Re: LAPD Shootings: Mistakes were made, Times investigative
Graeme Bacque (gbacque@idirect.com)
Sun, 07 Nov 1999 23:36:21 -0500
At 08:08 PM 11/07/1999 -0800, Tom Boland wrote:
>***********************************************************
>HOMELESS PEOPLE'S VIEWS, News, Alerts, Actions & Research
>6,000+ ONLINE POSTS by or via homeless & ex-homeless people
>HOMELESS PEOPLE'S NETWORK http://aspin.asu.edu/hpn
>***********************************************************
>
>Could better training on how to respond to emotionally stressed persons
>help to reduce police use of deadly force? Or is more required? Is so,
>what?
My own impression is that police need to learn to actually disengage in
such situations, and that some form of separate crisis intervention body
needs to be created that can be called upon to handle such situations in a
manner that isn't threatening to the person. Any such body needs to heavily
involve poor persons and in particular members of the homeless and
Psychiatric Survivor communities.
The cops in such instances are generally acting out of extreme ignorance
and bias, which clouds their judgment in such instances, and when this is
coupled with the enormous power and lack of accountability typically
afforded to police officers, the end result can be deadly. It appears that
many of the incidents in question in fact are not precipitated by
suspicion of substantial criminal activity by the victim so the need for
the cops to even become involved at all is often highly questionable.
--
Graeme
<http://webhome.idirect.com/~gbacque/gbacque.html>
* * * * * * * * * * *
"Your anger is a gift." -- Rage Against The Machine