More on Police Shootings and Race
In my last post, I linked to a post by Peter Moskos noting that:
People, all people, are 1.6 times more likely, per capita, to be shot and killed by police in states that are less than 10 percent black compared to states more than 10 percent African American. Blacks are still more likely than whites, per capita to be shot overall. But this ratio (2.6:1) doesn’t change significantly based on how black a state is.
For both whites and blacks, the likelihood of being shot by police is greater in states with fewer blacks. And the difference is rather large. There are seven states less than two percent black. In 2015 and 2016, zero blacks were shot and killed in Maine, New Hampshire, Utah, Vermont, Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana. But if you think cops don’t shoot people in these states, you’re wrong. Compared to the four states with the highest percentage of African-American (Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, and Maryland are more than 30 percent black), the overall rate of police-involved killings in states with few blacks is higher. And this is despite a lower rate of overall violence.
It seems an odd result, so I have given it a bit of thought. I think I know what is happening and will try to provide a bit of an explanation over a few posts. I will start by noting that this is what the homicide rate looks like by state when put against the rate of killings by police:
(Click to embiggen. Note that data sources are shown on the chart.)
I’ve added labels to some of the points, but of course, there are only so many labels that can be added before the plot looks like a mess. Now… Moskos noted his finding applied to when one differentiated between states with populations > 10% Black v. states with populations < 10% Black. If you look at the graph above, and color states that have a population that is > 10% orange, unless I screwed something up, you get this:
(More click to embiggen & data sources are shown on the chart yadda yadda.)
One comment…. for the Black population as a percentage of the state population I used the Census’ “Race Alone or in Combination – Black or African American” and included both genders, but not those with Hispanic ethnicity. (This was to be compatible with the Washington Post data on killings by police officers.) I then divided by the total state population. Playing around with the data, because the various race classifications were for “alone or in combination” it was possible for the total of all the races to sum to more than 100% of the Census’ figures for the state population.
Anyway, a quick and dirty interpretation: in general, the higher homicide rate in a state, the more likely a person is to get shot by the cops. But, (again in general) for the same state homicide rate, people are less likely to be shot by cops in states where Black people make up 10% or more of the population than in states where people make less than 10% of the population.
Just to jump the gun, so to speak, the odd relationship between homicides and killings by police noted above does not seem to be driven by income:
(As before, click to embiggen & data sources are shown on the chart.)
Anyway, I’ve collected more data, and there’s still stuff I’m trying to find, but I should have more graphs over the next few whiles or so. Hopefully some positive recommendations about how to reduce homicide rates and killings by police will come out this exercise. The homicide rate in some places is terribly high, and many, many people suffer horribly as a result. Findings ways to reduce the carnage is something that should mater to all of us. Unfortunately, what the data appears to show is not what a very large segment (probably a majority) of the population seems to believe, which will only make it that much harder to come to a solution that can actually work.
As always, if you want my spreadsheet, drop me a line. Based on past experience, I reserve the right to lose my spreadsheet, have a computer crash, have my laptop stolen, die, etc., if the request comes too long after the publication of this post. I can be reached at my first name (mike) dot my last name (there’s only one m in my last name!!!) at gmail with a dot com. Its always possible I’ve made a mistake somewhere, so if I did, please let me know.
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Update, 7/24/2017 @ 5:47 PM PST
In comments, some readers indicated that the results could be misleading due to the comparison between states with very different population structures. I have redone the second figure, this time leaving out states with population < 3 million.
As should have been fairly obvious from staring at the second figure in the post, excluding small states doesn’t affect the story line in any way.
Mr. Kimel,
I see by your chart separating States with less than 10% Blacks from those with greater than 10% Blacks the data becomes clearer in quantitative terms.
I invert your axis to find the sensitivity of Homicides/Police Killings as follows (approximating slopes by eyeball):
States with more than 10% Blacks = 0.038 Homicides/Police Killing
States with less than 10% Blacks = 0.14 Homicides/Police Killings
Resulting in the relationship:
States with more than 10% Blacks have 27.1% the number of Police Killings / Homicide relative to States with less than 10% Blacks.
