Stop, Frisk, and Assault? Racial Disparities in Police Use of Force During Investigatory Stops

Authors: Rory Kramer, Brianna Remster
Context: Study analyzes racial disparities in police use of force during investigatory stops in New York City between 2007 to 2014.
Key finding: Black civilians are disproportionately stopped by police compared to white civilians and are subject to more police force, especially during stops where criminal activity is uncovered.

Police Stops Data: Used data from over 2 million police stops in New York City from 2007-2014.
Racial Disparities in Stops:
- Black Americans are approximately 2.5 times more likely to be stopped than white Americans, after controlling for factors like neighborhood context and crime rates.
- Increases in stop-and-frisk policies seen particularly from 2003-2009.
- Public concern and unrest regarding police use of force continues to center around racial inequalities.

Accusations of Bias: Racial bias has been implicated in widespread protests regarding police use of force, particularly against Black individuals.
Historical Context:
- Accusations date back to the 1960s riots in cities such as Detroit, Philadelphia, and Chicago.
- Recent cases such as Michael Brown, Freddie Gray, Laquan McDonald, showcase continued racial disparities in police interactions.

Research Hypothesis 1: Black individuals are likely to experience more police force, including lethal force, than white individuals regardless of other factors.
Research Hypothesis 2: Black individuals experience greater police violence when stops result in arrests or seizures of contraband.
Research Hypothesis 3: Racial disparities in police threats are more pronounced for youth than older individuals.
Research Hypothesis 4: Reforms made to NYPD practices reduce observed racial disparities in police violence.

Focus on Police Legitimacy: Research has largely concentrated on the legitimacy of police stops rather than the force used during stops.
Historical Limitations: There have been mixed findings in previous research about racial disparities due to limitations in data collection over the years.
Shift in Focus: Recent studies adapt modern data sources to analyze police encounters and use of lethal force, illustrating racial disparities in police violence: e.g., unarmed Black individuals are 3.5 times more likely to be shot than unarmed whites.

Contextual Factors:
- Racial inequality in police force may be attributed to the concentration of crime and poverty in Black neighborhoods.
- Structural factors alone do not solely explain police behavior; racial threat theory posits greater police violence in racially segregated precincts.
Behavioral Factors:
- Police perceptions of civilian behavior, such as being noncompliant or suspected of violent crime, play significant roles in police decisions to use force.
- Acknowledgment that Black individuals may be perceived as threatening by police based on stereotypes.

Violent Crime Association: Policing outcomes are often erroneously attributed to behavioral differences.
Civilian Behavior: Differences encompass responses to police authority, possibly amplified due to systemic bias.
Discrimination-Based Theories: Racial bias exists on both individual and systemic levels, which affects police violence against Black civilians.

Analysis Strategy: Logistic regression models to evaluate police force's racial disparities, adjusting for key contextual and behavioral variables.
Data Sources: NYPD stop data involving UF-250 forms, including the racial composition of precincts, demographic data from the 2010 census, and community context variables.

Racial Disparity in Use of Force:
- Black civilians are 27% more likely to experience force than white civilians.
- Odds for officers drawing guns on Black civilians are also elevated by 28%.
- Youthful demographics are correlated with increased likelihoods of police violence against Black youth, indicating compounded disparities.
Impact of Stop Outcomes:
- Higher odds of police violence for stops concluding with arrests or when weapons/contraband are discovered.
- Conversely, once criminal activity is discovered, Black civilians are subject to significantly more lethal force as opposed to their white counterparts.

NYPD Reforms Post-2013:
- Reduction in stop-and-frisk practices resulted in a lower number of overall police stops while adjusting training on non-confrontational techniques to mitigate violence.
- Despite reforms, substantial racial disparities in police violence persist; however, the likelihood of lethal force has decreased post-reform given a notable drop in stops.

Lasting Impact: The long-standing relationship between race and police interactions indicates pervasive inequities within the policing system.
Significant Findings: Counterfactual analysis estimated that approximately 61,207 fewer instances of police force would have occurred if Black civilians were treated the same as their white counterparts based on the analyzed data, suggesting transformative impacts of reforms alongside the need for continued evaluations of policing practices.

(Full reference list included in the original transcript)