10 ms·

Police fatally shot 1,055 people in 2021, highest total since tracking began

27 points by jbegley 5y ago

datarage 5y ago
- buster 5y ago
  "More people than ever being tits" would be people with guns shooting other people?
  - anononaut 5y ago
    Not just other people, cops specifically. More than ever.
    - thghtihadanacct 5y ago
      No, 'other people' had a pretty record year murdering with guns too.
  - sillysaurusx 5y ago
    Whoop whoop, this is the flamewar alarm. I go off whenever a flamewar approacheth. It's like TCAS: "Whoop whoop, don't reply! Whoop whoop, don't reply!" (More seriously, it's an interesting problem how to deal with threads like this. It seems almost deterministic based on a comment's initial wording. I guess the only effective approach is manual moderation, but I can't help but wonder if it'll be the same solution in 200 years.)
    - klyrs 5y ago
      Not that interesting, really. Flag the root and don't respond. As you note, little good ever comes out of a thread with that kind of opening.
      - sillysaurusx 5y ago
        Part of me really wants to try to train an ML model to auto detect such comments. Every time I see a pattern, I think "ML might be able to solve this..." But I know from experience that such feelings are often illusory.
h2odragon 5y ago
> Police have fatally shot roughly 1,000 people in each of the past seven years, ranging from 958 in 2016 to last year’s high. So not such a huge escalation, since "tracking began" in 2015.
- johncessna 5y ago
  If you stick with the article all the way to the bottom, it admits as much: > The relative stability of the annual number of fatal shootings does not mean the total is unchangeable. Wheeler said societal interventions, such as new policies around use of force, could shift the total from its expected range. Makes you wonder what agenda the headline writer is trying to push.
  - gameswithgo 5y ago
    Probably the agenda of making a living.
  - alwaysanagenda 5y ago
- ashwagary 5y ago
  Since coroners lie to protect Police Departments, the number is far higher than just ~1000/year. An earlier study showed the actual number murdered was roughly ~2000/year.
  - mansion7 5y ago
    But journalists & academics lie to protect criminals, so perhaps that balances things out.
    - ashwagary 5y ago
      Do they? And if they do, you think a lesser sentence is equivalent to extrajudicially murdering unarmed civilians? Strange world you seem to want to live in. I pray your family never becomes a victim of your nonsense.
trdtaylor1 5y ago
Shows you how screwed the stat tracking on gun kills in America is; different sources give significantly different kill numbers. Gunviolence claims it's more like ~1300 for police gun homicides in 2021 https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/past-tolls https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/past-tolls. I'm still trusting the CDC a bit more on these statistics then media outlets of varying political agendas.
- slowmovintarget 5y ago
  Those are, generally speaking, not homicides. Killings, yes, but not unlawful.
ocius 5y ago
For comparison: 14 or 15 killings by police in Germany in 2019 (depending on the source). Germany has ~80 million inhabitants, compared to the ~330 million in the US, so you'd expect roughly 60 killings by police in the US if the level of violence was similar. The English Wikipedia entry lists the circumstances for each killing by German police forces: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc... The German version talks of 15 killings for 2019.
- MisterTea 5y ago
  There are so many guns in the USA the police simply shoot first and ask questions later rather than trying to de-escalate and become victims in the process. We just had two cops shot dead in the Bronx responding to a domestic dispute between a middle aged man and his elderly mother. This is the grim reality we've been building in the USA.
  - slowhand09 5y ago
    Number of guns isn't the issue IMHO. The number of people who don't follow basic instructions is. "Put your hands on the wheel. Or put your hands up. Also, the number who want to argue and resist. If you've been told to drop the gun on the ground in front of you, but choose to wave it instead, you should expect you will be disarmed, even if it results in your death. Reaction time kills.
    - bastawhiz 5y ago
      Do you have data that supports this?
      - slowhand09 5y ago
        I've watched numerous bodycam videos where people were told to do something to make themselves and the officers safer. They mostly show the ones that go bad. How often do you see a posted video where a person laid down the weapon and followed instructions? Rarely, because they rarely go bad. Not saying there aren't screwups, because obviously there are. Amir Locke (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWCpkPBKFR0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWCpkPBKFR0) for example appears to be a terrible result of a poor practice, No knock warrants. This one (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ1mo-ecOzI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ1mo-ecOzI) is an example of not following direction. There is no shortage of evidence if you look for it instead of having it spoon-fed by the media. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cops+shoots https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cops+shoots
_-david-_ 5y ago
The total number of police who were intentionally killed is also at at the highest since we started tracking as well.
yucky 5y ago
It's too bad they stopped creating the interactive version of this like they used to[1] (unless I missed it). It was really instructive to visualize some of the not so obvious truths in the data. For instance, white males are more likely to be shot by police than their percentage of the overall population would suggest (along with black males and hispanic males). Whereas asian males, and females of all races (including black females) are less likely to be killed than their percentage of the population would suggest. This isn't the narrative portrayed in the media, and I wonder if this is what led to them changing how they present the data.. It suggests that the problem is actually gender-based, not race-based. Interestingly enough, it also shows a significant correlation to violent crime rates by demographic groups (white, black and hispanic males committing violent crime at higher rates than asian males and females of all races, which would likely lead to more potentially dangerous interactions with police. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police-shootings-2019/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police...
Proven 5y ago
[dead]
glonq 5y ago
"Let's solve this by blaming each other and then doing nothing" - America, yet again.
chrismcb 5y ago
ABC claims 2021 had the lowest with 888. Claims the data is from Washington posts database. I can't read the Post article, so which is it. Why the discrepancy? https://www.google.com/amp/s/abcnews.go.com/amp/US/fatal-police-shootings-dip-2021-amid-calls-reform/story%3fid=81914364 https://www.google.com/amp/s/abcnews.go.com/amp/US/fatal-pol...