The first thing that occurs to me is that this relationship might be correlated with (related to) Police per Capita such that the States with more than 10% Blacks have a greater Police per Capita.
In other words the relation may be positively correlated to Police per Capita. If this were the case it would suggest that States with more Blacks also have more cops / capita and the converse. That might stand to reason if States with a greater proportion of Blacks fund more police than states with a lower proportion of Blacks. I note that this would be consistent with history recalling that the dominant reason for the Constitution’s militia clause was driven only by the Southern slave states which had to have a state police force (militia) to maintain control of what they were always deathly afraid of…. slave revolts which could only be put down successfully by a fast and large policing presence.
On the other hand if the relationship is inversely correlated, then it might suggest States with a lower proportion of Blacks have more police per capita… and States with a greater proportion of Blacks have fewer police per capita. This might be the case for example if funding for police forces were greater when the proportion of Blacks is lower, which might have to do with local county income and tax revenues for local and county communities.
I spent a week in New Orleans about 4 years ago and noted the high visibility of police day and night in cruisers, on the walking beat, and on horseback. The population was overwhelming Black in the regions I visited (day or night). It sure kept the crowds and bars from getting too roudy though… as soon as it looked like a fight might break out, there were 4 cops there in less than 3 – 4 minutes (like they came out of the woodwork) so there were more cops or plain-clothes cops that weren’t visible or nearly so.
The only other places I’ve seen that type of police presence is in Singapore and in Shenzhen China when it was just beginning to be a trading center in the new Economic Zone. Oh, and I’ve spent considerable time in Manhattan and SF… they don’t compare with New Orleans.
And no, my week in New Orleans wasn’t around Mardi-Gras time.
Longtooth,
If some (primarily Southern?) states are motivated by a mentality of keeping Black people down, and they have more cops per capita than states that aren’t motivated by a mentality of keeping Black people down, then those states would have more police killings per capita for the same number of homicides, not less.
My theory as to what is going on takes into account what you see with, say, RI, NM and WY. Not incidentally, I think WY’s position in 2015 is very different from where it would be in 2016. I think areas where a lot of Black people live can tend to crime concentrated. For instance, one reads that poor Black people tend to be more urban than poor White people. So the cops in New Orleans have a fair amount of regular exposure to violence and can be trained to deal with it. But violence in WY is a more dispersed affair. A typical cop in WY might come across very, very few shootings in his/her entire career. They won’t be as well trained to deal with someone who just shot his girlfriend and is now wandering down the street with a gun in hand. And from lack of exposure to such an event, they will have a harder maintaining their cool when actually facing one.
I have an idea as to how to prove that, but I haven’t managed to find all the data I need. I am actually surprised by the information that isn’t easily available. Also, I note that Moskos has his own theory which he calls the Al Sharpton effect. I suspect it does explain events to some degree. Follow the link in the post and check the comments to see Moskos’ explanation.
As to your second post… maintaining a large, visible police presence is typically very expensive, which means its not something done lightly. There have only been a few instances in my life where I’ve seen large number of police, and where significant numbers of the police were toting automatic rifles. Once was in Rio in 2001 when the city was undergoing one of its periodic “pacifications” and the other was in Buenos Aires (sorry – do not remember the year) when there seemed to be heavily armed police more or less stationed within a hundred feet of every bank. I’ve also once found myself pushed aside while driving in Juarez, MX by a heavily armed rapidly moving multi-vehicle police convoy the likes of which I wouldn’t expect to see outside of a warzone. I think that was about 2006. The common thread with all of those instances is that each of those cities, at that time, had a degree of violent lawlessness about them.
I don’t see the reason for excluding Hispanic statistics in this area.
I think training is the key phrase here.
Places with “lots of” black people are more likely to be urban, urban areas are likely to have large police forces, and those forces are more likely to be “professionalized.” By professionalized I mean there is the type of turnover and training that you would associate with any other large entity. I mean this in a similar way to the way it is used for military forces, but I don’t necessarily mean militarized. A lot of this training has recently shifted towards reduction of force, conflict de-escalation, methods of dealing with the mentally ill, etc.
