On The Apology For Past Racial Policing

I've been fuming about this for a while. It's not that the statement by the head of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (a new outfit for me) isn't welcome, it is that it frames the problem of abusive policing as historic, not current, and it essentially absolves police themselves of responsibility, blaming vague social and political forces for the policies and actions of departments and officers.

That argument can be made, but it is just that, an argument. It's not an apology, it's not a correction, it's not restitution, it's not reform.

Here's what the statement said:

There have been times when law enforcement officers, because of the laws enacted by federal, state, and local governments, have been the face of oppression for far too many of our fellow citizens. In the past, the laws adopted by our society have required police officers to perform many unpalatable tasks, such as ensuring legalized discrimination or even denying the basic rights of citizenship to many of our fellow Americans.

While this is no longer the case, this dark side of our shared history has created a multigenerational—almost inherited—mistrust between many communities of color and their law enforcement agencies.

Many officers who do not share this common heritage often struggle to comprehend the reasons behind this historic mistrust. As a result, they are often unable to bridge this gap and connect with some segments of their communities.

While we obviously cannot change the past, it is clear that we must change the future. We must move forward together to build a shared understanding. We must forge a path that allows us to move beyond our history and identify common solutions to better protect our communities.

For our part, the first step in this process is for law enforcement and the IACP to acknowledge and apologize for the actions of the past and the role that our profession has played in society’s historical mistreatment of communities of color.

At the same time, those who denounce the police must also acknowledge that today’s officers are not to blame for the injustices of the past. If either side in this debate fails to acknowledge these fundamental truths, we will be unlikely to move past them.

Overcoming this historic mistrust requires that we must move forward together in an atmosphere of mutual respect. All members of our society must realize that we have a mutual obligation to work together to ensure fairness, dignity, security, and justice.

It is my hope that, by working together, we can break this historic cycle of mistrust and build a better and safer future for us all.

The lead in to this statement asserted that thousands of police officers have been killed and hundreds of thousands injured in the line of duty "over the years," and this apparently is to make palatable the coming "apology" among the Brethren in Blue. If you want to play the Dead Game, it might be worthwhile to point out that "over the years" hundreds of thousands of Americans have been killed by police and millions have been wounded. Families have been ripped to pieces and whole communities have been oppressed and destroyed by abusive and violent policing. The relatively few officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty, generally more in car wrecks, accidents, and heart attacks than by any other means, cannot begin to compare to the number of lives lost in civil society by the actions of police.

To cast this as historical and ignore the current situation simply beggars belief.

But that's where we are in this Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.

That's where we are. And a number of commentators have pointed out that this statement is "better than nothing." "It's a start..."

I've pointed out that -- statistically -- we're in a less violent period of policing and social violence than at almost any other period of our history. It doesn't seem so in part because there is far more available documentation of police violence now than there has been in the past. Some of it is truly horrifying, and so much of it demonstrates that police too often shoot or otherwise engage in violence when objectively there is very little or no threat to them or anyone else, and their use of violence is simply not necessary.

They do it because it is expected of them and because they can.

They can do essentially anything in the line of duty and get away with it so long as they use the Magic Words, "fearing for my life and the safety of others".

That's what's wrong. Police are jacked up to fear literally everyone and every thing. Their lives are always in danger from some shadowy source; the safety of others is constantly at risk. Even when there is no objective threat. They fear that something might happen and react to the potential rather than the actual threat.

When force protection is the prime directive, as it seems to be, then harming and killing those who are perceived as threats becomes the means to implement the directive.

And it so happens that men and boys of color are perceived as definitional and existential threats to police officers, far more than white men or most women.

The perception does not match the reality, but that doesn't matter. According to the law and much police training, the officer's perception at the time is all that matters -- so long as it conforms with a mutable standard of "reasonableness." That standard is that another officer would perceive the situation and the necessity to use force (lethal or non lethal) in the same way. If all of them are trained to perceive black and brown men as existential threats of course they're going to see the situation and the need to use force the same way. Even though there may be no objective threat at all.

