the living."
We must draw a line in the
sand and challenge this horrific pattern of police murder, followed by a slap
on the wrist at most, and full acquittal and a return to "the force"
in most cases.
Arrest the murderers of Alton
Sterling, Philando Castile and the other victims of police murder. Release the
surveillance footage. Convict the cops and put them in jail.
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