Thread on how we see it at Human Rights Watch:

1: #GeorgeFloyd’s family should see swift and complete justice for his killing, including the prosecution of all officers connected with his death.

2: The problem in Minnesota goes far beyond one officer, it’s about a law enforcement system that does not value all citizens equally and allows the lives of Black Americans to be sacrificed as a result.

3: Day-to-day abuse by police, especially towards Black people, is pervasive. It often escalates and leads to killings.

4: Mechanisms to hold police officers accountable for harming people are ineffective at best, encouraging officers to act with impunity.

5: Police default to using force far too quickly.

6: US society is extremely stratified by race, with disproportionate numbers of Black people and other minorities living in low-income communities. Police are basically given the role of enforcing that racial stratification.

7: Local & state governments fail to address societal issues like addiction, homelessness, mental health & intimate partner violence through direct solutions, instead tasking police with handling them, which results in more conflictual interactions between police & public.

8: This week underscores that the US needs to confront its racial history, which still impacts institutions that fail to protect African Americans and other minorities.

Until these root causes are addressed, these problems will not be solved.

9: Minnesota and communities across the US should use this moment to examine and change practices and policies that keep inequalities in place.

10: For example, Floyd did not have to be arrested for possibly using what a store owner thought was a counterfeit $20 bill – alternatives to arrest were at the disposal of the officers. He could have been given a summons if there was real evidence against him.

11: But this happens every day in the US – police often choose the harshest responses when it comes to Black communities.

12: US needs political leadership that addresses racial disparities in the criminal justice system. Instead, we see rhetoric that traffics in racism & in the aftermath of the Floyd killing glorifies the idea of violence against people fed up & protesting against abusive policing.

13: Human Rights Watch sees no jurisdiction in the US where policing has made meaningful reforms.

14: There have been lawsuits (often by US Justice Department) that impose court-ordered supervision of police departments that may reduce force incidents. However, these tend to result in superficial changes that do not change the basic relationships between police & community.

15: Reducing the role of police while addressing the economic and health disparities that contribute to crime in poor and Black communities would make a substantial improvement.