militarization of law enforcement over community base policing

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June 15, 2011

The Relationship with Law Enforcement and the Community,

The Militarization of Law Enforcement over Community-Based Policing.

This year, I attended a forum hosted by the Martin Luther King Jr. Institute where over 300

youth of all races attended. The subject of the forum was Building the gap between lawenforcement and the community. It was very interesting and disturbing to hear how our youthview law enforcement.

This event was a perfect opportunity to allow the youth to voice their opinions in an open forum.From the law enforcement perspective, we explained our job and that there should be respect for

authority and that law enforcement is here to help. I do believe that the exchange in dialogue was

helpful to both sides.

What has happened to the image of the law enforcement officer who is sworn to protect and

serve? A child does not come out of the womb hating law enforcement. The law enforcement

officer has a job that our youth have no desire to become; especially minority youth. Is there adisconnect between law enforcement and the community? Why do some of our law enforcement

management personnel promote an Us against Them attitude in the rank and file?

Unfortunately, there are many law enforcement officers who have the same view. I always ask

the question who is the them? Ifit is me against them, what is the description of the Them? Ihave yet to get an answer.

When I was growing up in Greenburgh, NY, nobody would ever think of walking up in a police

department with a shotgun and shoot at a law enforcement officer. The police department

represented a place of safety and a place of justice. You knew your local law enforcement

officer, he lived on the block, and he was your neighbor. I was coached on Dads Club Footballby two Greenburgh Police Officers from when I was in the fifth grade through the seventh grade.

Because of these brothers, Mike and Ray Turnbulls involvement with me and my community, I

wanted to be in law enforcement.

These days most law enforcement officers do not live in the community they work in. In most

cases, the new recruits have no ties to the community they now work for, thus stereotypes must

Accepting Our Responsibility to Rebuild Our Community

New York Office

405 Tarrytown Rd. #1318

White Plains, New York 10607

1-877-218-8835

Blacks in Law Enforcement of America

A National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Professionals

Member of the Grand Council of Guardians


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be broken on the officers side and on the communitys side before an honest relationship can

begin.

We can say that times have changed. There are economic issues, jobless issues that make the

people cold hearted toward law enforcement. However, at the end of the day; every community

wants to be safe. So why is there a distrust of law enforcement?

Since the tragedy of September 11, 2001, there has been a disturbing trend in the United States,

that of police departments becoming more like the military, yet the militarization trend hasgone unnoticed by most politicians, the U.S. Justice Department, the Bush Administration and

thus far, by the Obama administration.

McGuire and King (2004) in their discussion of trends in the "Policing Industry" refer to

"large-scale, macro or meta-level trends in policing." Militarization is one such example, since

the concept contributes to a transformation in the character and landscape of policing in the

United States. Militarization has replaced community policing in many parts of the U.S. With

militarization has brought forth a "destroy" and war mentality held by many police officers and,in response from civilians, a massive distrust of the police by the populace.

The Bureau of Justice (BJS) reports that 58% of all departments use full-time communitypolicing officers. Overall, 37% of residents in 12 cities reported seeing police talking with

residents in their neighborhood and 24% of respondents reported observing police facilitatingcrime watch and prevention activities.

Community-based policing is both a philosophy (a way of thinking) and an

organizational strategy (a means to carry out that philosophy) that allows the police and

community to work together in new ways to solve problems of crime, disorder, and safety. It

rests on two core elements: changing the methods and practice of the police and taking steps to

establish a real working relationship between the police and the community they claim to protect

and serve.

At the heart of community-based policing is the recognition that the police are much more

than mere crime fighters and can be public servants in other ways. The end goal is the creation

of a professional, representative, responsive, and accountable institution that works in

partnership with the public. These peace officers are a service rather than a force, and an

institution that only criminals need rightly fear.

The militarization of the police department has caused concern from many organizations andlegal scholars. Most believe that the transformation of U.S. police departments is therefore

volatile and dangerous. Just as significant, the militarization of many U.S. police departments

present a constitutional crisis.

In 2010, Governor David Patterson signed an agreement with homeland Security to involve

local New York police departments in the Secured Community Program by Homeland

Security. A few years earlier Immigration Custom Enforcement (ICE) implemented 287gprogram that have police officers checking to see if a person was an illegal immigrant. These


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two programs are having local police departments doing the work and duties of the Federal

Government.

