Police should have more training
According to CNN, states require more training time to become a barber than a police officer. This may be the reason there is an increase in police brutality. If the officers are not trained properly, then they aren't able to handle situations correctly.
Dear President:
There are problems that are currently occurring in the United States which you have to fix. Let's start by talking about how, according to The Washington Post, unfortunately 1,000 people were killed by police officers as of 2015. However, this number is slowly increasing in 2016 because there have been a lot of murders. In addition, about 281 of the people who were killed were unarmed. About 564 people killed were armed with a weapon.
To stop these tragedies that have been occurring over the past years we need to implement more training for police officers. According to CNN, the number of hours needed to become a cop in North Carolina is about 620 hours, while Licensed Barbers are required to have 1,528 hours. This shows how there are more requirements to be a barber than being a police officer. This is unacceptable because police officers are supposed to be the people who will make you feel safe. However, with the amount of training they get it seems like some may be taking the job cause it's an easy career to get into instead of choosing it to protect the people. Police officers need more training in order to handle situations in which there are people with mental illnesses involved or with a disability, so that they can be treated more appropriately in a serious situation, instead of being shot because their actions are misunderstood. For example, in the recent issue in El Cajon, California, an African American man had a seizure. He reached into his pocket but was shot because the police thought he was crazy and wanted to reach for a gun. This is an example that shows that many officers lack training and leadership. This type of situation is what causes people to lose their trust in police officers.
In conclusion, in order to bring down the percentage of innocent deaths caused by officers on duty , you as the head of the United States needs to add more training at police academies. A degree in higher education also should be required when someone is applying to be a police officer. By also having police with more training, people will slowly gain more confidence in how and what the police officers are able to do. I myself want to become an FBI agent, and I would like to see people give me their trust.
Sincerely,
Gerardo Cole