# How would you fix American policing? (UPDATED)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [February 6, 2020, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555 "2020-02-06T18:35:18Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 9
### Author:  [@Chisquirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chisquirrel)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2020, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/161 "2020-02-19T21:46:11Z")
> [@Shodan](#):
>
> No, both suggestions are ridiculous.
>
> It’s a numbers game insofar as the fact that police in America make more than 10 million arrests per year ([cite](https://www.statista.com/statistics/191261/number-of-arrests-for-all-offenses-in-the-us-since-1990/)). Of those 10 million arrests, the police shoot about a thousand people. Of those thousand people, the vast majority are justified by any common-sense or legal definition. The fact that all you have are cherry-picked anecdotes going back for years, as a justification that there is anything like a serious problem, means that it isn’t 500 to 1. More like 10,000 to 1.
>
> You should move to America, then.
>
> Regards,
> Shodan
That’s nice, except 1 in 10 civilians killed by police are unarmed. And that doesn’t include the “anecdotes” of multiple people being killed while armed but not threatening in any way - like Willie McCoy, mentioned previously, who was murdered while asleep.
---
### Author:  [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2020, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/162 "2020-02-19T22:20:09Z")
> [@Shodan](#):
>
> …It’s a numbers game insofar as the fact that police in America make more than 10 million arrests per year ([cite](https://www.statista.com/statistics/191261/number-of-arrests-for-all-offenses-in-the-us-since-1990/)). Of those 10 million arrests, the police shoot about a thousand people. Of those thousand people, the vast majority are justified by any common-sense or legal definition. The fact that all you have are cherry-picked anecdotes going back for years, as a justification that there is anything like a serious problem, means that it isn’t 500 to 1. More like 10,000 to 1.
First off, police shoot far more than a thousand people a year. Police _kill_ about 1,000 people a year. For every person shot and killed by police, [two more people survived being shot](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02601-9). So that is upwards of 3,000 people a year shot by police.
Also, minorities are being shot at a higher rate than whites, with blacks are being shot at a rate that’s [2.5 times](https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-36826297) to [3 times higher](https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/) than whites.
So your numbers game starts looking worse and worse if you are a young, black, male, for instance.
And all of this ignores the civilians who aren’t shot by police, but are subject to other forms of police brutality and excessive force.
But regardless, for you to say that there isn’t a serious problem that 1,000 people are getting shot and killed by police every year is a pretty callous thing to say. That’s about the same number of people in 5 commercial airliners. If 5 commercial airliners were going down every year, we would be making major changes to the airline industry. Why? Because we recognize that there are things we can do to prevent the crashes and minimize the number of deaths. Similarly, there are things we as a society can do to minimize the deaths due to police shootings.
A good start would be to first acknowledge that a problem exists in the first place.
> [@Shodan](#):
>
> You should move to America, then.
We are talking about America, where as you yourself said, “The problem is not that they were shot. It was that they were presenting a danger to the public and to the police.” As if that is all the justification the police need to shoot and kill them.
Whether these shootings can be justified after the fact or not, the bigger question is, “Were these shootings preventable?”
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### Author:  [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2020, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/163 "2020-02-20T13:45:41Z")
> [@robby](#):
>
> But regardless, for you to say that there isn’t a serious problem that 1,000 people are getting shot and killed by police every year is a pretty callous thing to say. That’s about the same number of people in 5 commercial airliners. If 5 commercial airliners were going down every year, we would be making major changes to the airline industry. Why? Because we recognize that there are things we can do to prevent the crashes and minimize the number of deaths. Similarly, there are things we as a society can do to minimize the deaths due to police shootings.
People in airliners aren’t attacking the police or threatening the public.
> [@](#):
>
> A good start would be to first acknowledge that a problem exists in the first place.
Too many people are attacking the police and threatening the public. That’s the problem.
> [@](#):
>
> We are talking about America, where as you yourself said, “The problem is not that they were shot. It was that they were presenting a danger to the public and to the police.” As if that is all the justification the police need to shoot and kill them.
It is.
> [@](#):
>
> Whether these shootings can be justified after the fact or not, the bigger question is, “Were these shootings preventable?”
Yes, they were preventable. If people don’t attack the police or threaten the public, that prevents them from getting shot nearly all the time.
Regards,
Shodan
---
### Author:  [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2020, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/164 "2020-02-20T17:16:48Z")
> [@Shodan](#):
>
> Too many people are attacking the police and threatening the public. That’s the problem.
