Surprising New Evidence Shows Bias in Police Use of Force but Not in Shootings

[rangerrebew]

Surprising New Evidence Shows Bias in Police Use of Force but Not in Shootings

By QUOCTRUNG BUI and AMANDA COX JULY 11, 2016
 
Police officers are more likely to ...
   with blacks    than with whites
in similar situations    
use hands    2,165for every 10,000 stops
in New York City    1,845for every 10,000 stops
in New York City    17% more likely
push into wall    623    529    18%
use handcuffs*    310    266    16%
draw weapons    155    129    19%
push to ground    136    114    18%
point weapon    54    43    24%
use pepper spray or baton    5    4    25%
* Handcuffs exclude arrests. Counts represent at least that level of force, based on stop-and-frisk data from 2003 to 2013. Similar situations account for gender, age, police precinct, the reason for the stop, whether the stop was indoors or outdoors, the time of day, whether the stop took place in a high-crime area or during a high-crime time, whether the officer was in uniform, the type of identification provided, and whether others were stopped at the same time.

A new study confirms that black men and women are treated differently in the hands of law enforcement. They are more likely to be touched, handcuffed, pushed to the ground or pepper-sprayed by a police officer, even after accounting for how, where and when they encounter the police.

But when it comes to the most lethal form of force — police shootings — the study finds no racial bias.

“It is the most surprising result of my career,” said Roland G. Fryer Jr., the author of the study and a professor of economics at Harvard. The study examined more than a thousand shootings in 10 major police departments, in Texas, Florida and California.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/12/upshot/surprising-new-evidence-shows-bias-in-police-use-of-force-but-not-in-shootings.html?_r=0

[Suppressed]

Looking at the way this study was conducted, and the way the encounters were coded, it doesn't necessarily indicate bias.  There's no coding to see whether black subjects were more defiant, for example.

[skeeter]

This study shows cops don't shoot suspects for fun, or that there's any thought process involved other than an instinct for self preservation.

Whether that instinct is justified is another matter, there's no racism involved.

[bolobaby]

Looking at the way this study was conducted, and the way the encounters were coded, it doesn't necessarily indicate bias.  There's no coding to see whether black subjects were more defiant, for example.

EXACTLY.

You need to consider the behavior of the perp. So, therein lies the million dollar question: are blacks acting DIFFERENTLY than white perps, creating needless escalation of force?