Criminology

The relationship between the minority groups and law enforcement agencies has been a controversial issue throughout the history of United States. There are many cases of reported and unreported police brutality andor harassment against the minority groups. The first form of organized policing in the United States was against a minority group. This was the slave patrols which took place years before the American Civil War started. After the civil war, it was the responsibility of the police to enforce the Black Codes and later in the 20th century, the Jim Crown policies which instituted racial discrimination and   segregation of the minority groups. Throughout the 20th century, police responded poorly to criminal activities against African Americans. The police and the judicial systems were dominated by the white where discrimination was recurrent. In the early 20th century there were many cases of riots where the blacks were assaulted by the mobs of whites with no action from the police. The civil right movements against racial segregation and discrimination in the second half of the 20th century were accompanied by violent conflict between the African Americans activists and the police. Security agencies such as the FBI monitored the lives of African American prominent leaders such as Dr. King.

Minorities in policing
There are various studies that have been carried out to scrutinize the extent of harassment of minority group by the police in different parts of the United States. Some of these investigations have sampled out substantial evidence that the minority groups are subjected to unfair treatment in the course of law enforcement. There has been many incidence of police brutality against a minority group such as the African Americans. One example is the incidence in March 1991 where United States was transfixed by a police officer from in a video tape beating a Rodney King. The incidence which took place in Los Angeles attracted a lot of public debate as the many people were shocked by the police brutality against the African Americans. The African Americans and the whites were however divided on the opinion about the brutal act. The African Americans accused the police officer for unnecessarily pummeling the individual who was already helpless while the white thought that the police officers acts were justified. The acquittal of the police officers involved in the acts by a white jury resulted into a riot against the injustice where over fifty people lost their life, more that two thousand were injured and property worth a billion dollars was damaged. This incidence reawakened the long standing debate on whether minority groups were subject to harassment by the police.
  
There have been other incidences of police harassing members of minority groups since the Los Angeles incidence. In 1997, the American society was shocked by sexual harassment of Abner Louima after a dubious arrest by the police in New York. The man was sodomized by the perpetrators using a wooden handle and the injuries sustained were fatal. However, the case become public only after the nurse informed his family about the inhumane acts. Nonetheless, the perpetrators were jailed and the victim compensated. More recently, reporters of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath aired a videotape of policemen senselessly beating an old man in New Orleans. The police officers were recorded harassing the old man by news producer in an incident where the news producer was assaulted by the police officers. Later, the officers were however indicted for their conducts. Therefore racial tensions between the police and the minority groups remain high while the federal government is losing a lot of resources through compensation of victims of police brutality. However, harassment of the minority groups has not affected African Americans only. Other minority races have such as the Hispanics have also been subjected to unfair treatment by the police. Recently, police ended an immigration rally and arrested over six thousand Hispanics in Los Angeles. Those arrested in the peaceful crowd included women and children. The order to arrest the crowd was issued in English while the crown was composed of Spanish speaking individuals.
  
A research carried out the national institute of justice in 2000 indicated that the use of force in the police force had generally reduced. The report indicated that in 1996, reasonable force was required in only 0.65 percent of all cases of arrest reported in the years while the rest of these cases involved improper force. This indicates police used improper force in 38 of cases that involved the use of force. This research included a random sampled survey of the police officer to determine the level of abuse of authority among the police officers. The officers were sampled from different parts of the nation and police departments and interviewed through telephone. Of five thousand and over departments in the whole country, one hundred departments were selected based on their sizes and region. Out of these only one hundred and thirteen agreed to participate. The participating departments provided the rosters of their officers with their full details which made sampling and contacting of the officers easy. The officers response was treated as confidently and autonomously. The officers were interviewed on various issues related to abuse of authority and harassments of victims of arrests.     The survey observed the view about abuse of power among the police was different between the different races. The response of the African Americans police officer was different from the views of the white officers. However, other minority groups had similar views with the white Americans officers. The survey reported that 17 percent of all officers surveyed agreed with the view that the whites are treated more fairly by police officer as compared to the minority races. Surprisingly 51.3 percent of the African American officers supported this view. However, only 23.4 and 11.9 of officers from other minority races and whites respectively supported this view.

Implications
Equal justice for all is a preeminent principle of the American society. However, the discrimination based on race, social class, religion and gender has been evident for many years where the minority groups are treated unfairly by the security agencies. Unfair treatment of minority community has had severe implications such as the deterioration of relationship between the minorities groups and the police service or even between officers of different races. It has also cost the federal government a lot of resources through compensation of victims of police brutality.

Conclusion
It is surprising for police officer to admit that there exists discrimination of minority groups by the police officers. Incidences where police officers physically harass members of minority groups are also evident in the American society. Although the situation has improved, measures need to be taken to eliminate the vice.