So you say. But it’s certainly not the only problem. It may not even be the primary problem.
> [@Shodan](#):
>
> Yes, they were preventable. If people don’t attack the police or threaten the public, that prevents them from getting shot nearly all the time.
“Nearly all the time?” :rolleyes: Fine, let’s start there. What can we do to keep people from getting shot by police if they _aren’t_ attacking the police or threatening the public?
People like [Justine Damond](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond) or [Philando Castile](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Philando_Castile) or [Atatiana Jefferson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Atatiana_Jefferson) or [Willie McCoy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Willie_McCoy), for example. I get that you’ve dismissed them as “cherry-picked” anecdotes, but the anecdotes are starting to pile up and are instead looking more like a disturbing trend.
---
### Author:  [@DirkHardly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DirkHardly)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2020, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/165 "2020-02-22T18:45:29Z")
> [@robby](#):
>
> You’re correct that you didn’t say that. It was **pkbites** who [keeps](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=22138184#post22138184) [saying](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=22145060#post22145060) that any change to the current use of force policies will inevitably lead to more dead cops.
>
> You’re the one who evidently thinks that the only risk to civilian bystanders is from criminals who might shoot them if the police don’t gun them down first. This [isn’t the case](https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/crime/article238422053.html).
So you falsely attribute a statement or viewpoint to me and then proceed to do it yet again. I made absolutely no statement on the dangers to civilians with regards to police use of deadly force, only on the effects of requiring police to wait and return fire only when fired upon. So you have not only made an error in conflating two separate issues but you’ve compounded your error by assuming my views on the issue without it being previously raised by anyone. Just really batting a thousand here.
> [@robby](#):
>
> Here’s even [more examples](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contagious_shooting#Examples) of police putting bystanders (and fellow officers) at risk far more than the alleged perpetrators. In many of these cases, police fired dozens or even hundreds of times indiscriminately at suspects, killing bystanders and fellow officers.
>
> You are the one who doesn’t like news media cites and offered to “provide actual, relevant, academic cites” that will disprove virtually everything that I am claiming is wrong. So where are these studies?
>
> And if it pains you so, replace “trigger-happy” with “excessive use of deadly force.”
>
> Still waiting…
>
> Apparently all that you have is your own “bare assertions” that I am wrong with nothing to back it up. At least I provided some cites, even though you don’t like them. You haven’t provided anything other than refutations.
And you still don’t seem to get that it is not my personal opinion that newspaper articles are not acceptable academic or scientific cites but the unanimous standard of those who actually determine such things, actual scholars and scientists. Also, you don’t seem to grasp how actual debate works and that a bare assertion, unsupported by competent evidence, can be summarily dismissed. And once again, no number of newspaper articles you post will come remotely close to meeting that standard.
So not only am I under no obligation to rebut your claims which are so broad and vague as to be essentially meaningless but I’m content to wait for you to fail to support your own contentions with evidence that I know doesn’t exist. As far as my own evidence I have plenty, but again your contentions are so vague and ill-defined that they are essentially meaningless, and so not even subject to anything but a similarly pointlessly broad rebuttal.
Unsurprisingly, actual scientists and scholars, when studying such issues, refine their inquiries beyond “Do police shoot people too much?” or “Does our legal system allow police to get away with things they shouldn’t?”. Instead they do things like define terms, identify variables, gather data, and create a methodology where conclusions can be supported as a result. So where have you defined, for example, either “trigger-happy” or “excessive use of deadly force” and what evidence do you have that a statistically significant percentage of police meet this definition? And even if you offer some definition such as “an unjustified use of, or proclivity to the use of, deadly force” then you’ve simply kicked the question down the road a step by needing to define the parameters of what is “justified.”
> [@robby](#):
>
> Like what? Fewer murdered citizens? :rolleyes:
>
> Maybe we could indeed change policies in a city or state, and see what happens.
>
> OK, you don’t like that idea. Here’s another: maybe we could look at other countries where the police _aren’t_ constantly gunning down their own citizens, and compare their outcomes to ours.
>
> I and others understand that just fine. The problem is that this “reasonable person” standard does not look particularly objective. It looks like whatever the police, investigative agencies, and prosecutors think it is. There are many, many examples in which ordinary citizens are being killed by police that would fail this “reasonable person” standard, and yet the police in question are not charged or even terminated from their employment.
