Police brutality is the excessive and unwarranted use of force by law enforcement against an individual or a group. It is an extreme form of police misconduct and is a civil rights violation. Police brutality includes, but is not limited to, asphyxiation, beatings, shootings, improper takedowns, and unwarranted use of tasers.
Police misconduct is inappropriate conduct and illegal actions taken by police officers in connection with their official duties. Types of misconduct include among others: sexual offences, coerced false confession, intimidation, false arrest, false imprisonment, falsification of evidence, spoliation of evidence, police perjury, witness tampering, police brutality, police corruption, racial profiling, unwarranted surveillance, unwarranted searches, and unwarranted seizure of property.
The Alameda County Sheriff's Office (ACSO) is a law enforcement agency serving Alameda County, California. ACSO is accredited through the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA), the American Correctional Association (ACA), National Commission on Correctional Health Care (NCCHC) and the California Medical Association (CMA).
Otto Zehm was a man with a developmental disability from Spokane, Washington, who died on March 20, 2006, during an altercation with police officer Karl F. Thompson Jr. Zehm committed no crime, and on May 30, 2006, the Spokane County Medical Examiner ruled the death a homicide. In 2012, the first of several officers on the scene at Zehm's death was convicted of excessive use of force and lying to investigators, and was sentenced to 51 months imprisonment.
Oscar Grant III was a 22-year-old African-American man who was killed in the early morning hours of New Year's Day 2009 by BART Police Officer Johannes Mehserle in Oakland, California. Responding to reports of a fight on a crowded Bay Area Rapid Transit train returning from San Francisco, BART Police officers detained Grant and several other passengers on the platform at the Fruitvale BART Station. BART officer Anthony Pirone kneed Grant in the head and forced Grant to lie face down on the platform. Mehserle drew his pistol and shot Grant. Grant was rushed to Highland Hospital in Oakland and pronounced dead later that day. The events were captured on bystanders’ mobile phones. Owners disseminated their footage to media outlets and to various websites where it went viral. Both protests and riots took place in the following days.
The Albuquerque Police Department (APD) is the municipal law enforcement agency of Albuquerque, New Mexico. It is the largest police force in the state, with approximately 1,000 sworn officers in 2022.
Occupy Oakland refers to a collaboration and series of demonstrations in Oakland, California, that started in October 2011. As part of the Occupy movement, protestors have staged occupations, most notably at Frank H. Ogawa Plaza in front of Oakland City Hall.
The following is a timeline of Occupy Oakland which began on Monday, October 10, 2011, as an occupation of Frank H. Ogawa Plaza located in front of Oakland City Hall in downtown Oakland, and is an ongoing demonstration. It is allied with Occupy Wall Street, which began in New York City on September 17, 2011, and is one of several "Occupy" protest sites in the San Francisco Bay Area. Other sites include Occupy San Francisco and Occupy San Jose.
The 2011 Oakland general strike was a demonstration held in Oakland, California on November 2, 2011 as part of the larger Occupy Oakland movement.
Occupy Cal included a series of demonstrations that began on November 9, 2011, on the University of California, Berkeley campus in Berkeley, California. It was allied with the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York City, San Francisco Bay Area Occupy groups such as Occupy Oakland, Occupy Berkeley, and Occupy San Francisco, and other public California universities. "Cal" in the name "Occupy Cal" is the nickname of the Berkeley campus and generally refers specifically to UC Berkeley.
The UC Davis pepper spray incident occurred on November 18, 2011, during an Occupy movement demonstration at the University of California, Davis. After asking the protesters to leave several times, university police pepper sprayed a group of student demonstrators as they were seated on a paved path in the campus quad. The video of UC Davis police officer Lt. John Pike pepper-spraying demonstrators spread around the world as a viral video and the photograph became an Internet meme. Officer Alex Lee also pepper sprayed demonstrators at Pike's direction.
The Occupy movement has been met with a variety of responses from local police departments since its beginning in 2011. According to documents obtained by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, the FBI, state and local law enforcement officials treated the movement as a potential criminal and terrorist threat and used fusion centers and counterterrorism agents to investigate and monitor the Occupy movement.
United States v. City of Portland was a lawsuit filed by the United States Department of Justice against the City of Portland, Oregon on December 17, 2012, alleging a pattern or practice of unconstitutional use of force by the Portland Police Bureau against individuals with actual or perceived mental illness.
James B. Chanin is an American civil rights attorney, based in Oakland, California. Chanin has been an attorney since 1978, and is best known for his representation of victims in the “Oakland Riders” case, and as one of the two plaintiffs’ attorneys in the Riders Negotiated Settlement Agreement (NSA). Although best known for his cases involving police misconduct, Chanin has also represented police officers and other police department employees.
The murder of Laquan McDonald took place on October 20, 2014, in Chicago, Illinois. McDonald was a 17-year-old who was fatally shot by a Chicago Police Officer, Jason Van Dyke. Police had initially reported that McDonald was behaving erratically while walking down the street, refusing to put down a knife, and that he had lunged at officers. Preliminary internal police reports described the incident similarly, leading to the shooting being judged as justifiable, and Van Dyke not being charged at the time. This was later disproved after a video of the encounter was released, showing that McDonald was walking away.
The killing of Charley Leundeu Keunang, a 43-year-old Cameroonian national, occurred in Los Angeles, California, on March 1, 2015. He was shot by three Los Angeles Police Department officers.
Don't Shoot Portland, also called Don't Shoot PDX, is a Portland, Oregon-based accountability group formed by Black Lives Matter supporter Teressa Raiford to scrutinize actions of the Portland Police Bureau.
On August 5, 2016, Jamarion Rashad Robinson, a 26-year-old African American man who had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was shot 59 times and killed in a police raid in East Point, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta. The shooting occurred when at least 14 officers of a Southeast Regional Fugitive Taskforce from at least seven different agencies, led by U.S. Marshals, forcibly entered the apartment of Robinson's girlfriend to serve a warrant for his arrest. The officers were heavily armed, including with submachine guns. The warrant was being served on behalf of the Gwinnett County police and the Atlanta Police Department, and authorities said they had sought his arrest for attempted arson and aggravated assault of a police officer. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) stated that Robinson had been repeatedly ordered to put down a weapon and that officers who had been involved in the shooting reported Robinson fired at them three times.
William J. Lewinski is a Canadian-born retired psychology professor and expert on police use of force at his own Force Science Institute, founded in 2004. He provides training to police and serves as an expert witness in court cases.
On December 22, 2020, 47-year-old Andre Hill was shot and killed by Officer Adam Coy of the Columbus Division of Police in Columbus, Ohio. Coy had been called to the neighborhood in response to a non-emergency call from a neighbor who reportedly witnessed someone sit in an SUV and turn the car on and off. Hill was leaving a friend's house when Coy confronted and shot him. Hill was unarmed, and was holding a smartphone. Coy was fired from the Columbus Police less than a week later.
"Shot by police with rubber bullet at Occupy Oakland" Filmed by Scott Campbell, moments before being shot by an Oakland Police officer.