When their chief requires them to use force, including lethal force, whenever they perceive a threat -- which might be nothing more than disobedience -- it's no surprise that's what officers do. They follow commands -- for if they don't, they'll be disciplined or fired. Under those circumstances and rules of engagement, it's better for the officer to use force, even if the situation is dubious, than risk the wrath of their commanders for not using force.

It puts civilians in a bind, because under many circumstances, there is no way for them to comply to avoid the use of force against them. As we've seen, in some circumstances, black males purported  to be threats, not actual threats at all, have been shot and killed on sight, simply because someone said they were threatening. In other cases, black males who do not immediately obey confusing or conflicting commands are shot and killed. Black men "armed" with cell phones or packages or nothing at all are shot and killed and the officers who kill under such circumstances face little or no consequence. "Reaching" for anything -- including ID pr a cell phone -- is cause enough for summary execution.

We can go on and on and on listing the many ways a black or brown man can be legally murdered by police. It happens essentially every day.

Hundreds are killed every year -- God only knows how many are injured -- who are objectively no threat at all, except to the fevered and fearful perceptions of police officers who kill them.

Even most of those who are objective threats do not "need" killing. I've said and I will repeat that police killings can be cut by 90% or more -- which some cities have done (prominently, New York City) by changing the rules and the authorities under which police use force, including lethal force.

It's not rocket science. It can be done.

To apologize (sort of) for historic injustices is fine, but to do so without acknowledging the current problem of racialized and violent policing gets us nowhere. To assert that the situation isn't as bad as it looks, since so relatively few individuals are abused or killed by police -- relative to the number of police encounters overall, for example -- is beside the point when it is possible and necessary to further reduce abusive and violent policing to the point where it is essentially nonexistent.

Ideally, police should be modeling 'good behavior' not violent and abusive behavior. I would say that for the most part, 'good behavior' is what they try to show in most of their encounters with the public. Most officers try not to be overtly racist, abusive or violent most of the time. Most of their encounters are resolved peacefully-- or at least nonviolently.

The excreptions tend to involve young men of color far more often than white men or women of any color, or they involve disobedience, unsubstantiated reports by callers to 911, misunderstandings of police commands*, misperceptions of threat by police officers, inability to obey due to mental or physical problems and/or (ab)use of substances, or some combination of these and other factors.

[*Note: police should not be in the business of issuing "commands" to civilians. It is completely the wrong relationship between the People and those charged with serving and protecting said People. Officers follow the commands of their chiefs and supervisors, they should not be issuing commands to the public.]

The fact is that there is a current and ongoing problem of abusive and violent policing, a good deal of which grows out of the historic patterns and practices of police departments. They started in many instances as slave catchers and militias for the purpose of chastising Indians and other undesirables. That's kind of hard-wired into many police departments. Apologizing for history is fine, but it's not enough. Corrective action is necessary, and there's no indication that this association of Chiefs of Police recognize that.

That is not to say that there is no recognition anywhere within the police culture. In fact, recognition that correction is necessary is relatively widespread among police chiefs. And it is strenuously resisted among police officer unions -- whose members feel threatened every time they put on the uniform, and who, despite abundant evidence to the contrary, assert they are under assault every moment of every day.

Resolution of that contrast of perception may not be possible, though certainly many officers and chiefs are trying to find common ground.

The "national conversation" about race and abusive policing has been going on -- and on and on -- for years, and it seems always to be stuck in the same place, as the dead continue to pile up. There have been changes in some police departments that reduce the killing, but in others, there's no change, and the number of dead at police hands is still about 100 a month, year in and year out. To change that, requires a goal -- to cut the number killed by police in half year by year until the number is reduced by 90% or more.

It can be done.

But the goal has never been set let alone met in more than a few jurisdictions. It must become a national goal.

The chiefs have to set the goal for their departments.

Doing What Needs to Be Done to Reduce Violent Policing

Americans have become accustomed to the rat-a-tat-tat of police shootings and to the stories of other means police use to "control" suspects -- sometimes unto death. Americans are also accustomed to the protest that frequently arises from this or that act of violent policing.