>
> Glad to see that you two experts are on the same page. :rolleyes:
> Keep patting each other on the back, there. :rolleyes:
>
> I am telling the two of you as a citizen of this great country of ours that you are losing the confidence of the populace. It is evident that minorities have felt this way for years. I am a member of the demographic who is probably one of the least likely to be hassled by police (white middle-aged male, clean-cut, former military, no criminal record whatsoever), and you are losing my confidence. My default assumption is to now fear and distrust the police. When my son got his drivers license at 16 I had the “talk” with him to minimize the chance of him getting involved in a tragic outcome with the police.
>
> It shouldn’t be this way. ☹
First of all, I’m not a police officer or in any way a member of any Criminal Justice system, so I’ve not lost the confidence of anyone. Secondly, I’ve never claimed to be an expert, but my knowledge and grasp of the issue(s) far outstrips yours (or even the average persons) by roughly the same orders of magnitude that actual experts outstrip mine. And thirdly, once again you seem to use a lot of rolleyes for someone with no evidence backing their position and a tenuous grasp at best of the relevant facts, how debate works, and how science works.
So why should anyone care about your uninformed, unsupported opinion when we have actual experts in their respective fields of policing, law, and most importantly science? Who cares about your opinion on police procedures when you have no grasp of the complexity of the issues involved? Who cares about your opinion about the objective Reasonable Person standard in general or any particular application when you have no legal expertise? And who cares about your opinion of the extent and effects of the use of force by police when it is almost certainly dependent on your imagination rather than any statistical data and relevant conclusions on the part of actual scientists?
See your little idea of comparing incident rates of deadly force for different countries is exactly what these scientists do. Except, being scientists, they’re aware you can’t just compare two numbers and offer any conclusions without first identifying and controlling for variables. So for instance, I first studied racial disparaties in crime rates, arrests, prosecutions, and sentencing about 25 years ago, and the scholarship goes much further back than that. And not one of those studies on the policing aspects of those phenomena (prosecution and sentencing are necessarily a whole different ballgame for a lot of reasons) ever concluded that these disparaties were almost entirely, or even primarily, due to racism on the part of the police.
But of course what are facts, data and logic in the context of actual science compared to people convinced that the simple answer must be “racism,” presumably based on something other than facts, data, logic, and science. So convinced of the righteousness of their cause they proposed increasing minority representation on police forces as a solution. Now that may be a worthy goal in and of itself but this particular mandate in its various forms created its own issues with hiring/firing, promotions, etc. and most importantly, it was primarily motivated by being largely in denial of what the actual science said. Also, some even took it farther and accused their opponents, who were often simply citing the science, of being in denial about the issue and its cause, or of being racist themselves.
So guess what happened when these scientists studied these more racially diverse police forces and their interactions with minorities? It turned out, broadly speaking, there is pretty good evidence that an African-American officer treats an African-American suspect pretty much identically as a white officer, if not even more strictly/harshly. In other words, pretty much exactly consistent with what science had already determined and thus mostly ineffective in solving a problem where it wasn’t the primary cause in the first place. It’s almost as if all that time, money, and effort could have actually been used in accordance with what the science has long told us instead of emotion and bias and maybe some actual real progress could have been made.
And to show you some actual academic cites in support of my position just so you can see what they look like, here you go:
(PDF link)
An Empirical Analysis of Racial Differences in Police Use of Force
[https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/workshop/leo/leo16\_fryer.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwikx5v55OXnAhUXnZ4KHXREA\_IQFjACegQIChAB&usg=AOvVaw3RJg9xFipmewwufeJL\_Jpf&cshid=1582396242065](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/workshop/leo/leo16_fryer.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwikx5v55OXnAhUXnZ4KHXREA_IQFjACegQIChAB&usg=AOvVaw3RJg9xFipmewwufeJL_Jpf&cshid=1582396242065)
Racial disparities in police use-of-force: A state-of-the-art review
[https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323915697\_Racial\_disparities\_in\_police\_use-of-force\_A\_state-of-the-art\_review&ved=2ahUKEwi3pOqM5eXnAhWL4J4KHaXlAmU4ChAWMAd6BAgBEAE&usg=AOvVaw1HV8sVYfun7y3bghhKQVlk](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323915697_Racial_disparities_in_police_use-of-force_A_state-of-the-art_review&ved=2ahUKEwi3pOqM5eXnAhWL4J4KHaXlAmU4ChAWMAd6BAgBEAE&usg=AOvVaw1HV8sVYfun7y3bghhKQVlk)
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### Author:  [@MikeF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeF)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2020, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/166 "2020-02-24T18:58:33Z")
> [@robby](#):
>
> Well, it’s a meaningless hypothetical for me because I am never armed.
