Wednesday, December 24, 2008

ER doctors: Police use excessive force

Emergency Medicine Journal
December 24, 2008
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – In a survey of a random sample of U.S. emergency physicians, virtually all said they believed that law enforcement officers use excessive force to arrest and detain suspects.

The sample included 315 respondents. While 99.8 percent believed excessive force is used, almost as many (97.8 percent) reported that they had managed cases that they suspected or that the patient stated had involved excessive use of force by law enforcement officers.
Nearly two thirds (65.3 percent) estimated that they had treated two or more cases of suspected excessive use of force per year among their patients, according to a report of the survey published in the January 2009 issue of the Emergency Medicine Journal.
Dr. Jared Strote of the University of Washington, Seattle, and a multicenter team also found that emergency physicians at public teaching hospitals were roughly four times more likely to report managing cases of suspected use of excessive force than those at university or community teaching emergency departments.
Blunt trauma inflicted by fists or feet was the most common type of injury cited in cases of suspected use of excessive force, followed by “overly tight” handcuffs.
Most emergency physicians (71.2 percent) admitted that they did not report cases of suspected use of excessive force by law enforcement officers.
Read article

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

WELL I CAN CLEARLY SEE THAT THOSE OF YOU TALKING HAVE NEVER BEEN IN LAW ENFORCEMENT.
IT IS LIKE THE GUY RANTING AND RAVING AND RUNS TO CANADA TO AVOID THE WARS, OR ANY PERSON WHO HAS NEVER WALKED IN A POLICEMANS SHOES....
IT IS ALLOWED FOR THE PUBLIC TO SIGN A WAIVER, AND RIDE ALONG....TRY IT FOR JUST ONE WEEK, THEN LETS TALK.

IT WILL HAVE YOU SEEING MUCH DIFFERENT FROM INSIDE THE ARENA, RATHER THEN SIMPLY SITTING UP AND BEING SAFE IN THE STANDS.

ANY FOOL CAN MAKE A STATEMENT ABOUT THINGS, BUT BEING IN THE LINE OF FIRE QUICKLY GIVES YOU A MUCH DIFFERENT VIEW......

WHEN YOUR ASS IS THE ONE FIGHTING THE BIKERS, DRUG DEALERS, AND ALL OF THE OTHER VERY DANGEROUS FELLAS, LIKE THOSE WE HAVE ALREADY PUT IN PRISON...
THEY DIDNT POLITELY WALK INTO THE JAIL....WISE UP AND STOP SHOWING YOUR ONE-SIDED VIEWS UNTIL YOU HAVE SEEN BOTH SIDES....
ONLY A FULL FLEDGED IDIOT WOULD EVER ONLY TALK ONE POINT OF VIEW WITHOUT BEING IN THE COPS SHOES, and feeling the fierce danger in a only a very simple traffic stop, which many times erupts in a gun battle....you just never know ....

Unknown said...

I'd advice you to obey the Constitution, and you will be just fine. Otherwise..............