Introduction
In the contemporary world, there have been increased cases of police brutality and massive killing of the citizens that have been reported in various parts of the world. The law enforcement officers have been reported to go against their professionals’ duty to undertake torture and killing of the citizens. The suspects have been reported to suffer in the hands of the law enforcement officers massively. Throughout the Dominican Republic, the news headlines have been reporting increased rates of police killings and brutalities that have attracted the attention of the entire world (Martinelli, 2017). Human rights communities have been concerned with killings in the Dominican Republic, but little has been achieved to change the situation in the country. It is clear that police misconducts in Dominican have been exacerbating the violence hence creating an environment where human rights are ignored (International Business Times, 2017). The paper will critically analyse the police brutality and abuse of police power in the Dominican Republic, focusing on the causes of the brutalities and lastly, measures in place to end the police brutalities.
Analysis of Brutality in the Dominican Republic
Amnesty International recently issued a scathing report on the Dominican Republic stating that its national police force was responsible for the massive killing and torturing of the citizens of impunity. According to McCleskey (2017), the police were responsible for approximately 15 percent of all the recorded violent deaths yearly in the Dominican Republican from the years between 2005 and 2010. Within the last two decades, the rates of homicides in the Dominican Republic approximately doubled from about 13 homicides per 100, 000 residents around 1991 to approximately 25 homicides per 100,000 in 2011 (McCleskey, 2017). Amnesty International report has it that the police officers are behind the 15 percent of all the homicides. The National Police of Dominican reported that approximately 2,367 individuals were killed by the police between the years from 2005 to 2010. In 2012, about 290 people were reported to have been murdered by the police officers in the Dominican Republic as a result of a declined safety in addition to increased drug trafficking. Arguably, it is clear that the proportion is very alarming hence raises greater concerns that the police often employ the use of excessive force associated with deadly consequences. According to McCleskey (2017), based on the London-based human rights group, the massive police brutality in the Caribbean nation came out clearly against the backdrop of a surge in violent crime closely linked to increased social inequality, trafficking and even proliferation of firearms.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
In addition to widespread police torture of the criminal suspects, the Amnesty International stated that there was also evidence suggesting that some of the massive police killings were so severe to be called "extrajudicial executions." There have been significant extrajudicial killings allegations reported within the context of policing of demonstration (International Business Times, 2017). There have been instances where police shooting ended up killing some of the people who were living nearby. Further, there has also been evidence suggesting that the massive police killing were aimed at eliminating the witnesses to the unlawful killing. According to McCleskey (2017), reports by the Amnesty International further indicated that the murders carried out by police in the Dominican Republic were specifically intended to remove some of the repeat offenders or those individual linked to the reprisals by some of the corrupt officials. Reports by Amnesty has it that the Dominican Republic police are viewed as corrupt and highly ineffective working together with the criminals.
Police mistreatment and torturing of the suspects who are in custody has also been on the increase. The majority of the criminal suspects are often threatened with death, denied necessities such as food, water and medicine (Reuters, 2017). There are those who had been hanged from the bars, plastic bags put over their head or even nailed by their handcuffs. He prisoners often wear the same clothes and are denied every opportunity to communicate with their parents or even to have a shower for a very long time. Some of the prisoners find themselves into a condemn room where there is neither water nor food (Reuters, 2017). The prison warders have continually been inflicting pain and torture to the prisoners. Prisoners have continued to be subjected to intentional, malicious and discriminatory campaigns of harassment as a form of retaliation for the killing of police officers. According to Amnesty, it is only half of all the cases that reaches the courts or investigated but the rest are manipulated and suspects killed.
Causes of Police brutality
Hardline policing methods have been reported to increasingly contribute to the escalating crime and violence instead of playing a role in helping to curb it. Further, the police have also been said to have flourished as a result of the inadequate government reforms and oversights. At the epicenter of the failure of the government to implement an effective change and further ensure that the Dominican Republic have an effective policing that they require the lack of political will (McCleskey, 2017). For the individuals in power, they have utterly failed to confront those people with vested interest regarding maintaining the current system in which corruption is deeply rooted, and human right abuses by the police are highly pervasive. Further, Amnesty further argued that currently, there are no independent institutions that are mandated to oversee the officers and independently investigate the police abuses complaints.
In the recent years, reports had it that a surge in drug trafficking has resulted directly to what came to be considered as soaring rates of violent crimes in the Dominican Republic (Reuters, 2017). In response, the police have decided to take actions against all the suspected criminals together with some of the innocent bystanders. According to Reuters (2017), the report by the Amnesty indicated that about one-tenth of all the killings of the citizens in the Dominican Republic were carried out by the local police officers. Amnesty said that in most of the public gun fire in the country with the criminals, police often shoot to kill rather than to defend themselves. According to Reuters (2017), the police on the other hand state that most of the police officers have been killed in the war against drugs.
According to McCleskey (2017), the investigation system of police abuse in the Dominican Republic has also been shown to be much disorganized and further; they lack analytical procedures aimed at handling complaints of human rights violation by the law enforcement officers. Whether a law enforcement officer will face justice for torture and killing will entirely depend on whether the victims or their families have lodged an official complaint, political pressure that could have been exerted on the prosecutors or even the amount of publicity such a case would attract.
Measures to end police brutality
According to Reuters (2017), there have been calls by Amnesty for the Caribbean country to immediately put reforms in place to reform the police force so as to bring to an end the alarming level of the torture and killings. It is important for the authorities to make sure that the individuals who are responsible for the massive killing of the people faced justice and further, steps are taken to transform the policies and the practices that tend to enable the abuse and torture to take place. According to Reuters (2017), in the recent years, the Santo Domingo government reportedly fired thousands of the police officers associated with corruption. Critics have it that police killing are not the only way for the police to resolve the problem of repeat offenders (Reuters, 2017).
