Lethal Police Force: Unethical? Acceptable? Heroic?

Our justice system was designed to give all citizens the benefit of the doubt. Police officers bring suspects in and gather the information. Lawyers fight on both sides. Citizen peers and experienced judges listen to the case with all its nuance and a judgement is made about whether the suspect is guilty and what the next step in the process should be. There are problems with the way we conceive our prison system which I have discussed in another article, but for now let's operate from conditions as they are.

When people are murdered, especially people serving their community, everyone feels it. In Parkland last week, four police officers were ambushed and killed. This is a tragedy that is bringing in mourners and support from all over the country and even other countries. Maurice Clemmons was the prime suspect. Within a few days police officers had found him and killed him. Many praise the police officer as a hero and are calling for him to receive an award like officer of the year. This makes my stomach turn.

I will admit my bias. I am sickened by the premature end of a human life. If Maurice Clemmons had stood trial in front of his peers and trained judges. If he had been granted the benefit of a lawyer, I would have worked through this emotional reaction a lot better. My first reaction was that the police officer does not have the right to make that judgement.

Although none of the media accounts have made it seem that lethal force was necessary, I have to admit that I was not there. The truth will probably never come out about the exact facts of the situation. I am reticent to use the term unethical to describe the police officer's actions since I don't have the facts. At this point only the police officer in question can look into himself and see whether lethal force was necessary against Maurice Clemmons or whether he was just overly afraid, or whether he just really wanted to see dead the man who he perceived to be the murderer of his colleagues. Police officers are trained to use fire arms. There are many non-lethal ways to shoot someone in order to incapacitate them. I am thankful that the police officer was not hurt in the altercation.

I believe it is ethical for police officers to use the least amount of force necessary to do their job. Unfortunately police officers do not always operate under these guidelines. I would imagine it is especially difficult to keep these ideals in mind when you lose friends and family, when you lose fellow community servants, when you know there is a murderer on the loose, laughing at those whom you are mourning. It is human to not focus on the ideal of minimal force during these times. I do not know what was going on inside the police officer's head, so I will not judge but I would encourage him to get professional help to work through these issues. If it was an unethical situation, he needs counseling in order to regain an appropriate sense of his role in the criminal justice system. If it was an ethical situation then he was forced to kill someone when he really didn't want to, this also requires trained psychological staff to help cope with.

Lethal force is only acceptable when there are no other options. Acceptable force is the least amount of force necessary to apprehend suspects or perpetrators of crimes. Police officers have been authorized with great power. As we all know, with great power comes great responsibility. When we do not have all the information it is hard to judge a police officer's use of force. When the facts are known, however, police officers need to be held accountable for their actions. It is like my mom's view of lying. She said that if she catches us in a lie then it means there were probably several other times that she didn't catch. If a police officer has demonstrable unacceptable use of force, then they probably have unacceptable use of force when there isn't the evidence.

No matter what, I don't think that the use of lethal force makes a police officer a hero. I don't think that he deserves a police officer of the year award for killing a man who did not get the benefit of legal representation and a fair trial. The best case scenario, he did what his job required of him with the unfortunate result of the premature loss of human life. This was a difficult situation. The suspect is believed to have killed four police officers. It was a dangerous situation. I am not judging the police officer who took down Maurice Clemmons. I am in no place to judge, only he can reflect and judge accordingly. Whether or not it was ethical or acceptable, I do not find it heroic. If the police officer had been able to apprehend the suspect without sustaining injury himself and with minimal damage to the suspect, that I would consider heroic. It would be rising above the circumstances and upholding his role in the system despite the odds. For that I would nominate him for the officer of the year award.