Race/ethnicity composition of police officers in officer-involved shootings

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate officer and civilian race/ethnicity disparities during ten years of officer-involved shootings (OIS).

Design/methodology/approach

Internal affairs, personnel and geospatial data were triangulated for 253 OIS at the Dallas Police Department from 2005 to 2015. Multinomial regression models were used to evaluate the relationship between civilian and officer race/ethnicity in OIS, controlling for officer, situational and neighborhood factors.

Findings

In total, 48 percent of unique OIS involved a non-Hispanic black civilian and most OIS occurred in Hispanic majority neighborhoods (48 percent). Officer age and number of shooters on scene were the only variables significantly associated with officer race/ethnicity. Most notably, officer race/ethnicity was not associated with the race/ethnicity of the civilian during OIS incidents.

Originality/value

There is limited scientific evidence on whether officers of certain races/ethnicities are disproportionately likely to engage in OIS with civilians of a particular race/ethnicity due to the relative rarity of such events.

Citation

Jetelina, K.K., Bishopp, S.A., Wiegand, J.G. and Reingle Gonzalez, J.M. (2020), "Race/ethnicity composition of police officers in officer-involved shootings", Policing: An International Journal, Vol. 43 No. 2, pp. 263-270. https://doi.org/10.1108/PIJPSM-10-2019-0166