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Hundreds of Police Killings Are Uncounted in Federal Stats

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TheDemSocialist

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WASHINGTON—When 24-year-old Albert Jermaine Payton wielded a knife in front of the police in this city’s southeast corner, officers opened fire and killed him.Yet according to national statistics intended to track police killings, Mr. Payton’s death in August 2012 never happened. It is one of hundreds of homicides by law-enforcement agencies between 2007 and 2012 that aren’t included in records kept by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
A Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest data from 105 of the country’s largest police agencies found more than 550 police killings during those years were missing from the national tally or, in a few dozen cases, not attributed to the agency involved. The result: It is nearly impossible to determine how many people are killed by the police each year.


Public demands for transparency on such killings have increased since the August shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown by police in Ferguson, Mo. The Ferguson Police Department has reported to the FBI one justifiable homicide by police between 1976 and 2012.
Law-enforcement experts long have lamented the lack of information about killings by police. “When cops are killed, there is a very careful account and there’s a national database,” said Jeffrey Fagan, a law professor at Columbia University. “Why not the other side of the ledger?”
Police can use data about killings to improve tactics, particularly when dealing with people who are mentally ill, said Paco Balderrama, a spokesman for the Oklahoma City Police Department. “It’s great to recognize that, because 30 years ago we used to not do that. We used to just show up and handle the situation.”
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Read more @: Hundreds of Police Killings Are Uncounted in Federal Stats

:shock:
 
So basically Obama and Holder are just talking out their asses about cases like Brown and Martin being endemic of racism in American justice; because they don't even have the data to prove it.
 
CRUE CAB said:
Some people just need killin'.
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And some people just need mental health care, and there is a lot of overlap between the two groups.
 
American said:
So basically Obama and Holder are just talking out their asses about cases like Brown and Martin being endemic of racism in American justice; because they don't even have the data to prove it.
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Your right. The number should be a lot higher since hundreds go unreported.
 
American said:
If they're going unreported, how do they know how many there are?
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From the OP itself:

"It is one of hundreds of homicides by law-enforcement agencies between 2007 and 2012 that aren’t included in records kept by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. A Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest data from 105 of the country’s largest police agencies found more than 550 police killings during those years were missing from the national tally or, in a few dozen cases, not attributed to the agency involved. The result: It is nearly impossible to determine how many people are killed by the police each year."
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Read more @: Hundreds of Police Killings Are Uncounted in Federal Stats

:shock:[/FONT][/COLOR]
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There are three degrees of homicides and these are the same for police shootings:

1) Felonious: Like the shooting of Randy Weaver's wife by the FBI.

2) Jusitifiable: As are the vast majority of shootings where the officer is defending himself from harm or death.

3) Praiseworthy: With Michael Brown and any other scumbag thug that is removed from society to make it a better place.
 
brothern said:
From the OP itself:

"It is one of hundreds of homicides by law-enforcement agencies between 2007 and 2012 that aren’t included in records kept by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. A Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest data from 105 of the country’s largest police agencies found more than 550 police killings during those years were missing from the national tally or, in a few dozen cases, not attributed to the agency involved. The result: It is nearly impossible to determine how many people are killed by the police each year."
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How do they know there really are hundreds? Something sounds contradictory.
 
CRUE CAB said:
Some people just need killin'.
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And why not do so with roaming bands of armed government goons. I'm sure that was the intent of the Founders. :roll
 
American said:
If they're going unreported, how do they know how many there are?
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You not read the article?
"A Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest data from 105 of the country’s largest police agencies found more than 550 police killings during those years were missing from the national tally or, in a few dozen cases, not attributed to the agency involved. The result: It is nearly impossible to determine how many people are killed by the police each year.

Three sources of information about deaths caused by police—the FBI numbers, figures from the Centers for Disease Control and data at the Bureau of Justice Statistics—differ from one another widely in any given year or state, according to a 2012 report by David Klinger, a criminologist with the University of Missouri-St. Louis and a onetime police officer.

To analyze the accuracy of the FBI data, the Journal requested internal records on killings by officers from the nation’s 110 largest police departments. One-hundred-five of them provided figures.

Those internal figures show 1,825 police killings in those 105 departments between 2007 and 2012, 47% more than the FBI’s tally for justifiable homicides in those departments’ jurisdictions, which was 1,242, according to the Journal’s analysis. Nearly all police killings are deemed by the departments or other authorities to be justifiable.

The full national scope of the underreporting can’t be quantified. In the period analyzed by the Journal, 753 police entities reported about 2,400 killings by police. The large majority of the nation’s roughly 18,000 law-enforcement agencies didn’t report any."


---I know its hard to read, but if you simply read the OP...----
 
American said:
How do they know there really are hundreds? Something sounds contradictory.
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What do you mean "How do they know there really are hundreds?" Are you not reading the article?

The WSJ found 550 police killings reported on the local level that were not included in the national tally. How is that confusing you?
 
brothern said:
What do you mean "How do they know there really are hundreds?" Are you not reading the article?

The WSJ found 550 police killings reported on the local level that were not included in the national tally. How is that confusing you?
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Has anyone confirm the validity of the data?
 
