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Most of the time, the complaint is that black people are being killed by police disproportionally. It's not often explicitly said what they are killed dispropor

Most of the time, the complaint is that black people are being killed by police disproportionally. It's not often explicitly said what they are killed disproportionally to, but it is usually implied as compared to demographics. This chart says a black man is 3x more likely to be killed by police than a white man. The uncomfortable fact is that black people also commit a disproportionate amount of the crime in the USA. I was curious to see whether these police killings are disproportionate to the amount of crime being committed. Is a black criminal 3x more likely to get killed than a white criminal? Digging into the numbers, on this database there were 3,379 killings of white people by police, and 1,945 black people. In 2018 there were 589k property crimes committed by white people, vs. 264k by black people. [1] For each black crime, there were 2.2 white crimes. For each black killing, there were 1.7 white killings. So, yes, the data does support that black crime leads to a disproportionate amount of killings at the hand of the police, even accounting for higher rates of crime. A black criminal is 30% more likely to die at the hands of the police than a white criminal. Not 3x, however. [1]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/252486/number-of-property-crimes-in-the-us-by-type-and-race/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/252486/number-of-propert... EDIT: dead comment below points to some other statistics from the FBI: https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21 https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-... If we look at the rates of violent crime categories only (murder, robbery, and aggravated assault), the data actually indicates that a greater proportion of these crimes are committed by black perpetrators. There are 1.6 white perpetrators of aggravated assault per black perpetrator, 0.8 white robbers per black robber, and 0.85 white murderers per black murderer. This suggest that in this category, the police killings are actually disproportionate in that more white people are killed by police than the rates of violent crime committed would warrant.

pyritefan 6y ago
It seems that black criminals are more likely to be armed. Comparing the number of crimes alone vs. killings by police means nothing if you do not look at the types of crimes. Police are not as likely to kill a vandal or unarmed burglar as they are killing an armed criminal, especially one that has committed a violent crime. https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21 https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-... In all crime categories which are more likely to be violent, blacks are over-represented.
eirini1 6y ago
regardless of the reasons black people overall might commit more crime, or whether they actually commit more crime or are just singled out by police more often, do you feel that this is relevant to how often police kill people? Capital punishment is the mechanism through which the justice system has the right to kill people for their crimes. Cops do not have the authority to decide who is guilty, let alone what their punishment will be. Therefore I ask again, how is the crime rate of black people (even if that number is taken in good faith and not heavily questioned as any competent statistician should) relevant when we are discussing how often officers murder black people, before a court has decided whether they have actually committed a crime or not?
- gridlockd 6y ago
  > Cops do not have the authority to decide who is guilty, let alone what their punishment will be. Cops do have the legal authority to use lethal force on people resisting arrest if there's probable cause for injury to themselves or others.
  - eirini1 6y ago
    right, and the fact that there is no institution that seems to hold cops legitimately accountable as to wether or not there was actually probable cause seems to be a big issue here.
spangry 6y ago
You might find this Harvard study on the issue illuminating: https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/empirical_analysis_tables_figures.pdf https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/empirical_anal...
- kenneth 6y ago
  "Taken together, we argue that the results are most consistent with, but in no way proof of, tastebased discrimination among police officers who face convex costs of excessive use of force. Yet, the data does more to provide a more compelling case that there is no discrimination in officer-involved shootings than it does to illuminate the reasons behind racial differences in non-lethal uses of force." I'm rather confused as to what the conclusion is here. Reading through the entire introduction of the paper, my impression is that it supports that there is not a statistically significant discrimination in the numbers of shootings of black people by officers; that in a similar situation, race does not increase the likelihood of a shooting. Am I reading this right?

pyritefan 6y ago

It seems that black criminals are more likely to be armed. Comparing the number of crimes alone vs. killings by police means nothing if you do not look at the types of crimes. Police are not as likely to kill a vandal or unarmed burglar as they are killing an armed criminal, especially one that has committed a violent crime. https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21 https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-... In all crime categories which are more likely to be violent, blacks are over-represented.

eirini1 6y ago

regardless of the reasons black people overall might commit more crime, or whether they actually commit more crime or are just singled out by police more often, do you feel that this is relevant to how often police kill people? Capital punishment is the mechanism through which the justice system has the right to kill people for their crimes. Cops do not have the authority to decide who is guilty, let alone what their punishment will be. Therefore I ask again, how is the crime rate of black people (even if that number is taken in good faith and not heavily questioned as any competent statistician should) relevant when we are discussing how often officers murder black people, before a court has decided whether they have actually committed a crime or not?

gridlockd 6y ago
> Cops do not have the authority to decide who is guilty, let alone what their punishment will be. Cops do have the legal authority to use lethal force on people resisting arrest if there's probable cause for injury to themselves or others.
- eirini1 6y ago
  right, and the fact that there is no institution that seems to hold cops legitimately accountable as to wether or not there was actually probable cause seems to be a big issue here.

spangry 6y ago

You might find this Harvard study on the issue illuminating: https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/empirical_analysis_tables_figures.pdf https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/empirical_anal...

kenneth 6y ago
"Taken together, we argue that the results are most consistent with, but in no way proof of, tastebased discrimination among police officers who face convex costs of excessive use of force. Yet, the data does more to provide a more compelling case that there is no discrimination in officer-involved shootings than it does to illuminate the reasons behind racial differences in non-lethal uses of force." I'm rather confused as to what the conclusion is here. Reading through the entire introduction of the paper, my impression is that it supports that there is not a statistically significant discrimination in the numbers of shootings of black people by officers; that in a similar situation, race does not increase the likelihood of a shooting. Am I reading this right?