먹튀폴리스
Police officers have often been accused of racism, sexism and, even on occasion, fascism but often these accusations are denied or refuted to be either completely unfounded or to be sourced from aggrieved individuals without, or little, basis in fact. Nevertheless, the accusations continue. These accusations, largely, come from ethnic minorities and, specifically, the black and Asian communities. Women are generally less vocal and even then, by women who are serving police officers regarding poor promotional prospects; overall, most accusations made against law enforcement are in relation to race or ethnicity rather than 먹튀폴리스.
Are these accusations justified? Do law enforcement have problems with institutional racism as reported in the Macpherson Inquiry following the tragic death of Stephen Lawrence in London? Alternatively, can it be truly an instance that, statistically, men (and it is mostly men) who are black are more likely to commit street crime and thus police stop and search of such minorities work? Would even this justify the evidence that shows police officers stop and search those people who are black, six times more regularly than those people who are white?
Police officers generally stop individuals they suspect of committing, or being likely to commit, an offence. They're said to be equal inside their treatment of those they stop and shouldn't undertake, even subconsciously, racial profiling in order to carry out their duties. Needless to say, police officers are human and thus not infallible and so bring to their work (as lots of people do) their own prejudices, beliefs, opinions and interpretations of society and the difficulties within it. Whilst in a modern, multicultural and multi ethnic society, such prejudices are anticipated to be minimal, the stark reality is that in some regions of the UK, minorities are viewed as either overtaking or being given the soft treatment because of their race or ethnicity.
Police prejudices might have been normal in the past, but certainly you might hope that individuals have moved on as a community to accept anyone and everyone on the cornerstone of these actions, over and above the color of these skin or ethnic background. Again, however, infallibility is an individual trait and we cannot expect that police officers are any different. If young black men are committing more street robberies than white men, then undoubtedly they will be targeted as potential suspects by law enforcement and subject to more rigorous policing such as for instance stop and 먹튀폴리스.
However, can it be police racism, whether overt or else, which explains the bigger (and apparent disproportionate) amount of black men stopped by law enforcement? Could it be reflective of a community that (as some might argue) discriminates against minorities in most aspects: poor educational facilities and fewer employment prospects in order that criminality becomes more desirable and a simpler choice for ethnic minorities? Whilst there are some who climb the corporate ladder, becoming successful lawyers, even politicians, doctors or other white collar or blue collar workers, much more are excluded from certain posts. The Race Relations Act 1975 was supposed to get rid of discrimination from many facets of society but particularly in relation to employment. As we've often seen with legislation, however, laws to combat society's perception of 'the other' do definitely not work and, on occasion, may eventually come back and bite those that it seeks to protect.
Are police officers stopping higher numbers of young black men because they are, like society, implicitly racist? The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE), when it absolutely was produced, must have stopped, or at least reduced, the number of people stopped and searched for anything besides 'reasonable suspicion' (s.1). However, reasonable suspicion, whilst legislated to be objective, rarely is: police officers interpret 'reasonable suspicion' in many ways and it's easy to find justification where there might be none. Various laws allow police officers to search those they suspect of carrying illegal substances as well as for weapons, etc. Reasonable suspicion of certain individuals may seem obvious and thus stereotyping of several may seem an evident requirement of police work but not totally all black men are from the road seeking potential robbery victims; however, just how many white old ladies are stopped and searched for drugs or weapons or items found in burglaries? It's definitely not being put forward however that stereotypes should really be ignored altogether by police officers when consideration is given to who should really be targeted in stop and search procedures.
Obvious reasons for fewer numbers of old ladies (whether white or black) being stopped by police officers is they rarely commit crimes, such as for instance street robbery, burglary or drugs offences. Therefore, stop and search techniques which involve some type of stereotyping and/or profiling are necessary; if some method of stereotyping of the populace weren't undertaken then ways of policing would either have stop altogether (to avoid any claims of discrimination) or police numbers would have to rise significantly to deal with the bigger amount of stops required to search everyone who 'may' carry illegal weapons/substances. Either scenario is highly impractical.
Problems arise when one group (i.e. ethnic minorities) are specifically targeted over every other without reasonable grounds and such grounds should be reasonable using an objective method. Objective reasonable grounds shouldn't include the ethnic group to which a suspect may belong; this naturally occurs, but needless to say, whether consciously or not, officers utilise their experience and knowledge of offending patterns. For anyone police officers, such knowledge or experience may be objective reasoning and thus their stop and search practices continue to check out the pattern that young black men are stopped more frequently. When they think that, statistically, men of certain ethnic groups are more likely to commit offences such as for instance street robbery, then naturally they will target such groups. If an offender is going to steal from a home (burglary), he then or she may 'go equipped' and thus any stop and search would identify this person as such; it could be of observe that seven percent of those people who are stopped are in reality arrested.
Research indicates that whilst police officers are actually bias somewhat, the underlying reason for their bias is the evidence stated above – that certain groups from ethnic minorities commit higher rates of offences. This research also shows that, even though that there is disproportionately more stop and searches of certain ethnic groups, this is not solely owing to police bias nevertheless the geographic and demographics of the area. Nevertheless, in analysing the Islington Crime Survey, Brian Maclean found some evidence that young black men (16-24 years) were stopped by law enforcement more often than white or Asians (19.1% as against 10.9 for exactly the same number of white men). Interestingly, however, the figures for those who were stopped and searched are relatively similar: 4.6% for black and 4.0% for white men. The figure for Asian men who have been stopped only was 8.5% whilst stop and search figures are significantly lower at 1.4%. All figures relate genuinely to stops or stops and searches whilst suspects were on foot. Those in vehicles were lower still though the difference for searches of those in vehicles were more stark than their counterpart figures for anyone stopped on foot (2.6% white, 7.9% black and 2.5% Asian). On the cornerstone of the figures, it does appear that stops and searches of black men by police tend to outnumber white and Asian men, but what exactly is unclear is whether this is reflective of the demographic area. Many areas in Islington do house greater numbers of black people than white. Another potential trouble with interpreting statistical data, is insufficient clarity with regards to when and where such stops took place; i.e. were the stops undertaken by police immediately following a report of a block robbery, was the time of day suspicious for the reason that – at 2am on a Thursday morning, it could be curious to express anyone walking on and thus stopping people isn't wholly unusual. Statistical analysis is obviously difficult specially if one is seeking to get underlying causes as the information is often limited and structured in this way as to offer basic information only.
However, to return to the key question – does racial discrimination or racial attitudes affect police stop and search numbers? Is the disproportionate amount of black men who experience stop and search by law enforcement reflective of a broader society which discriminates against them (in that crime is the only real option as a result of fewer employment opportunities) or can it be geographic for the reason that regions of higher rates of stop and search of young black men are as results of a better amount of black people residing in the area?
A mix of both factors perhaps may exist, as well as the truth that younger people generally hang around without real purpose and/or direction more often than those inside their thirties and forties who may venture out to bars, parties, etc. When we look at age alone, figures reveal that those within the lower age groups (16-24) are subjected to raised rates of stop and stop and searches by police officers. Those who find themselves aged 45 or over are less apt to be stopped by almost one fifth (5.4%) of exactly the same group who are 16-24 years old (24.2%), whilst only half the quantity are apt to be stopped if they are in middle group (aged 25-44 : 13.1%). It's worrying however that it is a general assumption that police officers are racist or that racism is endemic within the police. This really is despite the assertion by Lord Macpherson that the Metropolitan Police was 'institutionally racist' (1999).