Dictionary

overpolice en · VERB

Etymology

From over- + police.

Meanings

1. (transitive) To police too much, as by patrolling a neighborhood excessively or meting out a punishment incommensurate to the severity of a crime.
   • First, many veterans of protest marches believe that the police overpolice these events. Second, why are the police still willing to protect a St. Patrick's Day Parade if security concerns and costs are suddenly so important? 2003 February 15, “The Fundamental Right to March”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 27 May 2015:
   • Part of the difference in attitudes comes from African Americans’ experiences within a racially biased criminal justice system that overpolices black and brown neighborhoods and rarely holds officers accountable for reported mistreatment, excessive force, or even killing African Americans. 2016 August 5, Victoria M. Massie, “Cops don’t need to hand out ice cream. They need to end racist policing practices.”, in Vox, archived from the original on 24 Mar 2024:
   • Black people in America fit that description of being overpoliced and oversentenced. 2016 January 7, Cory Doctorow, “White House plan to use data to shrink prison populations could be a racist dumpster fire”, in Boing Boing, archived from the original on 06 Mar 2021:
   • So if you live in a zip code that has been overpoliced historically, you are going to have overarresting. And we know that the overpolicing and the overarresting happens in Black and Latino communities. That's just a fact. 2023 July 19, Brianna Scott, Ailsa Chang, Jeanette Woods, “How AI could perpetuate racism, sexism and other biases in society”, in NPR, archived from the original on 04 Apr 2024:

Forms

Antonyms

underpolice