Guest editorial: Policing in the aftermath of the 2020 protests: Lessons learned and evolving strategies for reform

Statistical evidence from both countries document that this increased public scrutiny of POC, by police, repeatedly occurred in the absence of substantiated criminal activity (Delsol and Shiner, 2015;White and Fradella, 2016) [8], and in the US, was ultimately deemed by state and federal authorities to have produced persistent constitutional violations [9]. According to reports and statistical data released by the New York City Police Department (NYPD), from 1994 to 2000, the deployment of BWP led to unprecedented reductions in crime and substantial improvement in the quality of life experienced by New Yorkers across varying social strata (Bratton and Knobler, 1998;Zimring, 2011) [10]. Though George Floyd was killed in the United States, the papers in this special issue help build our understanding of how intersecting global social dynamics both, internal and external to police agencies, lead to and can lead away from the next incident that will fuel serious calls for sweeping change to the policing profession. In the US, there are no reports of serious police violence against the protestors associated with the Coronavirus protests, but investigations have revealed considerable complaints of police use of force against individuals who engaged in peaceful protests against the killing of Black men, women and children (Amnesty International, 2020) – deaths that extended back several years and with perpetrators that included police officers and civilians claiming to act in a law enforcement capacity [19].

A Qualitative Study: An Examination of Police Officers' Lived Experiences During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

In the spring of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the globe prompting stay-at-home orders for all but the most essential workers in society. Policing was one of the professions that is essential for community safety, regardless of the circumstances. Officers were on the front-line of the COVID-19 public health crisis and their preparedness was crucial for officer and community health. During the onset of the pandemic little was known about how officers perceived the virus and how police agencies prepared officers to work in a highly contagious environment. This study used semistructured interviews of police officers in two states in the United States that had elevated cases of the virus. The authors explored the lived experiences of police officers to explore officers' perceptions, concerns, implications the pandemic had on patrol activity, and agency preparedness during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The results revealed structural and cultural forces that resulted in officers and their agency leadership not taking the pandemic seriously, ill-preparation and ill-equipping, and disincentives in reporting exposure. Moreover, officers' fears were largely not based on their own well-being, but on the risk of spreading the disease to their family members.