After a decade of sending military equipment to police departments across the US, federal officials are reconsidering the idea in light of the violence in Ferguson, Missouri, over the shooting death of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown on Aug. 9.
The unrest in Missouri has exposed the public to images of heavily armed police, snipers trained on protesters and tear gas plumes.
US Attorney General Eric Holder said that when police and citizens need to restore calm, “I am deeply concerned that the deployment of military equipment and vehicles sends a conflicting message.”
US Representative Hank Johnson said he will introduce legislation to curb the trend of police militarization, while US Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services, said his committee will review the program to determine if the US Department of Defense’s surplus equipment is being used as intended.
As the country concludes its longest wartime period, the military has turned over thousands of surplus weapons and armored trucks to police, who often train alongside military personnel.
A report by the American Civil Liberties Union in June said police agencies had become “excessively militarized,” with officers using training and equipment designed for the battlefield on city streets.
The report found the amount of goods transferred through the military surplus program rose in value from US$1 million in 1990 to nearly US$450 million last year.
“Every police force of any size in this country has access to those kinds of weapons now,” said David Harris, a police expert at the University of Pittsburgh law school. “It makes it more likely to be used [and] is an escalation all by itself.”
In Louisiana, masked police in full body armor carrying AR-15 assault rifles raided a nightclub without a warrant, looking not for terrorists, but underage drinkers and fire code violations. Officers in California train using the same counterinsurgency tactics as those used in Afghanistan.
“They’re not coming in like we’re innocent until proven guilty,” said Quinn Eaker, who had his organic farm and community in Texas raided by special police teams in August last year. “They’re coming in like: ‘We’re gonna kill you if you move a finger.”
Police found no drugs or weapons and filed no charges after their search, which authorities said followed standard procedure.
In 1990, the US Congress authorized the Pentagon to give surplus military equipment to police to help fight drugs, which then gave way to the fight against terrorism.
Though violent crime nationwide is at its lowest level in generations and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have largely concluded, the military transfers have increased.
Police say the equipment, which includes free body armor, night vision goggles and scopes, keeps officers safe and prepares them for worst-case scenarios.
“Is it smart for them to use that stuff and perhaps look like soldiers from Iraq going into a place? Is that smart or over the top? I’d say generally that’s smart. Now, if you use that every time a guy is writing bad checks, that’s getting rather extreme,” said Bill McSweeney, chief of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office and head of its detective division.
The US has provided 610 mine-resistant ambush protected (MRAP) armored trucks, to police across the country since last year, including at least nine in Los Angeles County, US Defense Logistics Agency spokeswoman Michelle McCaskill said.
In rural Maine, the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office asked for an MRAP. Corporal George Cayer wrote in his request that Maine’s western foothills face a “previously unimaginable threat from terrorist activities.”
In Orange County, Florida, masked officers in tactical gear helped state inspectors raid barber shops in 2010 to find people cutting hair without a license.
Los Angeles Police Department Deputy Chief Michael Downing, who heads the department’s counterterrorism and special operations bureau, said officers are dealing with “an adversary who is more sophisticated, more tactically trained.”
Downing said that although police train with soldiers, they are not warriors with a mission to kill, but public servants with no “enemies.”
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