Arthur J. Villasanta – Fourth Estate Contributor
New York, NY, United States (4E) – One in 4 individuals killed by policemen all through the United States in 2017 was an African-American. Blacks had been additionally thrice extra prone to be killed by police in comparison with whites.
The latter statistic is frightful as a result of in 2015 and 2016, African-Americans had been killed by police at greater than twice the speed of white individuals.
Police within the U.S. killed 1,129 individuals till Dec. 26 and had been hardly punished for his or her crimes. In solely 12 of those incidents — or one % of all killings – was a policeman charged with against the law.
1 / 4 of these killed by police had been African-Americans who comprise simply 13 % of the inhabitants, in response to the in depth report, “Mapping Police Violence,” launched Dec. 28.
Overall, black individuals had been the most probably to be killed by police; most probably to be unarmed and fewer prone to be threatening somebody when killed.
Police in some giant cities are killing African-American males extra typically than the nationwide homicide fee. Black Oklahomans are seven instances extra prone to be killed by police than their counterparts in Georgia, mentioned the report.
The report discovered that almost all of those encounters — 631 killings — started with officers responding to suspected non-violent offenses or instances the place no crime was reported. It mentioned 87 % of individuals had been killed after a visitors violation.
More horrifying is the revelation that 147 individuals had been utterly unarmed when murdered by the police.
“Today is an important day to remind you that police violence is far from over,” mentioned Brittany Packnett, one of many report’s authors.
“Our analysis suggests these killings could have been prevented,” in response to DeRay Mckesson, a social justice activist who additionally helped write the report.
New insurance policies like requiring policemen to exhaust all different means earlier than capturing, or requiring all officers to report all use of pressure can cut back police killings by 25 %, mentioned the report.
“Mapping Police Violence” defines a police killing as “a case where a person dies as a result of being chased, beaten, arrested, restrained, shot, pepper sprayed, tasered, or otherwise harmed by police officers, whether on-duty or off-duty, intentional or accidental.”
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