Depending on the situation, a public reaction to the media representation of police brutality is protesting, or "rioting," - turning violent, tipping cars and starting fires. A lot of people's reaction to police brutalitiy is simply shaking their heads with disbelif. The media plays a important roll when police brutality occurs. The media informs the public when incidents happen, what they cover is what the public is led to believe as the truth. The way the media portrays the police is how the public will view them and consequently determines trusts or distrust of them.
It is an important topic to address, because many people are not knowledgeable, and are only educated by what they have viewed on the news. When police brutality occurs it significantly affects the public, because it portrays law enforcement in a negative way. Some of the public may even lose their trust in all officers-even if it was just one officer who committed the act. A 2005 study by the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics found that more than 2000 suspects died in police custody during a scuffle or tried to flee-over a three year period, (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21255937/). That number is surprising and supports the idea brutality happens more often than we know. Also, the article states that these cases are the unusual ones out of 40 million arrests within those same three years. This shows that police brutality doesn't happen as often as we think.
Police brutality is a problem, and it further research is needed to understand why and how often it happens, and how often it happens. The public should know if it was the law enforcement officer's fault or the suspects actions were to blame. There are two sides to every story-I hope to cover each aspect of police brutality to better understand it myself and to inform the public.