>
> While I do own firearms and have a state-issued pistol permit (which also allows me to carry a concealed weapon), I don’t feel the need to go around my community armed. If I go to the shooting range, my pistol is locked in the trunk. (BTW, I’m not unfamiliar with firearms – I earned a [U.S. Navy Expert Pistol Marksmanship Medal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marksmanship_Medal) when I was in the service.)
>
> Do you want to know why I don’t carry a firearm, even though I’m legally allowed to do so? Because when you carry around a hammer, everything looks like a nail. (Which is something I wish our police forces would realize as well.)
>
> A secondary reason is that having a firearm on my person is far more likely to do me harm than good. Only cops get qualified immunity. If I use deadly force, even if justified, I’m far more likely to be arrested and prosecuted. Secondly, having a gun on my person might just [get me killed by a trigger-happy cop](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Philando_Castile) during a traffic stop.
>
> Back to your hypothetical: what exactly does “behaving in such a way that you think he might have a weapon and is about to use it against your child” look like anyway? Because I can tell you right now that “might have a weapon” is pretty vague. If it turns out that the guy is unarmed and I shoot him, and my only defense is that he _looked_ threatening and I thought he _might_ have a weapon, I will be going to jail – because only the police can get away with that kind of behavior with their qualified immunity.
> Nevertheless, I’ll concede the hypothetical and answer your question: yes, I would wait. Just like I think the police should wait.
>
> This answer does not preclude me (or the cops) from drawing my own weapon and ordering the person to put down their weapon. But no, I would not be the first to fire. Nor should the cops.
So, if the circumstance were such that a reasonable person would believe that the guy was armed and intent on hurting your child, you would wait to be certain that he was armed before employing deadly force? You put the safety of the bad guy before the safety of your own child. Do I have this correct?
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### Author:  [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2020, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/167 "2020-02-24T19:26:52Z")
> [@MikeF](#):
>
> So, if the circumstance were such that a reasonable person would believe that the guy was armed and intent on hurting your child, you would wait to be certain that he was armed before employing deadly force? You put the safety of the bad guy before the safety of your own child. Do I have this correct?
So, if the circumstance were such that the cop thought your child was a “bad guy” you’d want the cop to shoot without even being certain your child was armed?
Very generous of you.
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### Author:  [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2020, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/168 "2020-03-03T00:46:49Z")
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> So you falsely attribute a statement or viewpoint to me and then proceed to do it yet again. I made absolutely no statement on the dangers to civilians with regards to police use of deadly force, only on the effects of requiring police to wait and return fire only when fired upon. So you have not only made an error in conflating two separate issues but you’ve compounded your error by assuming my views on the issue without it being previously raised by anyone. Just really batting a thousand here.
On the contrary, you wrote, “[police are in fact supposed to use bullets, if necessary, to prevent an armed suspect from firing their own bullets and endangering the police or any civilians present](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22145047&postcount=125),” as well as “[the potential cost to civilian bystanders](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=22145535&postcount=131)” if there were any change to lethal force policies.
How then can you say that you “made absolutely no statement on the dangers to civilians with regards to police use of deadly force”?
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …And you still don’t seem to get that it is not my personal opinion that newspaper articles are not acceptable academic or scientific cites but the unanimous standard of those who actually determine such things, actual scholars and scientists. Also, you don’t seem to grasp how actual debate works and that a bare assertion, unsupported by competent evidence, can be summarily dismissed. And once again, no number of newspaper articles you post will come remotely close to meeting that standard.
First off, I haven’t only linked to newspaper articles. I’ve previously posted a link to at least one scholarly journal article in this thread, which is more than you can say prior to your last post. Until your last post, you hadn’t provided cites for _anything_. (Not to mention the fact your cites are pretty weak – and not particularly relevant to the discussion at hand – which I discuss further below.)
For example, in [this earlier post](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=22138675#post22138675), besides links to two newspaper/magazine articles (one of which was the Washington Post, which is repeatedly cited as one of the few institutions currently tracking the number of police shootings in the U.S.), I also included a [Wikipedia citation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_by_country), as well as a [scholarly article in a research journal](https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793).
