According to ‘abc news’, excessive force is metaphorical. Experts tend to describe the term as the force that is far beyond the needed so as to arrest a suspect and to keep both the bystanders and the police at safety.
Extent of excessive force.
The extent at which force can be used in an excessive extent is when the law enforcer is trying to stop threats from the suspect. In this case, the law enforcer should try their level best to subdue the suspect. Secondly, the officer can use excessive force when the suspect has lethal weapons such as a gun, or may be in for a shoot-out like the Philadelphia case (Micucci et al., 2005).
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However, to some extent, the law enforcer cannot use excessive force when the suspect has accepted and come low in what they intended to do to the officer. The excessive force can be reduced when the officer needs to protect their reputation and the bystanders (Brandl et al., 2001). The excessive force the criminal justice and the police officers is going to reduce. Moreover, the other extent that the officer is going to use less force on the suspect is when the officer understands the situation and knows that the application of excessive force on the apprehended suspect would harm them and even cause their death.
Steps to reduce the incidence of excessive force.
Firstly, the law enforcement centers should call for strong civilian review panels and independent prosecutions. Secondly, the law enforcement firms should also put measures to deal with the officers who use excessive force because they are not afraid of the law. Moreover, reshuffling is needed for the enforcement organizations to deal with matters with no prejudice. The laws to be created should provide an ethical framework to be followed when dealing with such cases of the use of excessive force and trainings on individual’s character.
References
Brandl, S. G., Stroshine, M. S., & Frank, J. (2001). Who are the complaint-prone officers?: An examination of the relationship between police officers' attributes, arrest activity, assignment, and citizens' complaints about excessive force. Journal of criminal justice , 29 (6), 521-529.
Micucci, A. J., & Gomme, I. M. (2005). American police and subcultural support for the use of excessive force. Journal of criminal justice , 33 (5), 487-500.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=96509
