Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
A hard number to build solid common ground on race and deadly force
http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/mariel-garza/article8833760.htmlIn the months since a police officer killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., a lot of time and energy has been spent pondering the uncomfortable question of whether police officers are too quick to kill people of color.
The lack of data either way means much of the debate has relied on anecdotes, over-generalization and stereotypes. But in California at least, there are good, hard numbers from which to draw conclusions – and it doesn’t look good for those who doubt that race is a factor in the use of deadly force.
While African Americans make up only 6.6 percent of the Golden State’s population, they constitute 20.8 percent – or 222 – of the 1,068 people killed while in the process of being arrested from 2004 to early 2014....
The figure is probably not shocking to many people, least of all African Americans. We already know that African American men are much more likely to be incarcerated than men of other races, and represent nearly 30 percent of the state’s prison population.
The lack of data either way means much of the debate has relied on anecdotes, over-generalization and stereotypes. But in California at least, there are good, hard numbers from which to draw conclusions – and it doesn’t look good for those who doubt that race is a factor in the use of deadly force.
While African Americans make up only 6.6 percent of the Golden State’s population, they constitute 20.8 percent – or 222 – of the 1,068 people killed while in the process of being arrested from 2004 to early 2014....
The figure is probably not shocking to many people, least of all African Americans. We already know that African American men are much more likely to be incarcerated than men of other races, and represent nearly 30 percent of the state’s prison population.
