Disgusted, embarrassed, and ready to defund the police: Here's how some Black police officers across the nation feel about George Floyd's death

• Black police officers have found themselves in the middle of renewed tensions between the Black community and the police in the wake of George Floyd's death.
• Insider spoke to two Black police officers about Floyd's death and how they think policing can be changed.
• Other officers around the country echoed these thoughts, saying they were disgusted by Floyd's death and largely supportive of nationwide Black Lives Matter protests.

The police-involved killing of George Floyd has renewed tensions between the Black community and police across the US.

Demonstrations have swept the country, some turning violent — with concerning videos of protesters being exposed to tear gas and pepper spray, and reports of attacks against officers.

Nobody has been more caught in the middle of these flare-ups than Black police officers, some of whom have publicly shown support for the very protests they're ordered to police.

Insider spoke to two Black police officers — one from Massachusetts and the other from Texas — to hear their perspectives, as well as collected testimonies from others across the country.

'Disgusted' by what happened

Brian Morrison, a 49-year-old police officer in Barnstable, Massachusetts, said he felt "angry, disgusted, and just hurt" after watching footage of Floyd's fatal arrest.

He said he felt that ex-Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin "for all intents and purposes murdered another human being" and it left him "a little embarrassed to wear a uniform."

Another 30-year-old Black officer, who works in a precinct outside Austin, Texas, told Insider he would have intervened if he were on the scene. This officer asked to remain anonymous to avoid retribution, but his identity is known to Insider.

He said what happened was "heartbreaking," and it was "shocking" to see an officer hold a man down by his neck — a technique he says his department has never trained him or his colleagues to do.

"If I was any of the officers on the scene, if I would have seen that, I would have stepped in," the Texas officer said. "I probably would have pushed the officer off of him."

Chauvin, the officer who knelt on Floyd's neck, has been charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter. The three other officers involved in the arrest — Tou Thao, J. Alexander Kueng, and Thomas Lane — were charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

#HumanizingTheBadge

Other police officers have spoken out on Floyd's death on TikTok, some under the hashtag #HumanizingTheBadge.

And they echo many of the points made by the officers that Insider spoke with.

Like Morrison, Officer J.D. Williams of New Jersey said he was "disgusted with the things that happened in Minneapolis."

"Guy is laying on the ground, he's laying on his stomach, he has handcuffs on," Williams said in his video, which was published May 27, two days after Floyd's death.

"It's four of y'all, one of him," he said. "Who has control of the situation? There's not much one person can do against four people."

Williams also called out the officers for not rendering aid when Floyd repeatedly said he couldn't breathe, and for none of the officers interceding and making Chauvin take his knee off of Floyd's neck.

'I stand by the protesters'

Both of the officers that Insider spoke with were supportive of the protests that have swept the nation after Floyd's death, and said they agreed with the charges filed against Chauvin and the three other officers involved.

"I agree with the protests," the Texas officer said. "I don't think that you can go so long, and have so much history with the Black community and not expect people to be upset and hurt."

"The protests, they're needed," Morrison said. "There needs to be change, absolutely ... I stand by the protesters."

Morrison said there's been about seven or eight Black Lives Matter demonstrations on Cape Cod, where he works. He said he gave a speech at one recently, alongside Barnstable's chief of police.

TikTok user @ejaymoon, who identified herself as a police officer in Indiana, also said she stood by the protesters.

"We're mad too ... It takes one officer to just throw away everything that good officers have worked hard for," she said.

She added: "Never in my life would I let someone experience what George Floyd went through in front of me, never in my life. And I know a lot of officers feel the same, so we stand with you. We stand with George Floyd. Be safe."

But not all were comfortable with the violence that has seeped into a few of the demonstrations, namely the looting and destruction of businesses.

Williams, the New Jersey officer, in a separate video called the destruction of communities "backwards" and said the looters were short-sighted and selfish.

"We need to stand up better," he said. "Are we playing chess or are we playing checkers?"

Allen Poythress, another officer on TikTok, said in one video that he worries the violence will detract from the protest movement's message. He works on Indiana University's campus, according to his LinkedIn.

"We're trying to back you guys up, but we also have a job to do, and we don't want to prevent you guys from having [your] voices heard," he said in the video.

Caught in the middle

Unlike Morrison, the Texas officer has not policed any demonstrations in his area yet.

He said he was somewhat glad he hasn't done so yet, as he fears he would be caught in the middle.

"I don't think I would do well with it," he said.

"I'm a Black police officer and if I see an officer yelling at a protester, I'm going to be like: 'Dude, you need to chill out.' But I'll also want to get the protester to chill out," he said.

"I would end up being caught right in the middle, leaning more towards the protesters' side just because I'm empathetic to what's going on."

'If I'm there, I'm able to stop it'

The Texas police officer said he was so disturbed by what happened to Floyd that he initially considered quitting the force.

"I guess I didn't want to be viewed as somebody who was part of this culture of getting people killed for really minor offenses," he said.

But he decided to stay because he believes there needs to be people of color in law enforcement "who understand the struggles of other minorities."

"The reason I didn't quit was because if I quit, who's going to stop the next George Floyd incident from happening?" he said.

"I can't be everywhere at once, but if I'm there, I'm able to stop it," he said.

Others agreed. Morrison said it's "way too important for men of color" to become police officers.

"We should encourage them to become police officers and try to make a change," he said.

Poythress also said in one of his TikTok videos that the lack of diversity among the police is part of the reason he became an officer in the first place.

"I'm a Black man that grew up in one of the most segregated places in the United States, and that's Birmingham, Alabama," he said. "One of the reasons that I became a police officer was because I wanted to bring diversity to the police force in the South."

"I wanted to do it because I wanted to make a difference and show the kids that there's actually good people around them," he said.

Defund the police?

In recent days, Black Lives Matter protesters have been advocating for radical change to policing in the US, including abolishing or defunding the police.

The former would involve getting rid of the police force altogether, while the latter is about redistributing police funding to other areas like education and social programs.

The Texas police officer said he's "all for" reallocating parts of the police budget to education, housing, and social work, because he believes that will make less of a need for police officers in the future.

He said, however, that some departments — like the ones that handle violent crime — will likely always be needed.

"For violent crime, people dealing major drugs ... I think officers should stay and be involved in that," he said.

"But there should be a lot of investigation before they even get involved, so we don't have incidents where you go into a house and it's the wrong house and someone gets shot and it's on the news."

He appeared to be referencing the death of Breonna Taylor, a Louisville woman who was shot to death in March when police raided her home. Her family said the officers had entered the wrong address.

The Texas officer said a lot of his fellow officers "are closed off to" the idea of defunding the police, because they're worried about their jobs and not thinking about the bigger picture.

"I think our officers need to open up to the idea that everything is not going to be the same as it was three years ago," he said.

"Things are going to be different and if defunding the police means a better future for everybody as a whole, then we're going to have to be defunded and learn to live with less."

Meanwhile, Morrison said he doesn't think abolishing or defunding the police is the answer. In fact, he feels they need more money to educate officers and recruit good cops.

"It's only going to make matters worse," Morrison said of defunding the police. "Without the money, you can't hire the people to do the right things, to make the changes."

• Read more:
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• A FedEx employee was fired and a prison officer was suspended after reenacting George Floyd's death to taunt Black Lives Matter protesters
• George Floyd and Derek Chauvin 'bumped heads' at the nightclub where they both worked because of Chauvin's aggression with clients, former coworker says