BATON ROUGE – Given the increasing attention to unarmed African Americans who have lost their lives at the hands of police, LSU School of Social Work Professor of Child and Family Studies Cassandra Chaney examined community sentiment regarding police in her new book titled “Police Use of Excessive Force against African Americans: Historical Antecedents and Community Perceptions.” The book delves into how the early antecedents of police brutality like plantation overseers, the lynching of African American males, early race riots, the Rodney King incident and the Los Angeles Rampart Scandal have directly impacted the current relationship between communities of color and police.