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Abstract
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The hazards of policing represent a significant public safety and public health concern. Yet policing and public health have mainly been observed as separate perspectives by policy makers, researchers, and the medical profession (Shepherd & Sumner, 2017). The dangers of policing work are well documented with a decades‐long record of scholarly research dedicated to the topic (see, e.g., Barrick, Strom, & Richardson, 2018; Bierie, 2017; Duhart, 2001; Fridell, Faggiani, Taylor, Brito, & Kubu, 2009; Kaminski, 2002; Kent, 2010; Lester, 1981; Meyer, Magedanz, Dahlin, & Chapman, 1981). Today, however, American policing is at a crossroads. On the one side, policing leaders and policy makers are faced with growing concerns about use of force and policing legitimacy and trust, whereas on the other side, many in the policing field feel under attack, both figuratively and literally.
Many leaders have recognized the need to seek out and implement reform in the policing field to address unnecessary police use of force and racial discrimination. The final report from the President's Task Force on 21st Century Policing (2015) comprises a framework for steps that should be taken to promote positive change in American policing. Others have claimed, however, that negative reactions to law enforcement have resulted in a "de‐escalation" among officers, including in a retraction from more proactive policing activities that could be scrutinized or put the officers into unsafe situations (Mac Donald, 2015). This phenomenon has been titled the "Ferguson Effect," but it continues to prove difficult to define and operationalize within an applied policing setting.
We have long known about the potential consequences of an occupation that puts officers in highly unpredictable situations where even seemingly ordinary encounters can turn violent. There is also the reality of brazen, ambush‐style murders of law enforcement officers as demonstrated in high‐profile shootings in places such as Dallas and Baton Rouge over the last several years. These types of events have led some to suggest that there is a "war on cops" and that the rhetoric of some social‐justice-oriented organizations (e.g., Black Lives Matter) are responsible for a perceived uptick in violence directed toward law enforcement. In fact, the group "Blue Lives Matter" was a counter‐group formed in response to Black Lives Matter in order to spread awareness of a perceived increase in the dangers of policing. Although policing is inherently a dangerous profession, little is known about how these hazards have changed over time and more specifically, how the prevalence and characteristics of officer line‐of‐duty deaths, both felonious and nonfelonious, have shifted during the last 50 years...
Language: en |