27 points by jbegley 5y ago

buster 5y ago
"More people than ever being tits" would be people with guns shooting other people?
- anononaut 5y ago
  Not just other people, cops specifically. More than ever.
  - thghtihadanacct 5y ago
    No, 'other people' had a pretty record year murdering with guns too.
- sillysaurusx 5y ago
  Whoop whoop, this is the flamewar alarm. I go off whenever a flamewar approacheth. It's like TCAS: "Whoop whoop, don't reply! Whoop whoop, don't reply!" (More seriously, it's an interesting problem how to deal with threads like this. It seems almost deterministic based on a comment's initial wording. I guess the only effective approach is manual moderation, but I can't help but wonder if it'll be the same solution in 200 years.)
  - klyrs 5y ago
    Not that interesting, really. Flag the root and don't respond. As you note, little good ever comes out of a thread with that kind of opening.
    - sillysaurusx 5y ago
      Part of me really wants to try to train an ML model to auto detect such comments. Every time I see a pattern, I think "ML might be able to solve this..." But I know from experience that such feelings are often illusory.

> Police have fatally shot roughly 1,000 people in each of the past seven years, ranging from 958 in 2016 to last year’s high. So not such a huge escalation, since "tracking began" in 2015.

johncessna 5y ago
If you stick with the article all the way to the bottom, it admits as much: > The relative stability of the annual number of fatal shootings does not mean the total is unchangeable. Wheeler said societal interventions, such as new policies around use of force, could shift the total from its expected range. Makes you wonder what agenda the headline writer is trying to push.
- gameswithgo 5y ago
  Probably the agenda of making a living.
- alwaysanagenda 5y ago
ashwagary 5y ago
Since coroners lie to protect Police Departments, the number is far higher than just ~1000/year. An earlier study showed the actual number murdered was roughly ~2000/year.
- mansion7 5y ago
  But journalists & academics lie to protect criminals, so perhaps that balances things out.
  - ashwagary 5y ago
    Do they? And if they do, you think a lesser sentence is equivalent to extrajudicially murdering unarmed civilians? Strange world you seem to want to live in. I pray your family never becomes a victim of your nonsense.

trdtaylor1 5y ago

Shows you how screwed the stat tracking on gun kills in America is; different sources give significantly different kill numbers. Gunviolence claims it's more like ~1300 for police gun homicides in 2021 https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/past-tolls https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/past-tolls. I'm still trusting the CDC a bit more on these statistics then media outlets of varying political agendas.

slowmovintarget 5y ago
Those are, generally speaking, not homicides. Killings, yes, but not unlawful.

ocius 5y ago

For comparison: 14 or 15 killings by police in Germany in 2019 (depending on the source). Germany has ~80 million inhabitants, compared to the ~330 million in the US, so you'd expect roughly 60 killings by police in the US if the level of violence was similar. The English Wikipedia entry lists the circumstances for each killing by German police forces: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc... The German version talks of 15 killings for 2019.

MisterTea 5y ago
There are so many guns in the USA the police simply shoot first and ask questions later rather than trying to de-escalate and become victims in the process. We just had two cops shot dead in the Bronx responding to a domestic dispute between a middle aged man and his elderly mother. This is the grim reality we've been building in the USA.
- slowhand09 5y ago
  Number of guns isn't the issue IMHO. The number of people who don't follow basic instructions is. "Put your hands on the wheel. Or put your hands up. Also, the number who want to argue and resist. If you've been told to drop the gun on the ground in front of you, but choose to wave it instead, you should expect you will be disarmed, even if it results in your death. Reaction time kills.
  - bastawhiz 5y ago
    Do you have data that supports this?
    - slowhand09 5y ago
      I've watched numerous bodycam videos where people were told to do something to make themselves and the officers safer. They mostly show the ones that go bad. How often do you see a posted video where a person laid down the weapon and followed instructions? Rarely, because they rarely go bad. Not saying there aren't screwups, because obviously there are. Amir Locke (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWCpkPBKFR0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWCpkPBKFR0) for example appears to be a terrible result of a poor practice, No knock warrants. This one (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ1mo-ecOzI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ1mo-ecOzI) is an example of not following direction. There is no shortage of evidence if you look for it instead of having it spoon-fed by the media. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cops+shoots https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cops+shoots

_-david-_ 5y ago

The total number of police who were intentionally killed is also at at the highest since we started tracking as well.

yucky 5y ago

It's too bad they stopped creating the interactive version of this like they used to[1] (unless I missed it). It was really instructive to visualize some of the not so obvious truths in the data. For instance, white males are more likely to be shot by police than their percentage of the overall population would suggest (along with black males and hispanic males). Whereas asian males, and females of all races (including black females) are less likely to be killed than their percentage of the population would suggest. This isn't the narrative portrayed in the media, and I wonder if this is what led to them changing how they present the data.. It suggests that the problem is actually gender-based, not race-based. Interestingly enough, it also shows a significant correlation to violent crime rates by demographic groups (white, black and hispanic males committing violent crime at higher rates than asian males and females of all races, which would likely lead to more potentially dangerous interactions with police. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police-shootings-2019/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police...

Proven 5y ago

[dead]

glonq 5y ago

"Let's solve this by blaming each other and then doing nothing" - America, yet again.

chrismcb 5y ago

ABC claims 2021 had the lowest with 888. Claims the data is from Washington posts database. I can't read the Post article, so which is it. Why the discrepancy? https://www.google.com/amp/s/abcnews.go.com/amp/US/fatal-police-shootings-dip-2021-amid-calls-reform/story%3fid=81914364 https://www.google.com/amp/s/abcnews.go.com/amp/US/fatal-pol...