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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPolice Shoot a Lot More People Than Previously Known
https://www.alternet.org/human-rights/police-shoot-lot-more-people-previously-knowPolice Shoot a Lot More People Than Previously Known
A new investigation reveals that the number of people being shotand shot atby police is troubling.
By Kali Holloway / AlterNet
December 15, 2017, 2:26 PM GMT
In major metropolitan areas around the country over the last half-decade, police have shotand shot atpeople in numbers dramatically higher than previous tallies suggest. A new Vice News investigation finds that between 2010-2016, cops in the 50 largest police departments in the country shot more than 3,630 people, nearly double some previous estimates. Of the 4,381 people cops fired upon in that periodincluding the 700 people they shot at and missedtwo-thirds survived those shootings.
Absent a comprehensive federal database of police shootings, the Vice report offers the most complete picture of fatal and nonfatal police shootings available.
The data analysis also found that police shot black people more often and at higher rates than any other race, and two and a half times more often than white people. Vice found that cops shot no fewer than 1,664 black people in the period studied, comprising 55 percent of the total and more than double the share of the black population in these communities. Twenty percent of the African Americans tallied were shot following relatively innocuous pedestrian or traffic stops, which was true for just 16 percent of whites shot by police. Those figures are of particular importance considering that studies find black drivers are more likely to be stopped by cops based on less evidence, less likely than their white peers to be spoken to respectfully during those stops, and more likely to be ticketed and arrested than white drivers.
While police narratives of shootings studied by Vice suggest the majority of blacks shot by cops were themselves involved in shootings or robberies, the proliferation of cell phone and body camera footage that contradicts police versions of events brings the trustworthiness of those numbers into question. Many videos made public after the fact have illustrated that shootings initially described by police as being self-defensive were in fact extrajudicial executions of African Americans. Unquestionably, some shootings of black citizens result from actual crimes being committed. But the demonstrated fallibility of police accounts shows that in a disturbing number of cases, police officers shoot first and come up with reasons later. The Vice News investigation finds that a significant number of people (20 percent) shot by police were unarmed. Among those, 44 percent were African American.
It is a complex picture, but whats clear is that black people are more likely to be unarmed, and that more of these sort of low-level incidents escalate to shootings, Samuel Sinyangwe, data analyst and co-founder of police reform organization Campaign Zero, told Vice.
<snip>
One of the few positive trends in the numbers Vice examined is a 20 percent downturn in police shootings since 2014, the result of Obama-era reforms in response to Department of Justice recommendations. Of the 10 cities that saw the largest drops in police shootings, seven complied with changes proposed by the federal government.
<snip>
That downturn is likely to end. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has characterized the DOJs work with local police departments as federal intrusion, and ordered a review of all reform agreements aimed at curbing civil rights violations and police abuses. "It is not the responsibility of the federal government to manage non-federal law enforcement agencies, Sessions stated in a two-page memo issued earlier this year.
<snip>
[h/t Vice News]
Kali Holloway is a senior writer and the associate editor of media and culture at AlterNet.
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Police Shoot a Lot More People Than Previously Known (Original Post)
marble falls
Dec 2017
OP
The fact there is no central clearing house for police involved shootings is dumbfounding....
marble falls
Dec 2017
#2
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)1. Those are some
scary facts. Think most people here would not be surprised.
marble falls
(57,097 posts)2. The fact there is no central clearing house for police involved shootings is dumbfounding....
the story of what vice had to do to get its numbers - Detroit answered vices FOIA request with a bill in excess of $70,000 and a wait of twelve years, for example.
We need to change the laws, just stonewalling and insisting they felt in danger of their lives is all it tales to get 99% of murdering cops off. Cameras on cops do help, though, reducing not only shooting deaths by cops by also claims of police brutality.