Efforts to control or reduce violent policing have been under way for many years in many communities, and they've been met with resistance from line officers and their unions, from police chiefs and sheriffs, and often from the justice system itself (DAs and courts) which will typically defend and exonerate officers no matter what they do or how egregious their violence toward the public.

And yet progress has been made, slow and painful as it may be.

Ways to reduce police violence and use of lethal force are well-known and understood. Some of those ways and means have been widely adopted, but we still see almost daily examples of men and women in crisis, particularly if they are black or brown, violently abused by police or summarily executed by officers who ritualistically cite "fearing for my life and the safety of others" to justify and excuse what they have done.

Simply being in psychological or emotional crisis and being black or brown can be sufficient to trigger the deadly fear response in officers, and almost always that fear is sufficient to officially justify use of whatever force the officer deems necessary.

There can be no second guessing of the officer's split-second decision to use lethal force or any other force necessary to control the subject.

We see it over and over again, practically daily, and many Americans are fine with it. Since they believe that police violence would never be directed at them why should they worry or be concerned about police violence directed at others?

Often this means that white-folks don't care if police are violent or deadly toward disobedient or otherwise recalcitrant black and brown individuals. It's what they deserve. If only they would obey, nothing bad would happen to them. And yet we see over and over again, that's not necessarily true at all. Obedience will not necessarily protect an individual who's been targeted by police for execution. People are shot and killed or tasered and killed while in the process of obeying police commands. It's simply a fact. There are too many examples documented to continue to believe that "obedience = safety."

It doesn't.

The problem is not so much the disobedience of individuals as it is that police officers are trained and conditioned to experience the disobedience of some individuals (particularly black and brown men) as existential threats to their lives and others' safety. Obedience can be interpreted by officers in exactly the same way because of their training and conditioning. When they determine that an individual is a subject or suspect, everything that individual does or doesn't do is subject to being interpreted as a threat.

Police are trained and conditioned to neutralize threats when they perceive them, and the only standard is the officer's perception at the moment he or she chooses to use force, lethal or otherwise. There is a "reasonable" standard, but it is limited to what another officer in the same situation would perceive and do. When they are all trained and conditioned in the same way, they are likely to perceive threats and act on them in the same way. Consequently the reasonableness standard for use of force based on officer perception is no protection for individuals subjected to use of force.

This is due largely to court decisions and police department policies which deny civilians ('subjects') the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, or indeed any rights at all that an officer is bound to respect, when the officer perceives a threat from the individual.

How do we get past that? In so many cases recently -- but we can cite similar cases going back many years -- the use of lethal force against individuals who do not present an objective threat is practically routine.

One case I've featured is that of Joseph Mann in Sacramento. He was shot and killed in July by two jacked up officers who raced to the scene apparently specifically to "neutralize" the subject. The problem with their action -- which included trying to run him over with their vehicle and then gunning him down when that proved unsuccessful -- was that Mann was not an objective threat to anyone, not the officers on scene, certainly not to the officers who killed him, and not to bystanders or pedestrians in the vicinity. He was not perceived to be a threat by other officers on the scene, at least not to the extent that he needed to be "neutralized" -- euphemism for killing.

His threat matrix was that he was armed with a small knife, he was disobedient, and attempted to elude police. He was falsely accused of many overt threats toward police during the five minutes or so he was being pursued by them, but apart from tossing a mug or thermos at a pursuing police car,  he never demonstrated an actual threat toward police or anyone else.

And until the two officers who killed him arrived on the scene, the other officers were trying to defuse the situation, de-escalate the confrontation, and bring Mr. Mann into custody non-violently.

They had really only begun their efforts when the two killers arrived.

De-escalation in cases of mental or emotional crisis includes such things as:

Calm the situation, by using the following tactics:

 Request backup.

 Move slowly.

 When possible, eliminate emergency lights and sirens and disperse any crowd that may have gathered.



 Assume a quiet nonthreatening manner when approaching and conversing with the individual.



 If possible, avoid physical contact if no violence or destructive acts have taken place.



 If possible, explain intended actions before taking action.

 Take time to assess the situation.

 Provide reassurance that officers are there to help.

 Give the person time to calm down. Communicate with the person:

 Keep sentences short.



 Talk with the individual in an attempt to determine what is bothering that person.

