Early last month we highlighted a ThinkProgress report which suggested that more people were killed in encounters with police in the US in the month of March than were killed in encounters with UK authorities in 100 years.
From the report [2]:
A new report by ThinkProgress.com unearthed disturbing figures when it came to the number of police-related deaths that occurred in America in the month of March alone.
Just last month, in the 31 days of March, police in the United States killed more people than the UK did in the entire 20th century. In fact, it was twice as many; police in the UK only killed 52 people during that 100 year period.
According to the report by ThinkProgess, in March alone, 111 people died during police encounters — 36 more than the previous month. As in the past, numerous incidents were spurred by violent threats from suspects, and two officers were shot in Ferguson during a peaceful protest. However, the deaths follow a national pattern: suspects were mostly people of color, mentally ill, or both.
In that context we bring you the following compare and contrast visual exercise.
The UK…
....versus the US…
Note: the suspect who was shot in the latter video clip was unarmed and died as a result of his injuries.
The officer responsible killed another suspect in 2013 — he was cleared of wrongdoing in both cases.
