A lot of news stories lately have been about the police violence that has been escalating, or being covered by the media more. There has been an abundance of unarmed people being shot by police officers in attempted apprehension, whether the person was resisting or complying, such as in the South Florida shooting of Charles Kinsey, who was shot in the leg by South Florida police officers while lying on the ground with his hands in the air. The media is taking notice of the escalation, especially among African-American people -- not that the media hasn’t covered other shootings -- such as Dylan Noble, who was shot several times and even with a shotgun after he was on the ground. Lt. Burke Farrah said about the shooting that Noble told police, “he hated his life” before advancing towards officers.
If you Google “police assisted suicide,” dozens of articles showing stories of people who used police to commit suicide will pop up. Why is it possible for people to purposefully be killed by police? Why would they think it is possible for them to provoke police into killing them? Possibly due to the increasing rate of police shootings. With the inherent tensions between citizens and police straining, more and more the potential for police-involved confrontations to escalate is in itself escalating. Police officers seem to be more inclined to draw their firearms in a situation than go for any of the other non-lethal weapons in their arsenal -- at least, that is how it is being presented in the media these days. With what people are being shown by the media, police appear oppressive and confrontational, which might be the case sometimes, but does not represent all of the officers protecting and serving their communities.
The potential problem could also be their training. What are officers being taught to rely on, their taser or their firearm? What are they taught to use to resolve conflicts? And is what they are being taught actually helpful in resolving conflicts, or does it potentially increase the chance of a conflict occurring?
One article I read was about 18-year-old Limichael Shine who was shot by Ocean County police officers and killed in a police-assisted suicide. Officers claimed that he brandished a knife and asked police to shoot him. While a knife is definitely a deadly weapon, is a gun necessary to combat someone brandishing one, or would mace or a taser have been an effective means of stopping and deescalating the situation without killing someone who potentially needed psychiatric help?
With all the equipment police officers seem to carry, one would think that they would have something in their utility belt to disable an aggressive civilian who is unarmed or not wielding a firearm without resorting to using lethal force. But the shootings continue and seem only to be increasing even as officers are being pulled from the streets and FBI agents being put on the already existing cases.
It is very unfortunate that people who are unwell can manipulate police officers into killing them. It seems that police are being stretched in all directions and are tasked with dealing with too many jobs and, seemingly in some cases, reacting in many situations with the same use of force.
