#overpolicing

Unique among cities, here in Oakland, we voted to tax ourselves – once in 2004, again in 2010, and again in 2014 – in order to support violence prevention strategies alongside policing ones. Although the city retains a good portion of these funds, much of the violence prevention funding is distributed to local CBOs like ours. This fund has grown to over $9m. That’s as much as the entire state of California set aside last year for its Violence Intervention and Prevention Grant Program (CalVIP).

This is what happens when you flood a major transit system with a government-sanctioned, taxpayer-funded armed gang coated with official impunity and prone to violent escalation.

Sunday’s police shooting should be a lesson in why the subway should not be teeming with cops, responding to “crimes” of poverty — like fare evasion and panhandling — with deadly force. Unsurprisingly, the Adams administration has framed the incident within its ongoing, mendacious narrative about rampant subway crime, for which more policing is the only answer.

The need to expand and make more accessible the already existing half-price Fair Fares program — which only a third of eligible New Yorkers currently use — should be a priority. Funneling more money into police coffers while cutting budgets for social services only serves to prove a circular logic, in which greater desperation is met with more policing, producing greater desperation still — and thus providing further grounds for right-wing calls for even more policing.

Tyre Nichols was killed by members of SCORPION, a police task force that was implemented to reduce crime in "violent neighborhoods." The unit, named by an acronym for “Street Crimes Operations to Restore Peace in our Neighborhoods,” had already been criticized for how it overpoliced and caused conflict (The Atlantic). The family of Tyre Nichols demanded its end, and on Sunday, the department announced it was disbanded (Intelligencer).

But overpolicing is one of many ways that conflict between communities and law enforcement start. And despite the stated intentions, they do little to keep people safe. . . .

A report by the Prison Policy Initiative found that Black residents were more likely to be stopped by police than white or Hispanic residents, both in traffic and street stops. . . . During these interactions, police were twice as likely to use force against Black or Hispanic residents than white residents (Prison Policy). 

And there are countless examples of these stops resulting in death. Philando Castile was murdered in 2016 at a routine traffic stop – and had been stopped at least 46 times before in his lifetime (Reason). Army Lt. Caron Nazario, who identifies as Black and Latino, was recently stopped, pepper-sprayed, and handcuffed during a routine traffic stop. The officers involved illegally pulled their weapons, threatened to murder him, and illegally searched the vehicle (NPR). The death of Sandra Bland was also caused by an unjust traffic stop back in 2015 (Vox). Daunte Wright was killed by police officers after a routine stop in Minneapolis (NBC News). And the SCORPION unit was responsible for the death of Tyre Nichols.