Aligning policing with the law a distant goal
Minneapolis has become a touchstone of the movement for racial justice in a country historically plagued by the menace of racial policing, while Mumbai recently demonstrated via a Rs 100-crore extortion scandal that corruption is one major way in which the Indian police cross the limits of their authority and power, patronised by an administration with a colonial mindset with almost no public pressure to reform. There is a common lesson in the two stories: the old model of policing cannot be retrofitted and you have to work on a new model.
To align policing practices with the law is a distant goal. “We loathe mass incarceration. We loathe police brutality. But most of us have absolutely no idea how to address the critical flaws in our justice system,” said American civil rights activist Shaun King. Since the killing of George Floyd, an African American, in Minneapolis last May, over 30 American states have passed more than 140 new police oversight and reform laws, according to a New York Times analysis of data from the National Conference of State Legislatures. But the calls for change continue.
The Justice Department launched a broad investigation into the functioning of the Minneapolis Police Department a day after its former officer, Derek Chauvin, was convicted of Floyd’s murder. Los Angeles Times has reported, “Activists and politicians in Minneapolis spent Wednesday raising awareness about a City Council-backed measure that could go before voters this fall calling for the city to create a Department of Public Safety, which would encompass a broader health and social approach to fighting crime.”
While Derek Chauvin was on trial last week, episodes in Virginia, Minnesota and Illinois — which have all enacted reforms — underscored how the new laws would not always prevent traumatic outcomes. A police officer in Virginia pointed a gun at a Black army lieutenant and pepper-sprayed him during a traffic stop. A veteran officer in Minnesota fatally shot 20-year-old Daunte Wright, a Black man, after pulling him over. And a Chicago officer fatally fired at 13-year-old Adam Toledo, a Latino, after he appeared to toss aside a gun while obeying commands to raise his hands.
Clearly, typically deterrent or typically reformist attitudes are leading the discussions, even though the police unions have maintained their robust lobbying presence which is reflected in their argument that the violent crimes including murders are going up significantly across the US during last year. However, the experts have cited a number of possible factors, including pandemic, to explain that. Maryland, the first state to pass a bill of rights for the protection of the Law Enforcement Officers way back in 1970s, not only erased it from the statute book but also de-criminalised several minor prostitution and drug offences and restricted traffic violations for pulling over motorists to provide lesser contacts with law enforcement. The law-makers refused to be swayed by the police advocates who argued that it was going to cause fear in society.
In the wake of Chauvin verdict, New York Times noticed that House Democrats recently passed a sweeping police bill designed to address racial discrimination and excessive use of force, but it lacks the Republican support needed in the Senate. President Biden has also fallen short on a campaign promise to establish an oversight commission during his first 100 days in office. In fact, the things moving back and forth — ranging from the calls of defunding police departments to restoration of their budgetary cuts — are summarised by the New York Governor Cuomo’s quip to reporters on Wednesday: “You don’t have the option of ending the police, and you don’t have the option of continuing with the distrust of the police, so the relationship has to be repaired.”
The same report quoted Stevante Clark, whose brother Stephon was killed by the Sacramento police in 2018, as saying, “People aren’t necessarily happy with the change they’re seeing, because the same thing keeps happening.” Nearly 1,000 people have been shot and killed across the US by the police annually in recent years, according to data from The Washington Post, which also shows that officers fatally shot Black and Hispanic people at a much higher rate by population than Whites.
Can one exceptional conviction transform the racial policing scenario in the US? It would be like arguing that the nailing of one Sachin Waze will significantly curb the collection culture in Mumbai police. The question that has been asked far too long is why or how the police exceed the parameters of their authority and power. That would be a valid question for any policy-maker. But, for a common man seeking security and dignity, even more valid question the policy-makers must face, would be: who is that person exercising authority and power out in the street? Is he or she a democratically sensitised, community oriented and constitutionally conditioned individual? And, why is that person’s mental make-up so vital to policing? Because of the ever- lurking prospect of a seamless extension of the legitimate police authority into brute or corrupt power!
A Maryland law, named after Anton Black, killed by the police in 2018, requires disclosure of information about police misconduct investigations. His sister said, “That culture — that mentality has to do a complete 180 if we want to enact change. And it has to start in-house with the police departments, the captains, the chiefs and also the boards that are actually certifying these officers.” Any number of Minneapolis trial-traumatised Black youngsters has echoed the sentiment that the Chauvin conviction is not a justice package but only an accountability statement.
