The tragic death of Nichols confirms that, with thousands of encounters nationwide between police officers and suspects every day, occasionally one will go horribly wrong. It confirms that there are some very bad cops out there. If Nichols resisted the officers before they abused him — it’s not clear to me whether he did — his death confirms that it’s a terrible idea to resist the police.
But these are things any fairly intelligent person with a modicum of common sense already understood.
If there are real lessons here, they might be: (1) the drive to hire “diverse” police officers is causing police departments to enlist people who shouldn’t serve and/or (2) the demonization of the police by the left has made it difficult to retain and recruit good officers — again, causing police departments to enlist people who shouldn’t serve.
[In the end, police departments with solid support as well as vigorous oversight from their communities do best. That means putting real resources in the field, prosecuting criminals fully, committing to deterrent sentencing, and also requiring body cams, effective discipline and training, and demanding accountability for crimes committed by police officers when those occur. Defunding and decarceration are the worst possible policy responses. — Ed]
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