Rural areas are often policed by people who are not local (county sheriffs or state police), and they may have different levels of training and training focus.
Over time you would expect this type of training to spread across the entire country.
I wish there was a way to slice this data by state/county/urbanization police then look at single urban areas and see what happens.
While the original author was zeroed in on racial composition of different states, he seems to have missed the obvious observation that 7 out of 9 of the the states with the highest rates of police killings are western states (including OK?). Racial composition is not an independent variable: the settlement patterns in the western states are what lead to their low African American populations. That same history gave these states their own, unique, cultural patterns as compared to the former slave holding states or the urban destinations of the great migration. This greatly weakens his analysis.
The confounding variables in social science are so thorny that a simple correlation analysis like that of Mr. Moskos only impedes policy making by presenting a false veneer of scientificalness that it does not deserve. I am not calling for a discussion that bans numerical evidence but the pendulum has swung so far toward Data, Big or otherwise, that “reality” is often obscured.
What I would like to see(other than this never ending story of Blame The Victim), is the amount of these shootings where the deceased had a weapon or not.
As someone who has had interactions with police in heavily urbanized and in fairly remote rural contexts, I can tell you that a single deputy sheriff out in the middle of nowhere at night investigating a report of gunfire has a lot more reasons to be nervous than a couple of cops stopping a car in the city in daylight for a minor or non existent traffic violation. I am white so I have little to worry about with the traffic stop, but I sure went out of my way not to startle the deputy sheriff and keep my hands in completely plain view in the country at night. I do not think it is a training thing at all–most city cops are not all that well trained either–but a function of not having any backup and the near certainty in parts of the country that whoever you are interacting with is armed, probably with more firepower than you.
Mr. Kimel,
Your assertion:
“If some (primarily Southern?) states are motivated by a mentality of keeping Black people down, and they have more cops per capita than states that aren’t motivated by a mentality of keeping Black people down, then those states would have more police killings per capita for the same number of homicides, not less.”
is wholly without any merit what-so-ever. You’ve abandoned any semblance of objective analysis.
@Terry
Agreed. Comparing New Mexico to California, which contains four cities each with more people than the former state, and then claiming that race is the factor we should be examining is a bit silly.
If Moskos or Kimel were looking at cities with different racial makeups but controlled for the myriad inputs that cloud the result, then we could talk. Of course, we would run out of cities before we could build a proper sample size…
Fourth figure added. This one accounts for the Black pop as a % of the state total, and also leaves out states with less than 3 million people.
As to controlling for the myriad inputs…. not every post should require putting data through R. This is merely the exploratory stages and I am still collecting data. I am sure you won’t like the results at the point where I do pump the data through R.
Looking at cities would be nice, but I cannot get the data on homicides at that level. I also for some reason cannot find homicide by race by state, which one would think would be a no-brainer for the FBI to collect. Similarly, the Washington Post must have purposely left out “race of the cop who did the shooting” because that too seems like an obvious thing to collect with the rest of the data they are pulling. So… I can work with what is available.
Or you can just stop with this charade and tell us what you really think is wrong.
Nah, charts and stats cover up all kinds of sh!T.
Though I think you have the wrong forum for it. At least I hope so.
Mr. Kimel,
Perhaps you should look at homicides in the light to methods and means used in the US relative to the EU-28 since the difference in murder rates is stark. This is probably, almost an absolute certainty also related directly to Police Killings rates in the US.
On a per capita basis, the US’s murder rate is 5.4x that of the EU-28’s.
I’m sure this has been pointed out in almost every comparative crime statistic for years and years, yet for some reason we keep trying to figure out why the rate is so high in the US, or why it differs from state to state or city to city or [pick any differentiator].
If you start with the basics first you can probably figure out most of the reasons for the difference between the US and EU-28. It’s pretty simple stuff actually…. I’d even say rudimentary.
