More Female Officers Defuse Violent Policing Style
(and waiting for the usual suspects in 3. . . 2. . . 1. . . )
More Female Officers Defuse Violent Policing Style
Women on a police force are less likely than male coworkers to use excessive and deadly force, studies show, relying more on interpersonal skills. If policymakers knew the data, says one advocate, they'd "go on a hiring spree and hire more women."
(WOMENSENEWS)--Would the encounter between Eric Garner, who died last summer in Staten Island after being put in chokehold, and police officers have ended differently if a female officer handled the situation? Would Michael Brown, shot by a policeman in Ferguson, Mo., last August, still be alive if a female police officer had been on the scene?
Interviews with two women integrally involved with the question, along with a body of research data, suggest yes. Only 5% of citizen complaints of excessive force and 2% of sustained allegations of excessive force in large agencies involve female officers.
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Katherine Spillar, executive director of the Feminist Majority Foundation, based in Arlington, Va., strongly believes both situations could have ended differently. "The encounters wouldn't have ended in all likelihood in the death of the citizens," she said in a phone interview, adding that male officers tend to lean toward a paramilitary style of policing. Women, she said, are better at deescalating a potentially violent situation.
Spillar echoes several years of studies that indicate that women on a police force are less likely than male coworkers to use excessive and deadly force. They are also less likely to be involved in fights or acts of aggression on the job. Female officers rely more on interpersonal skills and deescalate potentially violent situations more often than men.
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http://womensenews.org/story/law/150127/more-female-officers-defuse-violent-policing-style
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