In 2014 the police shooting of Michael Brown and the chokehold death of Michael Garner sparked nationwide protests, civil unrests and debates about police brutality, race and the use of excessive militarized force against criminal suspects. Although these incidents were high-profile and extensively covered in the media in the U.S. and abroad, police brutality has been a hotly controversial contested issue for decades (Newburn). From the Civil Rights Movements of the 1960’s, to the Rodney King beating and L.A. Riots in 1991 and the racially inspired police protest riots of 2014, controversy surrounding police brutality is nothing new ( Continue reading...