 Acknowledge the person's feelings



 Ask if the person is hearing voices and, if so, what they are saying.

 Avoid topics that may agitate the person.

 Allow time for the person to consider questions and be prepared to repeat them.

Additionally, POST trains police officers to “not threaten the individual with arrest or in any other manner,” explaining that “threats may create additional fright, stress, or potential aggression.”

This is all well-known and understood and is standard training for officers in their interaction with individuals showing signs of crisis or mental illness. There is no mystery about it. And yet over and over again, police use lethal force rather than these de-escalation tactics. They do so because they know they can -- and can get away with it -- on the one hand, and because they are conditioned to see the subject (no longer a human being) as an existential threat, no matter the objective reality. On the other hand, officers who are allowed to use crisis intervention and de-escalation techniques, as well as mental health professionals who use these techniques, are almost always able to defuse situations involving mentally ill or in-crisis individuals without resort to violence.

In other words, fear, conditioning, and the expectations of threat -- not the actuality of it -- drive most officers' inappropriate use of force.

It's an induced form of cowardice that's masquerading as courage.

Other officers on the scene of Mann's killing were frustrated by Mann's failure to obey and his attempts to elude them, but they did not appear to be in fear. They were protected by their vehicles, for one thing, and they were always at a safe distance from Mr. Mann. They had no cause to fear for their lives, and as for the safety of others the situation appeared to be non-threatening as well. There were a few other people on the street, some of whom got quite close to Mr. Mann, and he is not seen to threaten them in any way. He may not even have been aware of them.

911 reports, while apparently false about his possession of a gun, and they did not claim that Mann was threatening anyone with his knife. They said he was tossing it in the air and catching it, and the only claim was that he was acting strangely, was probably mentally ill, and callers said they were concerned because of the presence of children in the area.

They also reported that Joseph Mann was black.

Which may have been the determining factor in his death.

What I want to know is whether someone in the department ordered the killers to do their job and kill Joseph Mann. Given the way they raced to the scene with the intent to administer great bodily harm to him and when they were unsuccessful, they killed him, I have a strong suspicion that they were ordered to do what they did, regardless of anything else. It happens more often than we know, and there are very few mitigations to protect the public. There are other means to reduce violence and death by police apart from simply abiding by policies already in place. I'll try to get to some of those in another post.

What's the Matter With Vallejo, and How Do You Fix It?

When I saw this story from March the other day while checking out Twit feeds from DeRay or Shaun King, I was gobsmacked. A single police officer has shot and killed three people under less than stellar circumstances and said officer is promoted to detective.

There have been demonstrations, quite a few of them, but the city on San Pablo Bay is not exactly up in arms about the rash of killings by this one officer, and the city administration is content to simply pull the veil over its actions and the actions of police in the hopes that soon enough passions will die down and business as usual will continue.

It's a mess, one of those typical messes that were once completely routine, and the reason why in so many cases, absolutely nothing was done to correct a system of policing that relied on brutality, violence and random lethal acts to maintain "order."

Since the protests began in Albuquerque last year and spread nationwide after the execution of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO in August, "business as usual" has been more and more difficult to maintain, but at the same time, police brutality, violence, and random killing seems to have increased rather than decreaed, and more and more, the media is focusing with utter horror on the very rare incidents of police encountering lethal force.

In other words, from a media perspective, it's still OK for civilians to be mowed down in their multitudes -- so long as it can be shown that they "deserve it" -- but it's horrific whenever a police officer meets a mortal fate in an encounter with a civilian.

Sigh. Plus ça change....

After all, a police officer's primary responsibility -- his job as it were -- is to go home to his family  each night,  right? 

If a few no-account scum have to die in order for that to happen, so. be. it.

End of story.

People believe this. They repeat it all the time. They seem to have no idea at all that people do not have to die at the hands of the police, that the officer's job is not to "go home to his family each night," or the killing has to stop -- and it can stop.

I've said before that sometimes the daily stories of police killings become ends in themselves, a kind of cop-porn/death-porn, with no suggestion at all that there might be alternatives to the constant killing. It's like there is a heavy investment in keeping the police killing spree going -- because it sells. 

