November 7, 2016

Dear Future President,

I am writing to you today because as you are taking on your new role in the white house I want to be assured that you will do your best to minimize the amount of issues we have in our world. I understand that this is a lot for a person to undertake, but I believe that some of our world’s issues are those created by the carelessness in our society, in which can be easily fixed. In the example of police brutality, this is a progressive issue in our generation that has cost the lives of many innocent people because of the brash actions of citizens who are assumed to be the protectors of our cities. Police brutality is an imminent issue that you should assess, because it first handedly affects the lives of our people in America; it further oppresses people of color and it allows for more injustice to consume our society.

I am sure by now that you have heard all about this issue, but it is pressing that you understand that the longer you allow for police brutality to occur, the more lives you put at stake. Last year it was recorded that police officers have killed over 1,152 people and more than half of these people were of color. According to the website Mapping Police Violence, “police killed 346 black people in 2015” and “have killed at least 234 black people in the U.S. in 2016”. The amount of death we have seen throughout the years has become increasingly high, and the amount of deaths we have seen regarding people of color makes us only assume that police brutality is a direct correlation to racism. We hardly see police brutality targeted towards white Americans, because society has stigmatized people of color, in which we see police officers acting upon them and sparing the lives of white Americans compared to their brash decisions when encountered with a person of color. We see this evident in an article from Washington Post where it states, “About 13 percent of all black people who have been fatally shot by police since January 2015 were unarmed, compared with 7 percent of all white people”. Because of statistics like these, we see more communities living in fear and questioning whether they should feel safe around law enforcement.

In relation to police brutality, citizens are now feeling more distrust not only with law enforcement but also with the justice system. Several citizens believe that justice has not been served to the innocent victims that have been caught between the misguided and brash decision of officers in our cities. We have seen several forms of police brutality being covered all over news broadcast. We hear about the victims who have died and the officers involved, but what we do not hear much of is what kind of forms of justice is being served to the victim's families or what kind punishment we will see from these officers who acted so carelessly. According to the website Cop Crisis, “cops are indicted in less than 1% of killings, but the indictment rate for Citizens is 90%”. This goes to show how corrupt our system can be, as they favor cops more than our citizens. A society with no justice or law, is a society destined for failure; and we cannot allow our future citizens to be mistreated.

Everyday we have been constantly hearing about police brutality and yet no changes have been made; and because of that citizens of America have taken matters into their own hands and are now fighting for justice and equality. These citizens that are taking action, are guaranteed someone we know, they are either our family members, friends, colleagues, or even somebody we remember pass by us on the street. Each one of these people fighting are someone we know and care about; and it affects me deeply because the longer these people continue to fight the higher of a risk they put themselves in to become another victim that falls on the lines of these statistics.

To the new president, I urge you to seek the change that everyone fighting for wants to see. You need to hear the wants and needs of these people protesting and understand where they are coming from. These families who are now victims to police brutality, not only want to live life without fear, but they also want to see justice being served to the officer(s) that have so carelessly worked to maintain a “safe” environment. We need to implement better training for the officers that are still remaining and to those that are just beginning. We need to enforce better judges that can see right from wrong and not just turn a blind eye for officers that have made a “mistake”; we need judges that will bring justice into society for officers and victims.

Thank you for taking the time to read my letter and understand where so many of us are coming from. I hope this letter and so many alike moves you into making the right decision that can better our citizens and protect our society.

Congratulations on your new presidency!

Sincerely,

Amber N, 12th grade