Police Homicide

This article examines homicide rates of Law Enforcement Officers (LEOs) from 1996 to 2010. Differences in rates of homicides of LEOs across states are best explained not by differences in crime, but by differences in household gun ownership. In high gun states, LEOs are 3 times more likely to be murdered than LEOs working in low-gun states.

This article was cited by President Obama in a speech to a police association. This article will hopefully bring police further into the camp of those pushing for sensible gun laws.

Swedler DI, Simmons MM, Dominici F, Hemenway D. Firearm prevalence and homicides of law enforcement officers in the United States. American Journal of Public Health. 2015; 105:2042-48.

US states with high levels of household gun ownership had higher rates of fatal shootings of civilians by police, even after adjusting for rates of violent crime, poverty, urbanization and racial composition. The relationship between gun levels and police killings was strongest for rates of police shootings of victims who were armed with guns. The rate of fatal police shootings in the high-gun states was 3.6 times greater than in the low-gun states.

This article was cited in the US Supreme Court Bruen decision, No. 20-843, June 2022.

Hemenway D, Azrael D, Conner A, Miller M. Variation in rates of fatal police shootings across US states: the role of firearm availability. Journal of Urban Health. 2019; 96:63-73.

Using data from Washington Post’s “Fatal Force Database” (2015-2017), we showed that there is little difference in rates of police killing of civilians between urban and rural areas. Indeed, among Whites, rates of fatal police shooting deaths were higher in rural than urban areas. Efforts to reduce police shootings should include rural as well as urban police forces.

Hemenway D, Berrigan J, Azrael D, Barber C, Miller M. Fatal police shootings of civilians by rurality. Preventive Medicine. 2020; 134:106046.

With NVDRS data from 2014-2015, we used latent class analysis to create a data-driven, exhaustive, mutually exclusive typology of seven classes. Classes differ across such dimensions as the event that brought the police and civilian together, the highest level of force used by the victim, and the kind of weapon used.

Wertz J, Nelson E, Salhi C, Azrael D, Barber C, Hemenway D, Miller M. A typology of civilians shot and killed by US police: a latent class analysis of firearm legal intervention homicide. Journal of Urban Health. 2020; 97:317-7328.

Using the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS), we read the narratives of over 600 fatal police shootings from 17 states for 2014-2015. In 32% the victims showed signs of a mental health crisis. In three quarters of the cases, the crisis manifested as suicidal ideation, typically expressed verbally to a family member/intimate partner.

Khan H, Miller M, Barber C, Azrael D. Fatal police shootings of victims with mental health crises: a descriptive analysis of data from the 2014-15 National Violent Death Reporting System. Journal of Urban Health. 2024; 101:262-271.

Using data from the Gun Violence Archive, Washington Post, and the Department of Justice, we constructed a cross-sectional state-level dataset 2019-2022. There was a strong across-state positive correlation (r=.66) between rates of police shot by civilians and civilians shot and killed by police. After accounting for differences in violent crime and other variables, the percentage of households with firearms was the consistent common denominator explaining the cross-state differences in rates both of police getting shot, and police shooting and killing civilians.

Jain V, Hemenway D. Cross-state relationship of firearm violence between police and civilians: gun ownership as a common denominator. Journal of Urban Health. 2024. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-024-00904-5.