In the wake of the “Central Park Karen” incident — in which a white woman called the police on an African-American man who’d asked her to put her dog on a leash — a number of U.S. lawmakers are taking steps to make using the police as a racial weapon illegal.
Oregon and Washington have already passed laws that make calling the police when no crime has been committed illegal, especially when using cops to harass people of “protected classes.” In New York, Assemblyman Felix W. Ortiz has authored a bill that seeks to add “hate crime enhancement” to an existing law that prohibits filing false police reports. If approved, the new law would establish a more punitive sentence against the caller if the victim is injured or killed.
Similar bills are already on the table in New Jersey and Minnesota, the latter being the state in which George Floyd was recently killed by a white police officer.
Situations like the one Amy Cooper put Christian Cooper in will soon be a criminal offensehttps://t.co/TAWHdshVla
— The Mary Sue (@TheMarySue) May 29, 2020
