Juli’s Research Process

In January 2019 the FBI launched the National Use-of-Force Database. This is a pretty useless system about to be abandoned because the contribution of data from local departments is voluntary, not mandated and thus incomplete. For this year’s calendar, I have used two web-based data banks. The Washington Post Fatal Force website registers officer-involved shooting homicides, but not homicides caused by strangulation, asphyxiation or death by police vehicles. Nor does Fatal Force register killings by off-duty officers. The site mappingpoliceviolence.org is very comprehensive in that it includes killings by off-duty officers and fatal car accidents that occur in police chases. In the calendar, I do not include fatalities that occurred when a fleeing driver made a driving error and crashed UNLESS the crash was caused by what police call a PIT maneuver. The innocuous-sounding acronym stands for “pursuit intervention technique” and means that the pursuing car purposely and strategically bumps the fleeing car in a way designed to make it spin out. There are many people on this calendar who were killed via police PIT maneuvers.

Even with two reliable websites, longer research processes are required. Websites rely on early reported data, dominated by police narratives. Accounts often change once an investigation is done, bystander or security camera video emerges, or witnesses come forward. (Videotape of Ronald Greene’s May 2019 murder was concealed for two years, and it took 4 years for 5 officers to be indicted and their trials to begin.) Initial homicide accounts may not have victims’ names, may lack race data, and rarely include the victim’s mental health history. These gaps necessitate the task of media research to get clarity on the facts of each case. Causes of death in cases not effected by shooting may be revealed by autopsy weeks later. I find many errors, rarely in favor of the victim, just repetitions of the same tired police narratives. Deaths in custody are even less well documented than those in the community. I rely on sources like Push Black, The Root, The Griot and Color of Change to learn about these cases. Most helpful to my research process are all the local Black Lives Matter chapters, similar organizations and bereaved families whose demonstrations and statements prompt news coverage that enables my efforts to find follow-up information. Thank you #BLM everywhere.

Again this year I saw many incidents termed “suicide-by-cop.” It is a national shame that this is such a reliable way to commit suicide. Around 75 of the individuals whose deaths are marked here had acknowledged mental health problems. Many sought treatment on the day of or the day before their deaths. I note an increase in incidents in which people accessing mental health care are turned away, or kept for only a brief time before being released still in crisis, and then killed by police. We need more crisis mental health workers available at all times and we need better systems for accessing their expertise. These professionals also risk their lives and should be paid as well as police. So often distressed individuals in crisis are killed in front of their families who are pleading with police for crisis intervention not execution. We could argue about the public relations confusion caused by the slogan “Defund The Police,” but know that this movement asks for parts of police budgets to be re-directed into psychiatric emergency services. This is SO needed.

Finally, know that mandatory minimums and “three strikes you’re out” endanger law enforcers. I read many cases where someone determined not to go, or go back, to prison initiates a shooting.