Police Use Of Excessive Force: A Case Study Of Lethal (Deadly) Force

Abstract

Two African-American civilians, Sean Bell and Amadou Bailo Diallo, suffered tragic deaths as a result of use of lethal force by the police. This case study presents an in-depth analysis of the determinants that affected the officers' use of lethal force with regard to the above mentioned cases.

A Decade of Police Use of Deadly Force Research (2011–2020)

“…On the other hand, there was greater variation among the articles in relation to sample size, unit of analysis, time periods, and methodologies. For example, sample sizes ranged from two case studies (Kargin, 2016) to 30 officer-involved shootings (Parent, 2011) to 23,578 police-related homicides (Finch et al, 2019). We also observed variation in the unit of analysis examined, as studies examined officer- ( n = 8), agency- ( n = 5), incident- ( n = 57), county- ( n = 3), city- ( n = 5), state- ( n = 2), and country-level ( n = 2) differences, among others.…”

“…Scholars have found that in police-citizen encounters in which a subject is armed with a gun or weapon and an officer is injured, the likelihood of officer-involved shootings (Davies, 2017; Jordan et al, 2020; Morgan et al, 2020; Taylor, 2020; Wheeler et al, 2018; Worrall et al, 2018), the number of shots fired by the police officer (White & Klinger, 2012), and the lethality of an officer-involved shooting (Fridel et al, 2020; Jennings et al, 2020; Johnson et al, 2019), all significantly increase. Researchers have also found a significant positive association between officer-involved shootings and police officers with prior police misconduct or citizen complaints (Kargin, 2016; Ridgeway, 2016; Worrall et al, 2018; Zhao & Papachristos, 2020), police militarization (Lawson, 2019), levels of household gun ownership (Hemenway et al, 2019), mental illness (DeGue et al, 2016; Lord, 2014), and Western states (Helms & Costanza, 2020; Johnson, 2013; Willits & Nowacki, 2014).…”

“…More specifically, cities with restrictive policies on police use of deadly force (Nowacki, 2015), policies that require officers to write a report for drawing and pointing a firearm (Jennings & Rubado, 2017), and policies or practices that allow the use of conducted energy devices (Ferdik et al, 2014), are all negatively associated with officer-involved shootings. Additionally, researchers have found that officers who join the police force later in their careers (Kargin, 2016;Ridgeway, 2016Ridgeway, , 2020, and who have made more misdemeanor arrests (Ridgeway, 2016(Ridgeway, , 2020, are also less likely to be involved in deadly force incidents.…”