FBI Director Admits That Cops Often Treat All Black Men Like Criminals

The director of the FBI has publicly addressed the ongoing issue of police brutality against young black men and even he admits that changes need to be made.

via CNN

FBI Director James Comey took on the issue of police and race relations Thursday challenging police to avoid “lazy mental short-cuts” that can lead to bias in the way they treat blacks and other minorities.

While he asked minority communities dealing with issues of high crime to also recognize the inherent dangers officers face in trying to keep them safe, Comey was also critical of the history law enforcement in the country, which he described as “not pretty,” but also the racial tensions have plagued American society as a whole.

“I worry that this incredibly important and difficult conversation about race and policing has become focused entirely on the nature and character of law enforcement officers when it should also be about something much harder to discuss,” Comey said. “Debating the nature of policing is very important but I worry that it has become an excuse at times to avoid doing something harder.”

Comey also name checked the deaths of Eric Garner, Michael Brown as well as slain police officers NYPD officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, a reference to what has been a bloody and tumultuous year between minority communities and law enforcement.

The speech before students at Georgetown University was unusual for Comey and the FBI, which usually only narrowly discusses race issues when dealing with civil rights investigations.

This agency in particular for decades had a conflicted relationship with African Americans, spending years monitoring and investigating civil rights leaders including Rev. Martin Luther King on suspicion of ties to communism.

“Police officers on patrol in our nation’s cities often work in environments where a hugely disproportionate percentage of street crime is committed by young men of color. Something happens to people of good will working in that environment,” Comey said.

As a result, he said, officers often treat young black men, who may look like others they have locked up, differently from young white men walking down the same street.

“We need to come to grips with the fact that this behavior complicates the relationship between police and communities they serve,” Comey said.