We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
THE LOCALE AND DAMAGES OF FATAL POLICING.
- Authors
JEFFREY, SCOTT; KIP VISCUSI, W.
- Abstract
George Floyd and Breonna Taylor’s violent deaths sparked global protests condemning police violence. Many agree that reforms to policing are necessary and while some changes have occurred, the structure, culture, and budgeting of policing are largely unchanged. This Article first introduces the term “fatal policing” to denote incidents in which police actions, such as shootings, result in victims’ deaths. This Article next reviews data on fatal policing to corroborate findings that Black people are disproportionate victims of fatal policing, calls for a complete census of fatal policing from independent governmental sources, and analyzes regional differences in fatal policing. This Article then considers financial incentives to deter fatal policing and advocates for three damages-related proposals: raising damages amounts after fatal policing, ending qualified immunity to increase access to these damages, and tying financial penalties more closely to police department budgets. To understand the nature and extent of the problem of fatal policing, it is essential to have a reliable, complete database that tracks the numbers, locations, trends, and circumstances of fatal policing. No governmental database accurately provides this critical information, leaving the task to independent researchers. Such a comprehensive database exists for occupational fatalities, and this Article argues a similar database for fatal policing is possible and necessary. This Article uses the existing independent datasets to corroborate the finding that Black people have been disproportionately shot and killed by police, especially in circumstances where lethal force is the least justified. This Article provides statistical evidence that the incidence of these killings varies greatly among regions, providing a roster of the top ten states by counts and by rates of fatal police shootings, revealing a prevalence of fatal policing in western states, even after controlling for demographic factors and homicide rates. Regional variations suggest that, even though the policing problem is a national problem, it cannot be addressed at the federal level alone. Diverse policing reforms need to be implemented at a local level, and jurisdictions have several reforms available. However, one common roadblock to many of these reforms is the lack of incentives for cities to curtail police behaviors that result in fatal policing. While Black Lives Matter protests have created pressure for politicians, other mechanisms should also be relied upon to induce changes in policing. Specifically, this Article examines financial incentives to deter fatal policing and ensure more generous levels of victim compensation following fatal policing. For victim compensation to create adequate incentives for responsible policing, the amount must be at a meaningful level, the compensation must be obtainable, and the financial penalties must impact police officers or their departments. This Article presents data on jury verdicts and settlements showing that payouts following fatal policing are far smaller than how most federal government agencies monetize mortality risks. This shortfall in damages suggests that increased access to damages by itself is not enough to create appropriate financial incentives to deter fatal policing. This Article calls for courts to align damages awards from fatal policing with the concept of the value of a statistical life (VSL), commonly used by administrative agencies, in situations where punitive damages are warranted. Based on the VSL, the monetized value of fatal police shootings in the United States from 2015 to 2019 is $54 billion. Next, this Article reviews the goals, successes, and failures of qualified immunity and calls for ending qualified immunity to improve victims’ access to damages awards following police violence. Recent scholarship shows that cities, not police departments or police officers, bear the costs of police misconduct. To ensure these financial incentives change police behavior, this Article calls for better aligning police department budgets with misconduct litigation costs. Forcing police departments to assume responsibility for the damages awards resulting from police misconduct creates financial incentives necessary to promote responsible policing. Policing in America needs comprehensive reform. While any effective policing reform should be pursued, the financial incentives proposed in this Article will encourage jurisdictions to adopt further mechanisms to deter fatal policing. As such, more appropriate victim compensation can better communicate to cities and police departments the severity of the harms from policing and the importance of eliminating them.
- Subjects
LAW enforcement; FLOYD, George, ca. 1973-2020; TAYLOR, Breonna, ca. 1993-2020; DAMAGES (Law); POLICE brutality
- Publication
Denver Law Review, 2021, Vol 99, Issue 1, p37
- ISSN
2469-6463
- Publication type
Article