George Rebane
[This is the transcript of my regular KVMR commentary broadcast on 7 January 2015.]
The recent police killings of two black men, and the revenge murders of two NYC police officers highlight legitimate fears that have now been brought to a fever pitch by grandstanding politicians and activist demagogues. In New York Mayor De Blasio ran on the alleged evils and racial bias of the city’s police department. Never mind that the data from policies like ‘broken windows’ and ‘stop & frisk’ did not support any of the popular contentions he used to stir up the city’s black population.
After the Staten Island death of Eric Garner his honor excoriated his police to the extent of inviting demonstrations in which police were physically attacked to shouts of ‘What do we want? Dead cops!’ This invitation reinforced the image of police targeting black men and ultimately resulted in the assassinations of officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu by Ismaaiyl Brinsley after posting “They Take 1 Of Ours…… Let’s Take 2 of Theirs, #ShootThePolice.” The result is a standown of policing in the city with ongoing public shows of disrespect by the police to their mayor. (more here)
When we step back and take a cooler and more reasoned look at the numbers that record what has actually happened in fatal encounters between police and civilians, two different pictures emerge. Each picture is used to support arguments of why blacks fear the police, and why the police fear blacks. And make no mistake, reasonable or unreasonable, the fear is real on both sides.
Kent Osband, who has studied the statistics of police and civilians killing each other, concludes that “while these inferences are not fair to the vast majority on either side, they are rational responses to fear and uncertainty.” And this is especially so when each only considers their own perspective. Using data from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Statistics database, Osband goes through a numerical analysis that would roll the eyeballs of radio listeners, so let me summarize the key findings.
Police are six times as likely to be killed by a black civilian as a black civilian is likely to be killed by police. In contrast, police are 22 times as likely to be killed by a non-black civilian as a non-black civilian is likely to be killed by police. This information lets blacks argue that police react far more defensively to blacks with a 1 to 6 homicide ratio than to non-blacks with a 1 to 22 homicide ratio. That’s a pretty strong conclusion if we stop there.
However, police view the situation completely differently. While blacks make up only 1 of 7 Americans, they account for almost half the annual police deaths. When you consider these numbers in the analysis, it turns out that blacks are over 5.5 times as likely to kill a police officer as are non-blacks. And police across the country know this statistic, which naturally explains why police act more defensively against unknown blacks than they do toward unknown non-blacks.
In other words when black population proportions, crime rates, and relative police and civilian body counts are included, then the reasons for the two sides fearing each other become very apparent. “And as such, neither legislation nor indoctrination can banish” these fears. (more here)
Ultimately, we all know that there are deeper reasons for the historical black vs police animosities that involve cultural differences, government policies, and economic factors. But to make progress in resolving the current problems – real and perceived – Osband counsels that “each side needs to appreciate the other’s fears. Each side needs to offer the other the respect and consideration it rightly demands for itself.” Today self-aggrandizing politicians and activists are not helping when they stoke emotions in the service of their larger agendas.
My name is Rebane, and I also expand on this and related themes on georgerebane.com where the transcript of this commentary is posted with relevant links, and where such issues are debated extensively. However my views are not necessarily shared by KVMR. Thank you for listening.
[Addendum] Upon further noodling with the data presented by Osband, it turns out that his argument from the black perspective is neither as clear nor as strong as it could be. His concern from the police perspective is correct. The police are interested in the likelihood (ratio of probabilities) that they will be killed when confronting a black vs being killed when confronting a non-black. The ratio of those probabilities with the presented data turns out to be 5.46, or close enough to the stated 5.5. In other words, a police officer knows from national statistics (and perhaps other knowledge/experience) that he is 5.5 times more likely to be killed by a confronted black than by a confronted non-black.
From the black perspective, to make the case that police are more likely to shoot a black than a non-black, the important ratio is the probability of being shot by the police given that I am black vs the same probability given that I am a non-black. It turns out that this ratio comes to 3.13, meaning that a black person sees himself as being more than three times as likely to be shot than a non-black when in a police confrontation. On the face of it – i.e. ignoring crime rates, fractions being in the judicial system, etc – this definitely brings up strong feelings about police being racially prejudiced.
However, as mentioned above, to bring these ratios closer to par requires much more than the current DoJ investigations and passage of new federal laws on policing. The causes for the real fears by both sides are buried in cultural and economic issues that are not being recognized, let alone addressed, by today’s political posturings.
rebanesruminations.com 
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