Complicated Abuse
On March 3, 1991 the issue of police violence became a national headline when four LAPD officers beat Rodney King, a construction worker. A witness videotaped the violence and gave the footage t
n March 3, 1991 the issue of police violence became a national headline when four LAPD officers beat Rodney King, a construction worker. A witness videotaped the violence and gave the footage to a local news station. The officers were charged with assault with a deadly weapon and excessive force. All were eventually acquitted of the charges by a grand jury.
Decades later, police violence has escalated. Only a few months ago Eric Garner, a resident of Staten Island, New York was choked to death by NYPD officer Justin Damico on July 17, 2014 for suspicion of illegally selling individual cigarettes.
Although Garner told the police officers that he couldn’t breathe, he died of what the coroner report ruled as “the compression of his chest and prone positioning during physical restraint by police.” A video recording ended up the news, including on YouTube.
On August 9, 2014 Michael Brown, an 18-year-old black teenager, was shot and killed by Darren Wilson, a white police officer for Ferguson County, a suburb of St. Louis, Missouri. While Wilson claims Brown had beaten him, the shooting was recorded by a local eyewitness.
In both instances, despite multiple eyewitnesses and detailed video footage of the events, grand juries decided not to indict the officers charged with murder, leading to civil demonstrations across the United States.
According to criminologist Candace McCoy at City University of New York, the fact that officers Damico and Wilson weren’t charged is not surprising. “It is very rare for an officer to get indicted at all, no matter what the race of the victim,” she said.
When it comes to using deadly force, “there is built-in leeway for police, and the very breadth of this leeway is why criminal charges against police are so rare,” says Walter Katz, an attorney specializing in police oversight. In a legal justice system that values the lives and opinions of police officers more than civilians, “there is just an underlying assumption that the officer did not engage in criminal activity.”
“. . . cops that use cannabis, or any associated byproduct, can end up in jail or worse for what they do.”
But in contrast to police officers that take human life for committing petty crimes, cops that use cannabis, or any associated byproduct, can end up in jail or worse for what they do. When Michigan Sergeant Tim Bernhardt, a 22-year-old veteran police officer for Kent County, was found in possession of cannabis butter, he was promptly arrested, charged and thrown in jail because only leaves and flowers are allowable under the Michigan Medical Marijuana Act.
After he plead guilty to felony charges and resigned, Bernhardt committed suicide. In another instance, police officer Kenneth Padgett of Birmingham, Alabama, was arrested and charged with unlawful possession of cannabis. Ultimately, Padgett lost his career over something that is legal just a few states away.
Why? According to retired police officer Howard Woolridge, politicians, pharmaceutical companies and alcohol lobbyists have criminalized cannabis to the point that police officers are expendable. “My biggest opponent on Capitol Hill is law enforcement,” he says. “All that federal money is just too much of a temptation to police departments nationwide.”
“The California Narcotic Officers Association fears the loss of their paychecks, knowing that the sensible people of California would legalize, regulate and tax marijuana the day after the feds end the national prohibition,” Wooldridge said. “Even if they did not lose their paychecks, they would be reassigned to go after drunk drivers, child predators and other public safety threats. That type of work is boring compared to kicking in a few doors a week, waving their guns around and arresting people.”
