Radicalized Police Are Dangerous and Depraved

The recent torture of an California man adds to the public’s distrust of police

Thomas Perez Jr. rips shirt off during interrogation in the suspected killing of his father, who was later found alive. (Screenshot | Fontana police video)

There has been a lot of discussion over the last several years about the divide between police and the citizenry-the people they’re meant to serve and protect. In the summer of 2020, during the anti-police brutality protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the conversation began to pick up steam only to fizzle out less than a year later.

Four years later we’re facing an increasingly radicalized and more militarized law enforcement apparatus that set a record for the killing of unarmed civilians just last year. A sign that all of the talk during the summer of 2020 was just that. Talk. What we’re seeing today is certainly not progress because it’s not just the cops.

It’s the culture that creates these physically aggressive and often, murderous environments.

On May 23, the city of Fontana, CA paid nearly $900,000 for the “psychological torture” of a man by police officers to get a false confession for the murder of his 71-year-old father who was still alive. The case not only highlighted just how far cops will go to get false confessions out of people but also just how depraved they can be while doing it.