Nationwide, nearly every state is showing frustration at one issue that has plagued American citizens across the board: police violence and abuse. It's no secret that police hold nearly all the power in any situation that could result in criminal charges; and it SHOULDN'T be a secret that many of these incidents involve police using excessive or unnecessary force. The real issue is that cops that fly off the handle seldom face any real consequences for their actions. Some of these aggressors don't even see any repercussions at all! This may all change thanks to the actions of some community activists. Several Seattle area community groups are calling for a step forward: enactment of stronger police accountability measures.

Accountability

Accountability: a person being held responsible for his or her actions. This is a word that oftentimes doesn't really ring in the ears of police officers. The recent measures proposed by activists seek to provide enactment of a permanent Community Police Commission. This would be volunteer based liaison between the community and police department, and it will hold authority to report on reforming progress and also report police misconduct, in addition to asking to become a permanent fixture, they have suggested some potential reforms. Mayor Ed Murray has so far adopted some of the recommendations in the reforms package but the overall talks were stalled. Still, on the whole picture, Seattle may finally be on the way to finally holding its brutal cops accountable for their poor behavior.

Police Violence

According to a news report from 2011, police were at an aggression level that had the statistics showing that 1 out of 5 violent encounters were unconstitutional. The same news report also highlighted the fact that oftentimes police officers do not even file reports on their actions. What does this mean? No conclusions can be drawn, but that's the troubling fact: if you can't have a report to go off of, how can you be sure an officer wasn't overly aggressive? On top of this, there is little to no investigation of officers who report their use of force, or officers who report nothing. Along with this, there was a small number of officers who reported about 18% of the entire department's use of force. The article also highlights a possible pattern of discrimination, in which over half of the excessive force cases were minorities in Seattle, where the population has a white majority.

So what happens when police get violent? YOU get criminal charges! There is no reason for this to happen, and no reason for you to be stuck with a conviction when you weren't even the aggressor. If you are facing criminal charges, contact Steve Karimi today, and build a good defense to fight them in court.