Police shootings in U.S.
The most controversial police shootings in terms of the public’s awareness and of media coverage in 2015 (and in previous years) have been shootings of unarmed black males by white police officers; however, only 4 percent of the cases last year fit that category, the Post found.
A large percentage of those fatally shot by police were armed at the time of their deaths and over half were white males. But the newspaper pointed out that “when adjusted for the populations where these shootings occurred” police killed blacks at three times the rate of whites.
And while black males make up but 6 percent of America’s population, the Post’s numbers found 40 percent of those shot dead by police while unarmed were black males. One-quarter of the civilians killed “showed signs” of mental illness.
Including 11 shot dead in 2016 up until Jan. 6, a total of 997 have been killed by U.S. police since Jan. 1 of 2015. Of those, 956 were male and 41 were female; 495 were white, 259 were black, 168 were Hispanic and another 38 were described as “other,” with ethnically Asians a part of that grouping. The race of 37 of the dead was described as “unknown.”
The Post project found 788 had a “deadly weapon” and 33 were brandishing a toy gun while 93 were unarmed. The newspaper discovered that for 55 of the officers who did the shooting it was not their first time using deadly force on the job. For some officers, the Post said “a handful,” it was their third time using deadly force; for one it was his fourth.
Videos of shootings
The Post found many of those shot were chased on foot by officers and that often police repeatedly gave the command for the victim to either drop a weapon or show their hands, sometimes giving that command dozens of times. Much of that data comes from witnesses but it also comes from shootings captured on video.
The prevalence of police officers wearing body cameras has given the public an eye on police shootings like they’ve never had before. Some video of shootings from the cameras of passersby or police cameras — six-percent of these shootings in 2015 were captured on police cameras — appear to show officers literally jumping the gun and shooting when the victim did not seem to pose a serious threat.
Examples include the shooting death of Walter Scott on April 4 in South Carolina by officer Michael Slager. Footage shot by passerby Feidin Santana shows Scott, who was black, running away from the officer and being shot multiple times in the back. Slager has been charged with murder and his trial is scheduled to begin in October.
A video from the body camera of Officer Lisa Mearkle in Hummelstown, Pa, shows her chase and Taser David Kassick, a white male, before shooting him twice in the back as he lay unarmed in the snow, killing him. He appeared to be complying and Mearkle was charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter but was acquitted on all counts.
While the Washington Post is continuing to compile statistics on police shootings for the year 2016, a similar initiative by the federal government will not be ready to launch until 2017.
