How would we apply the ethical theories used in this course to this problem?

1.  What implicit or explicit arguments is this columnist using?  How well supported are his conclusions?

       April 19, 2001  NYT
         Riots, Then and Now

             By BOB HERBERT

             I can still remember leafing
              through the Life magazine in July
             1967. I was just back from
             overseas, a 22-year-old sergeant
             stationed at Fort Belvoir, Va.,
             where I would serve out my last
             few months in the Army.

             On the cover of the magazine was a photograph of a 12-year-old
             boy lying unconscious on the filthy pavement of a street in
             Newark, N.J. He was bleeding from gunshot wounds.

             The story was about the riots that in a few days had all but
             ruined Newark. I froze when I got to page 16. There was a
             photo of a guy I knew from Montclair, Billy Furr, caught in the
             act of looting beer from a liquor store. The photo was the first
             in a frightening series that showed cops suddenly appearing at
             the scene, Billy Furr running, a cop in a helmet aiming a shotgun
             at Billy's back, and Billy continuing to run.

             The cop shot and killed him. On page 22 was a picture of Billy
             lying on the sidewalk, dead at 24. The cop with the shotgun
             stood over the body. He didn't look particularly concerned.
             Pellets from the shotgun blast also struck the 12-year-old boy
             whose photo was on the magazine's cover. Though seriously
             wounded, he would survive. The cop didn't seem too concerned
             about him either.

             I remember sitting in the barracks at Fort Belvoir, stunned. And
             I still feel strange whenever I see those pictures.

             Last week there were riots in Cincinnati, sparked by the fatal
             shooting of 19-year-old Timothy Thomas, a black kid who was
             said to have run from a cop. Mr. Thomas was wanted for failing
             to respond to several misdemeanor traffic charges. Five of the
             charges were for not wearing a seat belt while driving.

             As in Newark, the rioting in Cincinnati was an explosive
             expression of the rage among blacks that had built up from years
             of hateful treatment at the hands of the police, public officials
             and other influential figures throughout society, most of them
             white. You'll find that kind of maddening, simmering rage
             everywhere you find black people in the United States. It is the
             rage that comes from living in a society where every day there
             are humiliating reminders of one's debased status.

             But race issues are complex and sometimes paradoxical. It is
             possible to look back over the past half-century and conclude
             that we have come a long way and yet made surprisingly little
             progress, all at the same time.

             Police brutality, a criminal justice system that works one way
             for whites and another for blacks, employment discrimination,
             housing discrimination, the continuing fanatical resistance to
             real integration, social ostracism — these are not remnants from
             some distant past, but rather the everyday reality of life for
             blacks in America in 2001.

             Black people are angry because there is more than ample reason
             to be angry.

             That said, there is something both weird and very wrong about
             continuing to respond to the outrages of racism and police
             brutality by throwing bottles, smashing windows, overturning
             cars, looting stores, burning down buildings, shooting at police
             officers and dragging innocent white motorists from their
             vehicles and attempting to beat and stomp them to death.

             I felt as sick watching the video of Reginald Denny being
             hauled from his truck and savagely beaten during the Los
             Angeles riots in 1992 as I did looking at the sequence of photos
             of Billy Furr being killed in 1967.

             Few blacks ever riot. And some of the worst rioting over the
             past four decades has had surprisingly interracial components.
             There was widespread looting by whites as well as blacks in
             the horrible rioting that brought Detroit to its knees less than
             two weeks after the outburst in Newark. And more than half of
             the people arrested during the 1992 rioting in Los Angeles were
             Hispanic.

             But after the riots, when the smoke from the arson fires has
             lifted and the spasms of violence have passed, it is the black
             residents who, inevitably, have endured the worst of the
             suffering — lives lost, neighborhoods destroyed, hopes for the
             future derailed.

             That is a peculiar way of addressing one's grievances.

             Racism and police brutality should never be tolerated. But after
             so many tragic eruptions over so many decades, it's time for
             everyone to recognize the need for a smarter, more effective
             response to these evils than a riot.
 

How about the behavior of the police in ghetto communities or in riot situations?  Do they follow ethical guidelines?  Here is an excerpt from a  Web Site on Police Deviance and Ethics.

POLICE BRUTALITY

Brutality has been defined as excessive force, namecalling, sarcasm, ridicule, and disrespect (President's Commission
1967). Other commissions have simply used a vague definition as "any violation of due process". Kania and Mackey's
(1977) widely-regarded definition is "excessive violence, to an extreme degree, which does not support a legitimate
police function." When a citizen charges police brutality, they may be referring to a number of things, including:

    profane or abusive language
    commands to move or go home
    field stops and searches
    threats of implied violence
    prodding with a nightstick or approaching with a pistol
    the actual use of physical force

Only the last one of these (unreasonable and unnecessary actual use of physical force) can be considered police
brutality. This is commonly expressed as "more than excessive force". Police perjury and police brutality go hand in
hand, as officers who commit brutality will most likely lie on the stand to prevent the possibility of a lawsuit or
departmental charges. The reasons why an officer might engage in this kind of conduct are many:

    a small percentage may have been attracted to police work for the opportunity to enjoy physically abusing and
    hurting somebody
    an officer may come to believe "it's a jungle out there"
    an officer may be provoked and pushed beyond their endurance

The most common reason is occupational socialization and peer support. One common belief is that it's necessary to
come down hard on those who resist arrest because they may kill the next police officer who tries to arrest them (so
you have to teach 'em a lesson). Another practice is the "screen test", police jargon for applying the brakes on a
police vehicle to that the handcuffed prisoner in back will be thrown against the metal protective screen.

Police brutality has been found to be closely associated with riots ever since the Kerner Commission of the 1960s
which practically blamed every riot in that decade on the police. Significant police-initiated riots since then include:

    December 17, 1979 -- Arthur McDuffie, an African American, was riding his motorcycle in Miami, when
    according to police reports, he popped a wheelie, gave a cop the finger, and sped away. More than a dozen
    Miami patrol cars gave chase. When caught, at least six white officers jumped him, splitting open his skull. He
    died four days later. It came out at trial that the police fabricated an explanation that he fell, splitting his head,
    of his own accord, but an all-white jury acquitted the officers. Three days of racial rioting erupted.

    March 3, 1991 -- Rodney King, an African American, was detected speeding on a Los Angeles freeway, and
    apparently refused to pull over for fear a ticket would revoke his probation. Over eleven LAPD units, including a
    helicopter, gave chase. When stopped, there were two passengers who exited and were taken into custody, but
    Rodney refused to exit the vehicle.  He was savagely dragged out, tasered twice with fifty thousand volts, and
    kicked or beaten with nightsticks at least fifty-six times by four white officers while twenty-seven other officers
    stood around watching. Rodney suffered sixteen broken bones and permanent brain damage. The following day,
    an amateur photographer tried to surrender his videotape of the beating to officials, but instead sold it to KTLA
    television which aired the tape. The four white officers were acquitted of charges by a Simi Valley jury of ten
    whites, one Asian, and one Hispanic on April 29, 1992. Five days of racial rioting erupted. A federal trial in 1993
    resulted in convictions for two of the four officers.