Media Portrayal of Police Brutality and Public Perception

Introduction: Police Use of Force and the Media

Every day, police officers face the possibility of life-and-death encounters that require split-second decisions whenever they respond to a call or come upon a crime in progress. The overwhelming majority of police officers in the United States exercise their training and best judgment in admirable ways, avoiding lethal force even when a situation might justify it. In some isolated cases, however, police officers have used excessive force, and these incidents typically receive a great deal of media attention.

The well-publicized police treatment of Rodney King in 1991, broadcast repeatedly on national television, brought the issue of police brutality to the forefront of debate over what levels of physical force law enforcement authorities in the United States should be permitted to use, as well as the role of the media in covering such events (Sigelman, Welch, Bledsoe & Combs, 1997). As Lawrence (2001) emphasizes, "Police use of physical force is a particularly controversial issue in American crime fighting. Given the considerable ambiguity that surrounds the issue, whether police use of force is presented as police brutality and whether brutality is understood as a problem depend greatly upon which voices and views the media emphasize" (p. 18).

This observation suggests that the manner in which the media portrays an alleged case of police brutality goes a long way in shaping public opinion about the event — regardless of whether the officer or officers involved were actually guilty of using excessive force. These are vital issues because public support for the police is an important component of community policing. To the extent that local citizens view their police force in a negative light — the kind of light that high-profile instances of police brutality create — such support is unlikely to be forthcoming. As Ross notes, "Individuals who have never had an unsatisfactory encounter with the police are generally supportive of the police or at least ambivalent, and if we believe that public perceptions that excessive use of force is common are inaccurate, then efforts are needed to educate the public about the realities of police work and the infrequency of abuse of force" (2000, p. 5).

Defining Police Brutality

The definition provided by Devine, Hansen, Wilde, and Poole (1999) indicates the broad scope of behaviors that can be characterized as police brutality: "Police brutality occurs whenever police officers abuse their power by using excessive force against civilians. The category encompasses acts of violence and acts that violate human dignity, including unjustified police shootings of civilians, beatings and chokings of suspects in custody, and methods of inflicting physical or psychological suffering on detainees" (p. 263).

Clearly, these behaviors and actions on the part of law enforcement constitute violations of basic human rights as well as the fundamental constitutional protections afforded all Americans under the Fourteenth Amendment. However, this definition of police brutality has frequently been expanded by the media to include the use of lethal force by police even when that force was later found to be justified (Lawrence, 2001).

High-Profile Incidents and Media Sensationalism

Despite the relatively isolated and infrequent nature of police brutality in the United States, these events continue to receive an enormous amount of attention from the mainstream media. Mayer emphasizes that "recent incidents of police brutality have kept the issue prominent in national news. In November 2007, Sean Bell, a Black man, was killed by police in Queens, New York, after leaving his bachelor party. Bell was unarmed, yet the officers fired more than 50 shots into his car" (2007, p. 46). Following a grand jury investigation, three of the five detectives involved were charged in connection with the shooting (Mayer, 2007).

According to Mayer, "The incident is reminiscent of a similar situation in New York in 1999, in which a West African street vendor, Amadou Diallo, was killed when police shot at him 41 times. Diallo was also unarmed" (2007, p. 46). The fact that these two events occurred nearly a decade apart and were entirely unrelated was not the primary focus of the media coverage that attended them. It is reasonable to conclude that sensationalized media coverage of these and other instances of police brutality reinforces the perception among the American public that the police are broadly out of control.

Conclusion

The manner in which the media frames incidents of alleged police brutality has profound consequences for public trust in law enforcement and the practical functioning of community policing. While holding officers accountable for genuine misconduct is essential, a media environment that sensationalizes isolated incidents and neglects the far more common reality of restrained, professional policing does a disservice to both the public and law enforcement. A more accurate, balanced portrayal of police conduct — one that acknowledges both misconduct when it occurs and the everyday restraint exercised by the vast majority of officers — is necessary for an informed public debate and for the preservation of the community partnerships on which effective policing depends.