Since the recent protests began, reports of law enforcement officers using excessive force have been reported across the country, and now a new interactive map shows how bad it is both nationally and here in Tampa Bay.
The crowdsourced map—created from a megathread on the subreddit /r/2020PoliceBrutality before making it into a GitHub repository—allows users to contribute any known evidence of police brutality since the start of the George Floyd and Black Lives Matter protests.
“We will document examples of the use of excessive force, as well as other misconduct, by law enforcement officers during the 2020 protests sparked by the death of George Floyd,” the project’s mission statement reads. “Our goal in doing this is to assist journalists, politicians, prosecutors, activists and concerned citizens who can use the evidence accumulated here for political campaigns, news reporting, public education and prosecution of criminal police officers.”
Nationally, there’s currently 563 recorded use of force incidents shown on the interactive site. As you can see, three of the recorded Tampa incidents refer to general use of force by police, while two are reportedly isolated instances of brutality against an individual.
Each of the map’s recorded events consist of either social media evidence, video and or media sources. The five total Tampa incidents are listed in the form of one or more videos posted to Twitter. They include:
- June 3, 2020: “One woman is pinned to the ground and another is pepper-sprayed”
- June 3, 2020: “Police fire tear gas at peaceful protest”
- June 4, 2020: “Police pepper-spray peaceful protesters”
- June 4, 2020: “Police fire rubber bullets at protestors”
- June 4, 2020: “Police fire on medic"
A full thread of the Tampa events, with sources, can be seen here. You can also view a full timeline of nationwide events dating back to March here.
Four of the five Tampa incidents were shared on Twitter by T. Greg Doucette, a criminal defense lawyer who created a Twitter thread on May 30 to track instances of police brutality during nationwide protests.
Statewide, the map also shows that there have been five recorded events in Orlando, three in Miami, three in Fort Lauderdale, and one in Jacksonville.
It is important to note that the numbers on the map represent only a fraction of the use of force incidents reported in the Tampa Bay area since the beginning of the recent protests.
At a May 31 protest, days following George Floyd’s May 25 death, TPD fired non-lethal rounds and tear gas into a crowd of protestors near Memorial Park Cemetery at Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard E. and 22nd Street N. The night before, protests near Busch Gardens and University Mall were also met with tear gas.
More recently, several Black Lives Matter protestors were pepper sprayed during a July Fourth protest after arrests were made on N. Dale Mabry Highway. Pepper pray was also deployed at a June 4 interaction between Tampa Police officers and protesters.
According to a 2019 Response to Resistance internal report obtained by Creative Loafing Tampa Bay, use of force during arrests by Tampa Police Department has increased 24% since Brian Dugan was named police chief in 2017. The use of pepper spray and tear gas by TPD has increased by a staggering 223% under Dugan, despite the health risks it poses.
Support local journalism in these crazy days. Our small but mighty team is working tirelessly to bring you up to the minute news on how Coronavirus is affecting Tampa and surrounding areas. Please consider making a one time or monthly donation to help support our staff. Every little bit helps.
Follow @cl_tampabay on Twitter to get the most up-to-date news + views. Subscribe to our newsletter, too.
This article appears in Jul 2-8, 2020.