The Right Angle: Law enforcement is far from a problem

Eric Stubben

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Eric Stubben is a mechanical engineering junior and Mustang News conservative columnist. These views do not necessarily reflect the opinion or editorial coverage of Mustang News.

Police brutality isn’t a topic that’s new. I’ve written about it more than once, and I’ll continue writing about it until I’ve exhausted all my thoughts.

My point of view never becomes less taboo. I support law enforcement.

Am I biased because I grew up with a father who was a police officer? Probably. But to that point, I’ve experienced many stories and emotions that helped develop my views, which many who protest law enforcement will never get the privilege or heartbreak of experiencing.

Am I a week late to throwing my opinions into the ring of fire that Baltimore has become? Maybe. It’s probably healthier that way.

My opinions are much more refined now than they were during the raw emotion that encompassed me as I watched media provide mass coverage to the Baltimore riots while all but ignoring the slayings of two police officers in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

The argument that police officers are inherently evil and the insinuation that our law enforcement system has a race problem got old a long time ago.

In reality, nobody is arguing against the #BlackLivesMatter complaint. Nobody is arguing that law enforcement is perfect. But the constant notion that law enforcement is broken beyond simple repair is factually incorrect.

So answer this: Why are people rioting in Baltimore?

Beyond the typical, unsupported answers somewhere along the lines of “Freddy Gray was murdered by a white police officer,” nobody can provide a factual answer to the question. Nobody knows what happened to Freddy Gray. At 8:46 a.m. on the morning of April 12, Gray was arrested and placed in a police van. Nearly an hour later, medics were called after the police van carrying Gray stopped and Gray was found in the back with a severe spinal chord injury.

On one hand, it wouldn’t be the first time that a suspect physically hurt himself in the back of a police vehicle to gain notoriety or distract from his or her criminal action. It’s also not impossible for a “bad apple” police officer to let his dark side see the light of day as he assaulted a suspect.

All arguments go to show that we have no clue what happened to Freddie Gray.

Yet all arguments in support of individuals such as Freddie Gray, Eric Garner and Michael Brown fail to address the crux of the entire debate: Why should we demonize law enforcement?

Keep in mind that Gray, Garner and Brown combined for over 50 criminal incidents in their respective lifetimes at the time that each of their controversial incidents took place. Gray was involved in 20 criminal court cases in Maryland, Garner had more than 30 arrests since 1980 and Brown was fresh off of stealing cigars from a market at the time of his death.

Though these criminals live on in infamy in the minds of activists, police officers across the country are continually adversely affected by the public perception that law enforcement officers have some inherent evil.

This negative public perception cannot only serve poorly for our law enforcement officers, but for the American public as well. A law enforcement force that is acutely under the eye of public scrutiny and is forced to record their every word and every movement is a law enforcement force that will not perform up to its highest potential.

To address the arguments at hand that paint our law enforcement in a negative light, let’s look at arguments against law enforcement, then analyze why they’re wrong.

First, many critics argue that law enforcement targets minorities in arrest-related killings.

False.

According to data from the FBI and Bureau of Justice Statistics, arrest-related killings nearly mirror crime percentage by race.

The graph below shows the breakdown of all arrest related deaths by race compared to the percentage of all arrests nationwide sorted by race. As the graph shows, police killings do not run rampant among minorities. While a utopian world would hope for no arrest related deaths, this graph affirms the hope that arrest related deaths at least mirror crime rate. Police do not seem to be targeting one group of people over another.

A second argument against law enforcement usually runs along the lines of law enforcement becoming increasingly militant. Fewer law enforcement officers are being killed in the line of duty while arrest-related deaths rise. Over the most recent comparable data from 2003 to 2009, this premise is false. Both law enforcement deaths and arrest-related deaths hover around a constant value over the seven-year data span.

The graph below shows the breakdown of all arrest related deaths by race compared to the percentage of all arrests nationwide sorted by race. As the graph shows, police killings do not run rampant among minorities. While a utopian world would hope for no arrest related deaths, this graph affirms the hope that arrest related deaths at least mirror crime rate. Police do not seem to be targeting one group of people over another.

This graph can be somewhat confusing to read, so it warrants a quick explanation. Each of the first five color columns should add up to 100 percent, but there are exceptions. For example, the percent of arrest-related deaths was only reported for white and African-American races and the final 20 percent is split between other races. It’s also important to note that Hispanic/Latino data is originally recorded under the white race, then separated out later.

The third argument often pointed out against law enforcement is their lack of trustworthiness. Often, law enforcement critics slyly suggest that law enforcement is continually becoming more and more incredible. Though there’s no way to argue trustworthiness, it’s important to note that America’s confidence in law enforcement has barely wavered over the years, according to Gallup.

Ending this column, I just want to make my point clear.

My point is that law enforcement is not inherently evil. My goal is to persuade others to come to the same conclusion.

My point is not to paint one race over another or to blame one race for any police violence. That would be incredibly untrue and incredibly unethical.

Growing up in the heart of law enforcement, I take complaints hurled at law enforcement with vengeance. I’ll go down swinging while fighting the stereotype that law enforcement has an inherent evil.

As Americans, we must understand that law enforcement is here for the greater good. Their job is complicated, their shifts are rough and their stereotypes are unfair. As we don’t let a few bad apples spoil a tree, don’t let a few rough officers define the rest.