Lauren Etter and
By Lauren Etter and
Tim Jones
To America’s police, the shooting of two of their own in Ferguson, Missouri, reinforces a sense that they’re under siege.
“The bottom line is, any police officer who puts on a uniform has to be concerned,” said Pat Camden, spokesman for Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge 7.
There are fewer walking the streets after cities made the thin blue line even thinner because of the recession. Unions have clashed with public officials over cuts to pension and health benefits. At the same time, police have been confronted by accusations of racism, some of which were reinforced last week when the Justice Department said the St. Louis suburb used the courts and cops to squeeze fines from blacks to keep itself afloat.
A midnight Thursday ambush at the Ferguson Police Department was the latest conflict in that city since Darren Wilson, a white officer, shot and killed Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, in August. Police have yet to arrest a suspect in Thursday’s shooting, which injured the two officers.
Officers have been on edge for months. In New York, two were shot and killed in December while sitting in their squad car. In September, a Pennsylvania trooper was killed and another wounded when a man opened fire on a barracks.
Such attacks are rare. From 2003 through 2012, an average of 53 law-enforcement officers died each year as a result of attacks while on duty, 11 of which were unprovoked or premeditated, according to FBI statistics. In 2013, the most recent year for which figures are available, there were 27 such deaths, only five of which were unprovoked.
But on the streets, anger at police has boiled over in cities from New York to Oakland, California. A Gallup poll last year found that a quarter of blacks had little or no confidence in the police. Twelve percent of whites shared the same view.
Public attitude toward law-enforcement officers has long fluctuated based on the events of the day, a phenomenon that’s gained new force during the social-media age.
Maria Haberfeld, a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, said, “9/11 happens and everybody looks at police officers as heroes. Today they are the villains of the nation.”
The gulf between police and communities has been reinforced by the use of military gear, such as night-vision goggles, helmets and armoured vehicles intended for counterterrorism. Since 1997, more than 8,000 law-enforcement agencies have received $5.4bn worth of such equipment, according to figures from the Defence Department.
Municipal financial strains have also taken a toll. Retirement and budget cuts reduced the number of police officers to 390,000 in 2013, 14 percent fewer than four years earlier, according to FBI figures.
Some cities are relying on citations, tickets and arrests to raise revenue.
David Couper, a former Madison police chief, said turning the justice system into a cash machine is the worst thing cities can do, especially in areas sensitive to race.
Couper says police need to spend more time in communities.
“If the police retreat now, it’s all lost,” he said. “We’re gonna be like some third-world country where police are like an unjust government.”
President Barack Obama set up a task force last year to find ways to ease tensions that erupted after Ferguson.
A report by the group last week said departments need to invest in more protective equipment and counselling to help officers do their jobs.
In Chicago, a city with teetering finances, officers are issued protective vests, which last about five years before wearing out. They are required to buy replacements with their own money, according to Camden, the police union official.
Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo wants New York to pay for bulletproof vests for officers, body cameras and protective glass for patrol cars in high-crime areas.
San Francisco Police Department officers aren’t changing tactics in light of the recent violence, said Officer Albie Esparza, a spokesman. Fundamentally, he said, nothing has changed.
“We’ve always been targets by simply putting on our uniform,” he said. “You are a target, you respond to calls, officers get killed.”
WP-BLOOMBERG
By Lauren Etter and
Tim Jones
To America’s police, the shooting of two of their own in Ferguson, Missouri, reinforces a sense that they’re under siege.
“The bottom line is, any police officer who puts on a uniform has to be concerned,” said Pat Camden, spokesman for Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge 7.
There are fewer walking the streets after cities made the thin blue line even thinner because of the recession. Unions have clashed with public officials over cuts to pension and health benefits. At the same time, police have been confronted by accusations of racism, some of which were reinforced last week when the Justice Department said the St. Louis suburb used the courts and cops to squeeze fines from blacks to keep itself afloat.
A midnight Thursday ambush at the Ferguson Police Department was the latest conflict in that city since Darren Wilson, a white officer, shot and killed Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, in August. Police have yet to arrest a suspect in Thursday’s shooting, which injured the two officers.
Officers have been on edge for months. In New York, two were shot and killed in December while sitting in their squad car. In September, a Pennsylvania trooper was killed and another wounded when a man opened fire on a barracks.
Such attacks are rare. From 2003 through 2012, an average of 53 law-enforcement officers died each year as a result of attacks while on duty, 11 of which were unprovoked or premeditated, according to FBI statistics. In 2013, the most recent year for which figures are available, there were 27 such deaths, only five of which were unprovoked.
But on the streets, anger at police has boiled over in cities from New York to Oakland, California. A Gallup poll last year found that a quarter of blacks had little or no confidence in the police. Twelve percent of whites shared the same view.
Public attitude toward law-enforcement officers has long fluctuated based on the events of the day, a phenomenon that’s gained new force during the social-media age.
Maria Haberfeld, a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, said, “9/11 happens and everybody looks at police officers as heroes. Today they are the villains of the nation.”
The gulf between police and communities has been reinforced by the use of military gear, such as night-vision goggles, helmets and armoured vehicles intended for counterterrorism. Since 1997, more than 8,000 law-enforcement agencies have received $5.4bn worth of such equipment, according to figures from the Defence Department.
Municipal financial strains have also taken a toll. Retirement and budget cuts reduced the number of police officers to 390,000 in 2013, 14 percent fewer than four years earlier, according to FBI figures.
Some cities are relying on citations, tickets and arrests to raise revenue.
David Couper, a former Madison police chief, said turning the justice system into a cash machine is the worst thing cities can do, especially in areas sensitive to race.
Couper says police need to spend more time in communities.
“If the police retreat now, it’s all lost,” he said. “We’re gonna be like some third-world country where police are like an unjust government.”
President Barack Obama set up a task force last year to find ways to ease tensions that erupted after Ferguson.
A report by the group last week said departments need to invest in more protective equipment and counselling to help officers do their jobs.
In Chicago, a city with teetering finances, officers are issued protective vests, which last about five years before wearing out. They are required to buy replacements with their own money, according to Camden, the police union official.
Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo wants New York to pay for bulletproof vests for officers, body cameras and protective glass for patrol cars in high-crime areas.
San Francisco Police Department officers aren’t changing tactics in light of the recent violence, said Officer Albie Esparza, a spokesman. Fundamentally, he said, nothing has changed.
“We’ve always been targets by simply putting on our uniform,” he said. “You are a target, you respond to calls, officers get killed.”
WP-BLOOMBERG