> [@robby](#):
>
> …[Over 1,000 people were shot and killed by U.S. police in 2019.](https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police-shootings-2019/) [Police shootings are a leading cause of death for young men in the United States, especially young black men.](https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793) [American police shoot and kill far more people than their peers in other countries](https://www.vox.com/identities/2016/8/13/17938170/us-police-shootings-gun-violence-homicides), [dwarfing the rate of other industrialized countries](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_by_country).
Secondly, we’re not actually engaging in an academic debate here. Online newspaper and magazine articles, if they are from a reputable source, are fair game.
In any event, I go back to the fact that you are vociferously denying the claim that there is a problem with policing in America today, without providing any evidence of your own to support your rebuttal.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …So not only am I under no obligation to rebut your claims which are so broad and vague as to be essentially meaningless but I’m content to wait for you to fail to support your own contentions with evidence that I know doesn’t exist. As far as my own evidence I have plenty, but again your contentions are so vague and ill-defined that they are essentially meaningless, and so not even subject to anything but a similarly pointlessly broad rebuttal.
Let me be succinct, then. It is my contention that police killings in the United States greatly exceeds that of other industrialized nations, and that this is a problem.
Here is a journal article that looks at this: [Lethal Policing: Making Sense of American Exceptionalism](https://www.jstor.org/stable/24878716?seq=1)
> [@](#):
>
> This article focuses on why the rate of police killings in the United States towers over that in other industrialized nations. Elevated police lethality is deeply rooted in two distinctive aspects of American society and culture. Police violence is both a tool and product of strategies to maintain racial segregation and inequality. However, racism cannot explain the fact that police lethality is greatest in states where African Americans are least prevalent. Elevated police killings are also rooted in America’s prevailing ideology (and mythology) of self‐reliance and limited government. Neoliberal ideology helped some politicians cut gaping holes in the social safety net, leaving ill‐equipped and fearful police officers to deal with desperate people who lack adequate treatment and support, yet who have easy access to weapons. It also limits the legislative and regulative authority that centralized policy actors exert over policing. Nevertheless, police overreliance on deadly force is increasingly understood as a national problem requiring large‐scale solutions.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …And thirdly, once again you seem to use a lot of rolleyes for someone with no evidence backing their position…
I have provided evidence backing my position. Besides the academic study I linked to above, here is an article written by a criminal justice professor at Rutgers University: [Why do American cops kill so many compared to European cops?](https://theconversation.com/why-do-american-cops-kill-so-many-compared-to-european-cops-49696)
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …and a tenuous grasp at best of the relevant facts, how debate works, and how science works.
I know how science works. For one thing, I know that there is a pretty large difference between the physical sciences and social “science.” FWIW, I have a B.S. and an M.S. in engineering, and defended and published a master’s thesis for the latter. I also taught the physical sciences for over seven years.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …So why should anyone care about your uninformed, unsupported opinion when we have actual experts in their respective fields of policing, law, and most importantly science? Who cares about your opinion on police procedures when you have no grasp of the complexity of the issues involved? Who cares about your opinion about the objective Reasonable Person standard in general or any particular application when you have no legal expertise? And who cares about your opinion of the extent and effects of the use of force by police when it is almost certainly dependent on your imagination rather than any statistical data and relevant conclusions on the part of actual scientists?
Well for one thing, it’s not just my opinion. I have provided numerous cites in this thread. Finally, you don’t have to be an expert on any of this to see the end result – a disproportionate number of people are being killed by police in the U.S. when compared to other industrialized countries.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …See your little idea of comparing incident rates of deadly force for different countries is exactly what these scientists do. Except, being scientists, they’re aware you can’t just compare two numbers and offer any conclusions without first identifying and controlling for variables.
Exactly. One of these variables is discussed in the article by the Rutgers professor linked to above: the difference in behavioral mandates for the use of deadly force in the U.S. versus those of Europe. In the U.S., the Supreme Court ruled in 1989 that it was “constitutionally permissible for police to use deadly force when they ‘reasonably’ perceive imminent and grave harm…”
> [@](#):
>
> …By contrast, national standards in most European countries conform to the European Convention on Human Rights, which impels its 47 signatories to permit only deadly force that is “absolutely necessary” to achieve a lawful purpose. Killings excused under America’s “reasonable belief” standards often violate Europe’s “absolute necessity” standards.
