The Daily Mail’s release of the police bodycam footage of George Floyd’s arrest and death confirms everything we already knew. But it also should help us refocus on practical solutions rather than aimless, anarchic riots over police misconduct.
What we already knew is that there is no reasonable excuse for the way officers manhandled Floyd before his death in custody. The man was accused of nothing more serious than passing a funny bill in a convenience store. He never made aggressive moves against the police. His hands were cuffed behind his back. He was begging for mercy. He repeatedly said he couldn’t breathe and that he wanted to cooperate, but he was “claustrophobic” and scared for his life.
At worst, in sum, he was a recalcitrant arrestee — one who, while not complying with the police, also was no way a threat against them.
Yet, one officer knelt on his neck while two others knelt on his legs and another threatened witnesses, all while ignoring dozens of pleas from Floyd and witnesses to spare Floyd’s life. Not one single thing in the videos exonerates the officers’ conduct.
Still, the answer to such horrid police behavior lies in reform, not revolution. Again and again in the video, we see these officers overreact to Floyd’s confusion and fear. Their only responses to his fright, even after he was cuffed, were to amp up verbal scolding and physical force. Not once did they attempt to calmly de-escalate the situation, show empathy, or give this cuffed and non-threatening man the emotional space to relax.
This is less a problem of racism (although perhaps racial stereotypes played into the officers’ overreaction) than it is of bad training and personal character. From the very moment of the first officer’s approach to Floyd’s window, the officer was aggressive, pointing his gun directly at Floyd before there was any sign of resistance. Again, this was all in response to nothing more serious than the use of forged currency.
This is the worst of a police ethos that exists in some officers who like to play the tough guy while being drunk on their own authority. We’ve all seen the type of officer who acts this way. I’ve personally seen police use such overreactive force while arresting a white guy who was fall-down drunk but not aggressive.
The constructive responses to this are all generally agreed upon. Universal training against implicit racial bias. Better training in recognizing when a suspect is non-threatening and in de-escalating situations involving unarmed subjects. More, not less, police presence, as friendly allies in crime-threatened neighborhoods. Restrictions on (but perhaps not full elimination of) the reach of “qualified immunity” for police. Rules to make it easier to discipline officers who act wrongly and for the discipline to have weight. Severe restrictions on “no-knock” search warrants and on the militarization of police. Better reporting of all use-of-force incidents. And maybe others.
Statistics indicate that the vast majority of police in the United States do a good job, that police are far more likely to be shot at than to shoot, that deaths from police action are steady or declining, and that police-caused deaths of unarmed suspects have been cut nearly in half in five years, on pace to just 50 nationwide this year.
Meanwhile, though, as police come under political attack, and as municipal authorities withdraw support and funding from police, crime spikes upward, with black victims predominating.
Riots and revolutionary tactics are making things worse. Targeted reforms can make things better. Only with intelligent reform, not with anarchy, will the response to George Floyd’s entirely preventable death make a safer and more just society for all people, white and black.