In fact, a report issued by Major Cities Chiefs, a group of over 50 big city police chiefs,

indicated that immigration enforcement by local police would likely negatively affect andundermine the level of trust and cooperation between local police and immigrant communities.

There are some that feel states agreeing to programs by Homeland Security is a step toward the

militarization of U.S. police agencies and an affront to the spirit and ethos of the Posse

Comitatus Act of 1878, which holds that themilitary cannot be used as "the police. Some might

argue that the Posse Comitatus act does not mention police departments, Justice Marshall andJustice Douglass in their dissent in Laird v. Tatum, 408U.S. 1, 19; 92 S. Ct. 2318 (1972) wrote:

"The alarm was sounded in the Constitutional Convention about thedangers of the

armed services. Luther Martin of Maryland said, "whena government wishes to

deprive its citizens of freedom, and reducethem to slavery, it generally makes use ofa standing army." Thatdanger, we have held, exists not only in bold acts of

usurpation ofpower, but also in gradual encroachments."

As to the former sentence, police departments across America are creating their own armies.

As to the latter sentence of the Dissent passage [above], as the statutory exceptions to thePosse Comitatus Act grow, some police commanders seize the vulnerability and create

military rule by dressing officers in fatigues and giving them M16s and tanks, in America's

residential communities (minority neighborhoods in particular).

The militarization of the police by the police circumvents a primary objective of the PosseComitatus Act. The objective is that of enabling citizens to perceive their day-to-day lives

as free of military-governmental siege. Although, the Posse Comitatus Act [statute] speaks to

behavior of the military and imposes harsh punishment on the military commander [by

example] who dares use the military as police, the Act imposes no restrictions on policecommanders who turn civilian police departments into military machines.

Reform to the police alone, however, is insufficient because community support and

assistance are also necessary to achieving the basic goals of the police. Community-based policing,

therefore, also encompasses strategies to reorient the public who, for frequently good reasons,

have been leery and distrustful of the police. However, beyond a rhetorical commitment to

community policing there has been little sense of how to operate a process to achieve thechanges sought. In the best-case scenario, management should come from the community;

have a true history with the people in that community so it will enable them to better manage

the rank and file to give proper service to the community through law enforcement.

In the communities of color in Westchester County, the crime rate has escalated with the

insurgence of weapons in the communities. Controlling the availability and circulation of small

arms and light weapons (SALW) is vital in the effort to increase community safety, the aim of
http://www.houstontx.gov/police/pdfs/mcc_position.pdfhttp://www.houstontx.gov/police/pdfs/mcc_position.pdf


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community-based policing. Does crime control necessitate and justify police departments

shifting from a police service to a military character? Do the citizens we claim to servereally feel safe?

However, citizens will only be willing to hand over firearms in their possession if they

perceive an improvement in public safety and security, and if they have a certain degree oftrust in the law enforcement and other security agencies, instead of seeing tanks blocking

their streets.

This is where community-based policing can play an important role in strengthening SALW

initiatives. Similarly, if there is a good working relationship between the policing and the

community, it will be easier for the policing to obtain information about arms caches or transit

routes for arms trafficking.

Community-based policing, through its partnership approach, aims to ensure that the safety

and security needs of all groups in a particular community are addressed. In this way, the

police can facilitate all peoples access to justice, regardless of their social oreconomic status.Addressing local needs while effectively combating crime improves safety and security, and

with it, strengthens the conditions for development to take place.

Policing is an activity that is not carried out in isolation. All the disparate aspects of policing

that individual officers are called upon to do, from issuing parking tickets to thwarting crimes,

impact and involve other institutions and processes.

In closing, effective community policing will link other criminal justice institutions. The Police

Department is the primary entry point to the justice system. A fair, competent, non-

discriminatory, and respectful police is integral to upholding the rule of law. Along with courts

and the correctional service, thepolice are an essential part of the triad of institutions needed to

make a justice system run effectively and truly serve its community.

In Unity and Peace

Damon K. JonesDamon K. Jones

New York Representative

Blacks in Law Enforcement of America

militarization of law enforcement over community base policing

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