“To protect and serve”: When I was growing up in Los Angeles it was a phrase printed on the doors of law enforcement vehicles. At one time I, like so many others, believed it to be true. There were also members of my family who served as police officers who told me time and again that “people should not fear us, for we are their friends”. Several decades have passed since I assumed that adage to be true. British historian John Dalberg Acton once wrote: “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.” When I read the newspapers every morning, there is always a story recounting incidents of excessive force and abuse by law enforcement officers; and, as a result Baron Action’s maxim readily comes to mind. It puzzles me how any we can tolerate such behavior and, yet, claim ourselves to be part of a “free society”. One of the most disturbing stories I have read involved Cecily McMillan, an Occupy Wall Street protestor, and an undercover New York City police officer. She was involved in a public demonstration, in accordance with her First and Fourth Amendment rights to do so. In an effort to arrest her, the plainclothes officer grabbed Miss McMillan’s breast from behind without identifying himself, to which she responded by pushing him away. At that moment she was arrested and charged with assaulting a police officer. Miss McMillan’s sentencing hearing is being held today and she could receive a seven year prison sentence. Last year in Charlotte, North Carolina, college student Jonathan Ferrell was shot to death by police officers for no apparent reason. Ferrell was involved in an auto accident and, afterward, had walked to the nearest house asking for a call for help. When law enforcement arrived, rather than questioning Ferrell, the officer in charge stated “we don’t have time for this”. As a result, they shot him dead for no apparent reason. No officer involved was either charged or disciplined for their actions. These are just two instances among literally hundreds of such stories I have read in the newspapers during the past year. Granted, there is a need for law enforcement and I readily accede to that point. But the instances of brutality and murder in the name of the law has increased to numbers that quite simply cannot be ignored. One can argue “they have a badge and a gun, what do we have?” My answer is that we have the obligation to vote for change and to speak out loudly against such injustice. It is one thing to uphold the law; but, it is entirely another to terrorize the citizenry in the name of it: Once an officer chooses the latter over the former, they are nothing more than jack-booted thugs!
Posted on: Mon, 19 May 2014 14:19:11 +0000
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