Almost glee at each and every new atrocity; nary a hint that it doesn't have to be that way.

Vallejo is a strange, smallish Bay Area town on the edge of California's San Pablo Bay -- which connects with San Francisco Bay. It once hosted the workers at Mare Island Naval Shipyard. My grandfather (actually, my mother's step-father) worked there during WWII as a machinist helping to build ships sent to the Pacific Theatre. He and my grandmother lived in Vallejo. Both of them died before I was born, so I never had family in Vallejo.

My connection with the town is as a pass-thru place on the way to San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley or wherever the destination may have been in the Bay Area. I did some work there but not much, and I came away from it with an odd sense of disconnection.

The only claim to fame Vallejo has had since the shipyard closed in 1999 (or whenever it was) is an amusement park on the north side of town, one I've never been to, never had an urge to stop at -- though the roller coaster is visible from the freeway, and the highway to Napa and such passes right by the entrance.

I have been to the Solano County Fair at least once, maybe twice. I remember a knot of young cowboys spitting and cussing at the Fair while we enjoyed the livestock exhibits and the musical entertainment. Solano County is one of the areas of California which still can boast some real cowboys...

What I remember from working there briefly in the late-90s/early 2000s is that it was pretty rough edged, and the people tended to be as rough as the town. This was partly because it was one of the few places in the Bay Area where ordinary people could still afford to live, but that was changing fast. Living costs were going up fast, but with the closure of Mare Island, the opportunities to make a living were shrinking for many residents.

This transition was happening in many places in California at the time, and dislocated people were being left to fend for themselves. This led to a contemptuous police attitude toward people who might be on the edge of survival.

And so it seems to have been in Vallejo, where one police officer, Sean Kenny, has shot and killed time after time, in murky circumstances at best, and earned a promotion. Some have speculated that his promotion to detective was a clever way to get him off the street, but who knows?

As the death toll from police killings rises inexorably, it's been noticed that a relative handful of police are responsible for the the bulk of the killing, and in many cases the officers involved are repeat offenders. A pattern is beginning to emerge.

In Albuquerque, we noticed for example that a few officers appeared to be the delegated killers, snipers whose job  it was to kill suspects/subjects like James Boyd who refused to comply, or who otherwise complicated policing. Surprisingly -- or maybe not -- their names are often... "Sean."

Apparently this Sean Kenny in Vallejo was the delegated killer sent on calls where lethal force might be called for.

And so he killed, time after time.

And the police department did everything in their power to make sure the public had as little information as possible after the fact -- apparently to tamp down any likelihood of protest.

There were protests nonetheless, but they were (apparently) ineffective. Despite changes in staffing, the police, DA and the city manager's office are still in stonewall mode, simply refusing to provide the public with more than the sketchiest information, much of which is directly contradicted by eyewitnesses -- some of whom were never interviewed by investigators.

When police, DAs, and city managers collude to ensure the public has as little information as possible, it's not accidental. It happens because that's the policy decision made at the top. That decision is often made cynically -- because the "people" are viewed with condescension and contempt -- or it may be because of old-line traditions, "it's always been this way and we see no reason to change things...".

It may be due to a combination of factors. What seemed to have happened in Vallejo is that there was a culture clash between a largely white-rightist police force and city administration on the one hand and a shifting racial and economic demographic on the other made for tensions that authorities believed could only be relieved through use of force.

And so force was used, often and sometimes lethally.

So far as I can tell, it's still being used, frequently and inappropriately. The point being to keep those no-accounts in line.

When the economy of Vallejo collapsed after the closure of Mare Island, the city declared bankruptcy. It was traumatic for the city administration, and that trauma seemed to filter throughout the city's employees, including the police. But I somehow doubt the Vallejo police were ever measurably less violent prior to the trauma of bankruptcy.

Violent policing is a matter of policy. It is what is expected and demanded of officers in the field -- so as to maintain "order," don't you know.

You fix it by changing the policy.

In order to change the policy, you have to convince the Powers That Be that police policies MUST change.

To do that, you have to be a voice the police and the city administration (ie: city manager, not so much elected officials) believe they MUST listen to.