Based on the utilitarianism, an action would be considered to be right when they explicitly uphold the contentment while on the other hand; something would be deemed to be wrong when they result in a significant amount of sadness (Martinelli, 2017). In this case, utilitarianism often would support what has been considered as the most affirmative simply because it holds that morally right action will produce the greatest good for the majority of the people. Therefore, it is important for the police officers to take into consideration the consequences of their action to the society. According to Martinelli, (2017), brutality and mass killing of citizens do not benefit anyone rather; it creates sadness to the community hence the need to stop it immediately. The police should be encouraged to work in close collaboration with the local people and built a lasting relationship that would facilitate coordination and harmony.
Conclusion
From the above analysis, it has been shown that the police behaviours in the Dominican Republic have resulted in the mass killing of the people rather than protecting their lives. There have been calls from the international community for measures to be in place to help counter brutality and killing carried out by the police in the country. There has been an increased case on police brutality and murders which have substantially led to a massive violation of human rights. Therefore, police behaviours have been considered to be unethical because they are often characterised by theft, brutalities, hanging of suspect, denying them food and water and medicine. Lack of proper structures to manage and control brutality in the Dominican Republic has led to the innocent killing of the citizens and perpetrators going free without being punished. It is important for the lawmakers to come up with a policy that would protect human rights of the citizens, end the massive killings and put to justice those involved in the brutality and killings.
References
International Business Times . (2017). Corruption and Abuse Rife Among Dominican Republic Police: Amnesty . Retrieved from http://www.ibtimes.com/corruption-abuse-rife-among- dominican- republic-police-amnesty-361008
Martinelli , T. (2017). The Ethical Challenges in Dealing with Noble Cause Corruption – Chief Magazine . Unconstitutional Policing . Policechiefmagazine.org . Retrieved from http://www.policechiefmagazine.org/unconstitutional-policing-the-ethical- challenges-in- dealing-with-noble-cause-corruption/
McCleskey, C. (2017). Police Killings on the Rise in the Dominican Republic . Insightcrime.org . Retrieved from http://www.insightcrime.org/news-briefs/police-killings-dominican- republic
Reuters . (2017). Amnesty deplores police abuse in Dominican Republic . Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-dominican-police-idUSTRE79O4AQ20111025
Annotated Bibliography
International Business Times. (2017). Corruption and Abuse Rife Among Dominican Republic Police: Amnesty. Retrieved from http://www.ibtimes.com/corruption-abuse- rife-among-dominican- republic-police-amnesty-361008
In this article, the author analyzed the amount of corruption and the abuse of rifle among the police officers in the Dominican Republic. From the article, it is clear that police have consistently been abusing their authority through resorting to committing torture and murder. Amnesty calls Caribbean country leaders to put reforms into the police force to end the massive killings and police brutality. The author further stated that drug trafficking is behind the soaring rates of violent crime. The article is credible because the author has been highly objective in reporting police abuse of power in Dominican Republican. The article is useful in this study because it adds vital information on police corruption and abuse rife in Dominican Republican.
McCleskey, C. (2017). Police Killings on the Rise in the Dominican Republic. Insightcrime.org. Retrieved from http://www.insightcrime.org/news-briefs/police- killings-dominican-republic
In this article, the authors analyzed the rising police killing in the Dominican Republic and how it has affected the law enforcement. From the article, about 290 people were killed in 2012 by police in Dominican Republican. The rates of homicides in the country doubled over the past two decades from about 13 homicides per 100, 000 people in 1991 to about 25 homicides per 100,000 in 2011. Most of the police killings are reported to occur from exchange of fire during police shootout leading to extrajudicial execution by the officers. The National Police experiences intense mistrust by the citizens as a result of perception of an endemic abuse and corruption. The article is highly credible because the author used accurate information from the report from Amnesty International. From the article, we know the current situation and the massive brutalities carried out by police officers in Dominican Republic.
Martinelli, T. (2017). The Ethical Challenges in Dealing with Noble Cause Corruption – Chief Magazine. Unconstitutional Policing. Policechiefmagazine.org. Retrieved from http://www.policechiefmagazine.org/unconstitutional-policing-the-ethical- challenges-in- dealing-with-noble-cause-corruption/
The article clearly focused on the ethical challenges when it comes to dealing with the noble causes of corruption. From the article, police crimes often results to constitutional right litigations which generally cripples the agencies. In order to promote police integrity, there is the need to emphasize the duty of the law enforcement agencies to respect the dignity and even value of citizens. Failure to have administrative accountability in the country leads to noble cause corruption among police officers. The article is credible since it was based on facts and objectivity. It is useful in the study because it adds valuable information on various ethical challenges when handling noble cause corruption.
Reuters. (2017). Amnesty deplores police abuse in the Dominican Republic. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-dominican-police-idUSTRE79O4AQ20111025
The article is an analysis of police abuse in the Dominican Republic based on Amnesty report. The police are behind the killing and torturing with impunity in the country. From the article, the police were responsible for about 15 percent of all violent deaths years from 2005 to 2010. The rates are very high raising concerns why police often adopt excessive force. There has been the massive abuse of human rights linked to drug trafficking, increasing social inequality and firearms proliferation. The credibility of the article can be traced to its use of reliable and accurate information provided by Amnesty report. The article, provided information to the current study on the police abuse in the Dominican Republic.