>
> For example, the unfounded fear of Darren Wilson – the former Ferguson cop who fatally shot Michael Brown – that Brown was armed would not have likely absolved him in Europe. Nor would officers’ fears of the screwdriver that a mentally ill Dallas man Jason Harrison refused to drop.
>
> In Europe, killing is considered unnecessary if alternatives exist. For example, national guidelines in Spain would have prescribed that Wilson incrementally pursue verbal warnings, warning shots, and shots at nonvital parts of the body before resorting to deadly force. Six shots would likely be deemed disproportionate to the threat that Brown, unarmed and wounded, allegedly posed.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …And to show you some actual academic cites in support of my position just so you can see what they look like, here you go:
>
> (PDF link)
>
> An Empirical Analysis of Racial Differences in Police Use of Force
>
> [https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/workshop/leo/leo16\_fryer.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwikx5v55OXnAhUXnZ4KHXREA\_IQFjACegQIChAB&usg=AOvVaw3RJg9xFipmewwufeJL\_Jpf&cshid=1582396242065](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/workshop/leo/leo16_fryer.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwikx5v55OXnAhUXnZ4KHXREA_IQFjACegQIChAB&usg=AOvVaw3RJg9xFipmewwufeJL_Jpf&cshid=1582396242065)
>
> Racial disparities in police use-of-force: A state-of-the-art review
>
> [https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323915697\_Racial\_disparities\_in\_police\_use-of-force\_A\_state-of-the-art\_review&ved=2ahUKEwi3pOqM5eXnAhWL4J4KHaXlAmU4ChAWMAd6BAgBEAE&usg=AOvVaw1HV8sVYfun7y3bghhKQVlk](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323915697_Racial_disparities_in_police_use-of-force_A_state-of-the-art_review&ved=2ahUKEwi3pOqM5eXnAhWL4J4KHaXlAmU4ChAWMAd6BAgBEAE&usg=AOvVaw1HV8sVYfun7y3bghhKQVlk)
These are pretty weak studies, evidently hampered by lack of data.
Your first cite states that: "On non-lethal uses of force, blacks and Hispanics are more than fifty percent more likely to experience some form of force in interactions with police. Adding controls that account for important context and civilian behavior reduces, but cannot fully explain, these disparities. In the conclusion, it states that “…very little data exists to understand whether racial disparities in police use of force exist.”
The second cite is simply a meta-review. The abstract states that: “The relationship between race and use of force remains unclear after an examination of these studies. This indicates a need for high-quality research focusing on comparable operationalization of variables and stronger methodologies.”
OK, then. :rolleyes:
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### Author:  [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2020, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/169 "2020-03-03T15:42:35Z")
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …I’m content to wait for you to fail to support your own contentions with evidence that **I know doesn’t exist**. [emphasis added]
Nobody who actually understands how science works would ever make a statement like this.
> [@DirkHardly](#):
>
> …As far as my own evidence I have plenty…
None of which you have provided, despite repeated requests to do so. :rolleyes:
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### Author:  [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2020, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-fix-american-policing-updated/847555/170 "2020-03-03T16:20:31Z")
> [@MikeF](#):
>
> So, if the circumstance were such that a reasonable person would believe that the guy was armed and intent on hurting your child, you would wait to be certain that he was armed before employing deadly force? You put the safety of the bad guy before the safety of your own child. Do I have this correct?
Not only would I wait to be certain that the “bad guy” was armed, I would not employ deadly force until and unless he utilized deadly force first. And unlike the police, I don’t walk around wearing a ballistic vest.
In any event, this is yet another false dichotomy. Even if I grant your hypothetical situation of a bad guy a reasonable person would believe was armed and intent on hurting my child, it is by no means assured that I will not endanger my child to a greater extent by employing deadly force. For example, I might accidentally hit my child (or a bystander). I might hit the bad guy, but not incapacitate him, thereby inducing him to open fire on my child, myself, and/or bystanders.
Or like in so many police shootings, I might kill the bad guy, only to discover that he was actually unarmed and merely posturing or mentally ill or drunk, etc.
Last but not least, I don’t agree with the “reasonable belief” standards used in the U.S. I think a better approach would be the “absolute necessity” standards used in Europe (i.e. deadly force may only be utilized if it “absolutely necessary” to achieve a lawful purpose). These differing mandates for the use of deadly force is discussed in [this article](https://theconversation.com/why-do-american-cops-kill-so-many-compared-to-european-cops-49696) written by a criminal justice professor at Rutgers University (previously linked to upthread).
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