use of force
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Four Guards at a Alabama Charged for Using Excessive Force on Inmate
Alabama’s prison system has come under scrutiny in recent months following a federal report that details widespread, systemic issues of abuse and a lack of proper oversight. As a result of the findings, four guards have been charged with using excessive force against an inmate. The New York Times reports that the charges stem from…
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ProPublica Publishes Database Containing Thousands of Police Misconduct Complaints After Federal Judge Blocked Their Release
In the weeks following the first Black Lives Matter uprisings, criminal justice reform advocates scored several major legislative wins. In New York state, one of these was the repeal of Civil Rights Law 50-A, which shielded the misconduct records of law enforcement from the public. Last week, however, a federal judge paused the release of…
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Miami Officer ‘Relieved of Duty’ and Under Investigation After Video Catches Him Hitting Black Woman in Airport
You really can’t blame Black people for believing that excessive force is just the police go-to for dealing with Black people when they get into heated exchanges with them. If our lived experiences weren’t enough to convince us of this, the fact that we can’t seem to go more than a week without seeing a…
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‘The Use of Force is Never Acceptable’: 2 Atlanta Cops Fired After Tasing HBCU Students During Protest
At a time when volatile and emotional protests are popping up all over the country behind a black man dying due to what is widely seen as excessive use of police force, you would think that cops at these protests would exercise caution regarding their own uses of force on black demonstrators. Yet, several documented…
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A Police Chief Was ‘Concerned’ About How His Department Handled Police Shootings, So He Kept It a Secret
A Kansas police chief said that he was so concerned that his department was “contaminating” police shooting probes that he took several steps to address the issue, including continuing to employ allegedly corrupt officers, keeping broken policies in place and—most importantly—keeping all of this a secret. According to the Associated Press, newly filed documents in…
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#StephonClark: Bill Policing When Cops Can Use Lethal Force Advances in California
A little more than a year after Sacramento, Calif., police gunned down an unarmed Stephon Clark as the 22-year-old father of two stood in his grandparents’ backyard, California may be on the cusp of passing the nation’s strictest law governing when police can use deadly force. Under the proposed legislation headed to the state Assembly…
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Video Shows at Least 5 Cops Aiming Guns at Black Woman With Her Hands Up; LAPD Says She Is a Kidnapping Suspect
The footage is enough to make your stomach drop. In it, a black woman can be seen slowly exiting a vehicle with her hands up and turning around. As the camera pans to the left, you see at least five cops, all of them with their guns drawn and pointed at the woman, who slowly…
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California Cop Who Shot and Killed Diante Yarber Was Previously Charged With Hate Crime, Lawyers Say
A Barstow, Calif., police officer accused of being involved in the fatal shooting of driver Diante Yarber, a young father of three, was convicted of a hate crime back in 2010 but was somehow allowed to return to the police force, attorneys representing Yarber’s family and his passengers say. Not only was the officer allowed back…
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Tenn. Deputies Repeatedly Used Taser on Teen Strapped in Restraint Chair: Lawsuit
Cheatham County, Tenn., sheriff’s deputies are at the center of a newly filed federal lawsuit that claims the officers used excessive force on an 18-year-old who was taken into custody late 2016. The lawsuit accuses deputies of using a Taser on Jordan Norris multiple times, leaving some 40 Taser burns on his body, even as…
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‘We Are Not Thugs’: Black Police Chiefs Respond to Trump’s Endorsement of Police Brutality
Not all police officers are here for President Donald Trump’s casual endorsement of police brutality when he encouraged officers to be rough with suspects in a speech Friday to officers on Long Island, N.Y. Days after Trump’s controversial comments (when aren’t they ever controversial?), leaders of a leading black policing group met with Attorney General…