American policing has changed since George Floyd’s murder
TALK WITH Chris Thomsen and Rick Zimmerman, two longtime homicide investigators with the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD), and they’ll tell you their job has changed markedly over the past three years. Restrictions now forbid officers from stopping drivers for expired tags or something dangling from a rear-view mirror; those stops often yielded guns, drugs or people evading arrest warrants. A chokehold ban and body-worn-camera footage of every interaction mean officers worry that accidental contact with a suspect’s neck during a physical altercation could be grounds for a lawsuit or dismissal. Prosecutors and jurors used to defer to cops’ words in court; now they demand video or audio evidence.
But talk with Dave Bicking and Emma Pedersen—members of Communities United Against Police Brutality, an activist group—and they will tell you the opposite. The city council vowed to “defund the police”; instead the MPD’s budget has grown. Police killings, Mr Bicking asserts, “go on at the same rate as always”. The MPD’s culture, says Ms Pedersen, is “getting worse”.
These two poles define a roiling debate. Leftists argue that policing has changed far too little since a Minneapolis police officer murdered George Floyd three years ago. Police killings in America rose from 2020 to 2021, and again from 2021 to 2022. Politicians who promised reform have backtracked; changes have been cosmetic. Conservatives argue that public suspicion of police and policy changes driven by progressive politicians have hamstrung law enforcement, leading directly to a rise in violent crime. The consensus that 30 years ago led politicians from both parties to espouse “tough on crime” rhetoric and policies has disappeared. As in so much else in American life, the centre has not held.
2023-05-25 07:59:03
Link from www.economist.com
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