And who would that be? In most cities, it is the city's wealthiest and most financially potent individuals and interests.

They are the ones who tell the city manager what kind of policing they want.

The city manager tells the police chief who tells the rank and file.

And for the most part, they make it so.

The complication is that the wealthy and powerful talk to one another, city managers talk to one another, and police chiefs talk to one another. Sometimes a consensus is formed within each of these circles, and every now and then a consensus forms between them. Suddenly, "change happens." The public doesn't have to force anything into being, it just... is. Nor usually is the public consulted.

Policing policies are changing slowly, city by city, a process that is likely to take a generation or more, but there are also signs that consensus is being sought within the circles and then between them to -- potentially -- radically change policing from its current violent and deadly model to something more socially responsible and culturally sensitive.

Whether that will be any quicker than the city-by-city approach now under way is an open question.

Fixing policing policy in Vallejo is one of hundreds of "fixes" that need to be made. Resistance is certain. Yet overcoming that resistance is necessary.

Once the people at the top are convinced that further resistance is futile, the policies that enable violent policing and over-use of lethal force will change. Often the change comes overnight.

Clarity -- Why All the Police Killings?

Some of the recent incidents of police killings that really stand out as being out of line include the killing of James Boyd in Albuquerque in March, the killing of John Crawford in Ohio in August, the killing of Mike Brown in Ferguson, MO, also in August, the killing of Kajieme Powell in St. Louis a few days later, and the killing of Darrien Hunt in Saratoga Springs, Utah, only a week ago. There are dozens of other, similar case. In truth there are probably hundreds so far this year alone.

In each and every case, an imminent threat is perceived by officers were there is no real threat at all.

James Boyd was gathering his things and surrendering when flash-bang grenades, a dog and finally live ammunition were used to "bring him down." The excuse? He was "armed" with two pocket knives, he had mental problems and he had been in "negotiations" with police for hours. Thus he was, by definition, a threat to be neutralized. The decision to kill him had clearly been made well in advance of the actual shooting; this was no "split second decision," but because of the fact that he had knives, he was mentally disturbed, and he had kept the police at bay for hours, policies and protocols of the department made him into an imminent threat who needed killing.

It all started with a call to police reporting someone camping illegally.

John Crawford was the victim of a 911 call. The caller reported a "suspicious" man (read: black) waving an automatic weapon around in a WalMart. Police were depatched and essentially shot him on sight. As it happened, the "automatic weapon" was a BB gun from the store itself, Crawford was not waving it around or pointing it at anyone, and he was on the phone with the mother of his children when he was shot by police -- police who perceived an imminent threat where there was none. They were going by what they were told by the 911 dispatcher who was in turn repeating what the 911 caller had said leading to wild misperception all around and the death of an innocent man. Crawford may have had a "weapon," but he wasn't "armed." Even if he had been, Ohio is an open carry state where having a loaded weapon in plain sight is perfectly legal. So what was he shot for? Solely because he was perceived to be a threat based on the color of his skin and the fact that he had a "weapon".

Mike Brown was killed by Darren Wilson for reasons unknown. The only information is from eye witnesses who say that Brown was at first running away, then turned and with his hands up, was shot numerous times by Officer Wilson. The justification offered by the police was that Brown had assaulted the officer and "tried to take his gun," but we hear this all the time, it's often not true, and it is not a reason to kill him, even if it were true. We can certainly speculate that Officer Wilson perceived an imminent threat, however, regardless of the fact that Brown was not armed and was running away. That's why the police brought up the supposed assault on the officer and trying to take his gun. Under those circumstances, policy and protocol allow an officer to use deadly force. And the law protects the officer if he does.

Kajieme Powell was another victim of 911 calls. He was "acting strange" and was said to have two knives. He took a soda and a package of pastry from a convenience store (the manage called 911) and he was walking around outside a barber shop next door talking to himself and acting strange, scaring the proprietress. Within seconds of the police arriving, Powell was shot and mortally wounded. He was perceived to be a threat by police even before they got there. When he didn't instantly obey the police upon their arrival, he was shot to death -- because of their perception that he was an imminent threat, a perception driven by the 911 callers as relayed through 911 dispatch. The people on scene prior to police arrival did not see him as a threat -- except to the extent that the proprietress of the barber shop said she was frightened of him -- and he had two knives.

