The Albuquerque Police Department has been so mistrusted, for so long, that it really isn’t surprising that a handful of protesters (above) arrived to protest the 38th officer-involved shooting by the department since January of 2010.

The protesters need accept the reality, however, that not every officer-involved shooting is an excessive use of force.

Like the March 25 of Alfred Redwine, the suspect in this case, Mary Hawkes, apparently had a gun:

Police identified the woman shot as 19-year-old Mary Hawkes.

Eden said the officer approached Hawkes, who was the suspect in an auto theft. An officer spotted Hawkes running east on Zuni Road.

The officer chased her on foot for a short time. Eden said Hawkes pulled out a gun at close range, which is when the officer shot and killed her.

“An officer pursued on foot. When the suspect stopped, turned and pointed a hand gun at close range, the officer fired at the suspect,” said Eden.

Judging by the spread of three shots in the wall (above) and the spread-out location of evidence markers denoting expended brass shown during the video of the report, it appears that the situation developed from a chase to a close-range shooting very rapidly, with the officer firing on the move.  There is no reason to think that this incident was anything other than a “good shoot” caused by a criminal suspect that chose to draw a weapon instead of surrendering.

* * *

Readers of Bearing Arms are likely familiar with the fact that the Albuquerque Police Department was under investigation for allegations of excessive use of force.

The Department of Justice has released the findings of their investigation, and have excoriated the APD:

The report had four major findings:

• The department’s officers “too often used deadly force in an unconstitutional manner,” and of the 20 fatal police shootings since 2009, most were not constitutional.

Albuquerque police not only use deadly force when there’s no imminent threat of bodily harm or death, they also “used deadly force against people who posed a minimal threat, including individuals who posed a threat only to themselves or who were unarmed. Officers also used deadly force in situations where the conduct of the officers heightened the danger and contributed to the need to use force.”

• The department’s officers also use less-than-lethal force unconstitutionally. A review of 200 use-of-force reports since 2009 indicates that officers use Tasers on people who are nonthreatening, posing minimal threat, passively resisting or “unable to comply with orders due to their mental state.”

In one instance, officers used Tasers on a man who had doused himself in gasoline, setting him on fire and endangering everyone in his vicinity.

Officers also use “takedown procedures” in ways that increase harm, and they “escalate situations in which force could have been avoided had they instead used de-escalation measures.”

• Officers used a “significant amount of force” against people with mental illness and in crisis. “APD’s policies, training and supervision are insufficient to ensure that officers encountering people with mental illness or in distress do so in a manner that respects their rights and is safe for all involved.”

• Instances of officers using excessive force are “not isolated or sporadic.” The pattern of police conduct suggests “systemic deficiencies in oversight, training, and policy. Chief among these deficiencies is the department’s failure to implement an objective and rigorous internal accountability system. Force incidents are not properly investigated, documented or addressed with corrective measures.”

Like most similar instances, lax oversight, permissive judicial systems, and poor training leads to circumstances where law enforcement are unaccountable for their actions. It is going to take a very long time for APD to rectify these systemic problems, and far longer to re-earn the public’s trust.