Mission Statement: To bring the Police force and the communities they serve closer and contain the anomalous Police brutality.

Introduction: Throughout the history of democratic societies in general, and the United States of America specifically, there have been periods of social tensions between the Police force and the communities they serve in certain areas of the country.

Sometimes the tension between the Police and the community is a product of racial tension between two member racial or social groups in that society. There are numerous cases when an action of the Police towards an individual sparked tensions between the community and the Police. Others were the product of the dissatisfaction of some parts of the community with their local, state or even Federal governments.

Those cases are the most alarming among all because in some of those situations, the Police took a position against the very people they were hired to serve. In other situations, some members of the society directed their anger against the police members who were simply doing their jobs in protecting the peace. There were even times when the Police used lethal force against unarmed civilians. Most of these cases of tension underlined a shift in the way the public viewed the Police force and the way the Police force saw their mission. We will try to go in some details to explain the conditions and the causes that lead to those tensions in the following paragraphs.

Intercommunity Tension: In a country of immigrants like the United States, it is not unheard of that some members from two racial groups in close proximity get tangled up with each other. Sometimes these members are organized in the form of a gang or just an ad-hoc group that shares ethnicity or blood relations. When the Police move to diffuse the situation, it collides with the members of the violent groups. Thus far, this is at the heart of the Police job. However, it is often the case that the tactics the Police employ that cause the friction with the community:

1- Police sometimes ignore to reach out to the community through their elders and representatives to explain the intent of the police.
2- Sometimes inexperienced members of the Police force take the actions of the community members as an act of defiance to their authority and respond with excessive force which draws the ire of the community.
3- Sometimes an innocent member of the community gets arrested or even killed and that sets the alarms at the community that the police are out to get every member of the community indiscriminately.

Once the Police and the community become at loggerheads, it is hard for cooler heads to prevail and restore the normalcy.

Minorities concerns: Minorities, especially visible minorities, are often concerned about the fairness of treatment they get from the police. Police should be sensitive to those concerns, but not to compromise enforcing the law to allay those concerns. It is a tough balance and many police departments fail to achieve that balance. There could be many reasons for that failure:

1. Lack of diversity within the police force and failure to represent the ethnic mix of the society
2. Lack of appropriate training within the police force to be more sensitive to the values of different communities and how to enforce the law while respecting those values
3. Unavailability of regular and emergency meetings between the heads of the police force and the leaders of the communities to keep the communication channels open and clarify any misunderstanding before it becomes a crisis

Civil unrest: The freedom of speech and the right to peaceful assembly are enshrined in the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. This is a fact known by most Americans and even by some non-Americans.
The Police force anywhere in the United States get trained on the First Amendment rights, but that does not always guarantee that all members of police force fully understand it or act upon it. On the other hand, it also happens sometimes that individuals from the civilian population go beyond what is normally accepted as peaceful assembly. At a point like this it is quite possible that some members of the police force misconstrue the actions of these individuals as defiance to their authorities and react with excessive vigor. In worse cases, those members of the police force react forcefully to the assembly of people at large and in the process violate the constitution.
It was also revealed that some Police Departments conduct surveillance of active organizations and individuals even though those organizations/individuals never broke the law.

Police brutality: The anomaly of police brutality is among the most dangerous threats to the society. The police force is no different from the society at large in terms of having the majority as righteous citizens who do their jobs honorably with a small minority who join the force to advance their personal agendas or satiate their need to dominate others.

The problem is that those elements get very high visibility when they mistreat a member of the public and their actions, however rare, draw on the entire police department. It is even worse when some of their colleagues try to defend them in a clannish approach which draws the ire of the society because it defines the lines as “The people” versus “The Police” as opposed to the “Entire society” versus “Someone who broke the law”.

Instigators and saboteurs: At the risk of being tagged as “Conspiracy Theorists”, we do believe that there is a “Third Party” whose interest lies in driving a wedge between the public and the police. That “Third Party” sometimes uses instigators to infiltrate the demonstrations and try to convince some of the demonstrators to start some provocative or even violent actions and force the police to crack down on the demonstrations. If the ‘instigators” fail then the “Third Party” sometimes resort to deploying “Saboteurs” who will merge with the crowd and commit acts of violence from within the demonstration and force the police to crack down on the peaceful demonstrators. Once the confrontation is afoot, those instigators/saboteurs will pull out and let the events escalate while they try to remain anonymous.

Putting it all Together: The economy at large is getting worse which drives more people to be under stress. There will be more cuts to public services including Police force cuts and more crimes, including violent crimes will take place. All these, combined, contribute to creating a condition where the relationship between the Public and the Police force is less amicable than it should be.

Also, more people are getting disillusioned with their Municipal/State/Federal governments and facing their inability to change the situation through the ballot box with anger. That anger will eventually spill out on the streets and the government will try to suppress it with force using the readily available police force. It is in a situation like this where both the public and the police force should understand that they are being played against each other and refrain from acting counter to their own interests. The Police force is not the spoiled children of the administrations. It is often the case that policemen jobs were on the chopping block due to budget cuts despite the public opposition and the public lose in the process.
It is our observation that the public at large, while respecting the role of the police in the society, have misgivings about the way the police conduct themselves. This is partially due to the actions of a minority within the police force and the role of the media in exaggerating the incidents that happen sporadically with members of the police treating a member of the public inappropriately. Many members of the public often view the police force unfavorably compared to how they view the Fire Department for example. The reasons, as we heard them, were ranging from unpleasant encounter after a traffic violation stop to the reported incidents of Police brutality and Police cover ups
The goal of our organization is to bring the members of the Police force and the communities they serve closer and explain how they should be natural allies since they share the same goals and aspirations and coexist in the same social space.
It is our belief that the worst is yet to come and we are trying to prevent things from happening before they happen or, at least, to minimize the damage.