Darrien Hunt was yet another victim of a 911 caller who reported a "suspicious person" (yet again black-ish) acting strange and armed with something, perhaps a sword. Here we go again. Police were dispatched, made contact with Hunt, they appeared to witnesses to have a casual conversation with him, then they opened fire as he was running away, killing him. Police have apparently made false statements about Hunt "lunging" at them with his "sword" in an effort to justify the killing by characterizing the imminent threat they felt they were under, but witnesses do not corroborate the police version -- which has meant that the police story has had to "evolve" over the past few days. The sword morphed into two by fours (multiple?) and the police asserted that the sword was real, not a toy at all. Hunt refused to drop the sword or the two-by-fours, or whatever, and thus he needed killing. Witnesses maintain he turned and tried to flee, and that's when he was shot multiple times, but there is no corroboration that Hunt threatened the officers in any way. As for whether he "refused commands," who knows? But even if he did, is that an appropriate reason to use deadly force? The law will likely protect the police for using deadly force under the circumstances, as long as they say the right words in the right sequence, but was the killing of Hunt truly necessary?

A common pattern in these killings and many others is a call to 911 reporting someone suspicious or acting strange or doing something illegal. Depending on what callers tell the 911 dispatcher, the police sent to the scene will be on high or higher alert, prepared for... well, prepared for killing. It happens over and over and over again. It happens because certain kinds of reports trigger certain responses including use of lethal force where none is really necessary.

In some of these cases, the 911 caller has misperceived and misreported, and in some cases police misconstrue reports as far more threatening than they are.

This alone leads to hundreds of police homicides a year, simply by virtue of not understanding -- and not making a viable attempt to understand -- the situation in its entirety. In so many of these cases, the victim of police homicide is perceived to be a threat but realistically is not a threat, something that may only be realized after the victim is dead.

The perception of a threat is driven by rules, polices and protocols, not necessarily by reality at all. There is a media and police department legend about making "split second decisions" of life and death, but it's rarely the case. Instead the decision of how to engage the suspect is made well before the encounter based on reports that may or may not be accurate. Generally speaking, if certain threats are perceived *whether real or not* then lethal force is almost guaranteed. It's not "split-second" decision making, the decision is built in to the policies and the perception of the situation.

Certain kinds of incidents -- such as domestic abuse calls, child endangerment and/or suspicious person calls, suspected gunfire calls, and so on -- can trigger inappropriate lethal force responses. Service of no-knock warrants and drug raids can lead to lethal force responses to perceived threats, even when there aren't any real threats or threats are minor. Lack of obedience to commands -- which can be incomprehensible, contradictory, or impossible for the subject to follow -- can lead to use of lethal force. "Reaching" -- especially toward the waist -- is almost an automatic death sentence.

These uses of lethal force are all driven by policy and protocol which presume the officer is under imminent threat to life or limb and force protection overrides every other consideration. The police have no obligation to protect and serve the public, but they are specifically authorized by their own departments to protect themselves from perceived threats.

The police are trained and conditioned to perceive threats where often none exist. And that's the biggest reason for all the police homicides.

Even when there are real threats, use of lethal force is often the least appropriate response, and yet policies and conditioning lead nowhere else.

That's the problem, and that's what has to change. There are many ways to do it, including disbanding and re-forming whole police departments. But the problem is primarily a matter of rules, policies and protocols along with training and conditioning which provide the officers with no recourse other than use of lethal force, and laws which protect police when they use lethal force.

Unfortunately, part of the problem is due to the "professionalization" of police policies which have standardized a use of force continuum nationally. DoJ involvement in police department review and reform is no guarantee that police homicides will be reduced. What tends to happen instead is that rules become more comprehensive, and the use of force more rationalized -- though it may still not be appropriate.

The people have to take it upon themselves to change the dynamic of police interaction with the public. It's a long-term endeavor, but it can and if sustained will make a difference.

The killing must stop.