Ikari said:
And why not do so with roaming bands of armed government goons. I'm sure that was the intent of the Founders. :roll
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His statement stands. A court of law can decide to kill someone too.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Your right. The number should be a lot higher since hundreds go unreported.
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They're all reported locally, and probably at the state level. This is a problem with the FBI and it's data gathering. Remember, the police aren't federal. Mountain meet molehill.
 
American said:
Has anyone confirm the validity of the data?
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This particular issue has been noted many times, by many different news sources.

Hundreds of homicides committed by police reportedly not included in national crime statistics | Fox News
Nobody Knows How Many Americans The Police Kill Each Year | FiveThirtyEight
Another (Much Higher) Count Of Homicides By Police | FiveThirtyEight
How many police shootings a year? No one knows - The Washington Post

Even if we go with the lowest number, police in the US still kill far more people than in other nations:
Why Do US Police Kill So Many People - Business Insider
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/08/armed-police

There is more than enough information for us to recognize that there is, in fact, a problem here.
 
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stonewall50 said:
His statement stands. A court of law can decide to kill someone too.
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And yet that's not what his statement was implying, what is being said is that all those deaths by cops were OK because some people need killing. It was a dismissive statement aimed at the OP.

Last I checked, cops weren't a court of law, yes?
 
Visbek said:
This particular issue has been noted many times, by many different news sources.

Hundreds of homicides committed by police reportedly not included in national crime statistics | Fox News
Nobody Knows How Many Americans The Police Kill Each Year | FiveThirtyEight
Another (Much Higher) Count Of Homicides By Police | FiveThirtyEight
How many police shootings a year? No one knows - The Washington Post

Even if we go with the lowest number, police in the US still kill far more people than in other nations:
Why Do US Police Kill So Many People - Business Insider

There is more than enough information for us to recognize that there is, in fact, a problem here.
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Okay, so where is the OP trying to go with this?
 
brothern said:
From the OP itself:

"It is one of hundreds of homicides by law-enforcement agencies between 2007 and 2012 that aren’t included in records kept by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. A Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest data from 105 of the country’s largest police agencies found more than 550 police killings during those years were missing from the national tally or, in a few dozen cases, not attributed to the agency involved. The result: It is nearly impossible to determine how many people are killed by the police each year."
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What makes any local statistic (criminal or not) into a federal matter? Does a police shooting in NYC have any affect on police policy in TX? If we see a higher rate of gang shootings in Chicago should police procedures in Dallas be changed? Making anything and everything into a federal matter is simply insane. Police shootings generally involve different officers and victims and, as such, each is an entirely separate case not dependent in any way on any other cases in other cities or states.
 
ttwtt78640 said:
What makes any local statistic (criminal or not) into a federal matter? Does a police shooting in NYC have any affect on police policy in TX? If we see a higher rate of gang shootings in Chicago should police procedures in Dallas be changed? Making anything and everything into a federal matter is simply insane. Police shootings generally involve different officers and victims and, as such, each is an entirely separate case not dependent in any way on any other cases in other cities or states.
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The fact that the FBI keeps statistics on this? I didn't know there was an obligation on federal agencies to keep poor statistics, because of the 10th Amendment.

Perhaps you're suggesting that the CDC not keep record of the number of ebola cases in the country, because what does a ebola case in NYC have any affect on health policy in TX?
 
brothern said:
The fact that the FBI keeps statistics on this? I didn't know there was an obligation on federal agencies to keep poor statistics, because of the 10th Amendment.

Perhaps you're suggesting that the CDC not keep record of the number of ebola cases in the country, because what does a ebola case in NYC have any affect on health policy in TX?
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The CDC is federal, police are not. So the FBI data gathering has a bug. It's just data used for politics and showing off. The locals track this in their jurisdictions where the data is used for something useful.
 
Ikari said:
And yet that's not what his statement was implying, what is being said is that all those deaths by cops were OK because some people need killing. It was a dismissive statement aimed at the OP.

Last I checked, cops weren't a court of law, yes?
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His statement implied that some people need killing. Not that all the deaths are ok. Most cop shootings are justified. I would bet less aren't.

And how many of those shootings are reviewed?
 
stonewall50 said:
His statement implied that some people need killing. Not that all the deaths are ok. Most cop shootings are justified. I would bet less aren't.

And how many of those shootings are reviewed?
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Exactly, how many? It's a good question. All incidents of cops killing citizens should be seriously investigated and wrongdoing swiftly punished.

What's our track record on that?
 
stonewall50 said:
His statement implied that some people need killing. Not that all the deaths are ok. Most cop shootings are justified. I would bet less aren't. And how many of those shootings are reviewed?
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Ikari said:
What's our track record on that?
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Yeah, in my home state of Wisconsin, in the 129 years since police and fire commissions were created, there hasn't been a SINGLE ruling by a police department, an inquest or a police commission that a shooting was unjustified. Can you believe that? In the entire history of Wisconsin as a state, never has there ever been a police reviewing committee that has found that a cop acted in a irresponsible or irrational manner when killing another person.

Goes to show how sensible it is to arm high school dropouts with a gun and a badge. Makes for pretty justified cop shootings.
 
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