If you’re really seriously trying to understand you should contact your local or a major university sociology department of school of sociology.. not a criminal justice dept. There are countless academic well documented and well founded objective studies on the subject of the US’s murder rates, incarceration rates, violent and non-violent crimes and the relationships between them.
EU-28
Population 2015 = 508.2 million
Murders 2015 = 4,528
Murders/million population = 8.9, round up to 9.0
U.S.
Murders 2015 = 15,596
Population 2015 = 321.42 million
Murders/million population = 48.5
Ratio: US / EU-28 = 48.5 / 9.0 = 5.39x = 5.4x
If you draw a line on your charts orthogonal to the y-axis (homicide rates) at the mean US rate (50 per million) and then sort the data I’m sure you’ll find a substantial difference by geographic region which might start to give you a clue.
But I fully recommend you start by educating yourself with the sociological studies by non-criminal justice groups … maybe you should have been a sociology major instead of econ.
Sources:
US: https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2015/crime-in-the-u.s.-2015/tables/table-1
EU-28:
Population data: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/6903510/3-10072015-AP-EN.pdf/d2bfb01f-6ac5-4775-8a7e-7b104c1146d0
Murders: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Crime_and_criminal_justice_statistics, Source data for Tables and figures (MS Excel), Crime and criminal justice : Tables
hint:
If you want to understand crime you don’t ask the enforcers for answers.
Longtooth,
When I said I was searching for data perhaps I wasn’t clear.the data you mention is info with which I am familiar.
I would suggest you should look at FBI stats more closely. I don’t have the time to do it for you now but I suggest you look at this piece to see where the disparities are:
https://www.google.com/amp/www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/black-americans-12-times-more-likely-murdered-developed-country-dallas-shooting-statistics-a7127596.html%3Famp.
Yeah, let’s look at data that does not concern “More on Police Shootings and Race” cause it makes black people look bad.
Damn, this is despicable.
If any of AB’s readers are really interested in the subject, I suggest the sociological academic studies that have been and continue to pursue the issues… these aren’t “justice depts type studies”..
This one is particularly good
http://www.columbia.edu/~rs328/Homicide.pdf
And here’s another academic sociological study that sheds more light on the subject than Mr. Kimel can come up with if he spent the rest of his life pursuing the topic.
http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~japhill/sp802.pdf
You have to google a bit to find the credible academic sociological studies as opposed to those written from racist or law enforcement points of view at various universities.
The studies all point to solution paths, but unfortunately those paths aren’t pursued for two reasons: They cost money, and about half the white population is opposed since they continue to think “its their own fault”. We’d rather spend our tax dollars on a massive defense budget instead.
EMichael,
My lifetime consumption of alcohol – to include Nyquil – fits in a two liter bottle with plenty of room to spare. But I do know that the first step is o accept that there is a problem.
The discrepancy between Black homicide rates (bear in mind – the measure being discussed is victimization) and those of other groups has existed for a very long time. My understanding is that it exists in other parts of the globe, including places that have never subjugated Black people. And African countries, including those that have not been colonized (see Ethiopia for example) tend to have very elevated murder rates. So whatever is going on likely isn’t caused by 2017 American culture, whether gun culture or racism culture.
Now, if you care at all about reducing the number of Black homicde victims and wish to see those numbers reduced, you should want to understand the problem. On the other hand, if nobody does try to figure out what is happening, the odds of the problem successfully solving itself are not high. Me, I’d like to see fewer people becoming homicide victims, be they of whatever color. As the old saw goes, lead, follow or get the hell out of the way.
Yeah, let’s change the subject and then blame people for telling you the subject is being changed. Not to mention the second subject has already been addressed, cause genes
EMichael,
Actually, no. A while ago I wrote my first post on homicides and police shootings. I showed the two are related. And it should be obvious from the graphs in this post – at the state level, all else being equal, more homicides correlate with more police killings. So if you want to reduce police killings, one place to start is to with homicides. But besides that, homicides are a much bigger problem. I assume you aren’t completely innumerate, so I’ll suggest you might have a look at the scale of the axes on the graphs above.
I’m done.
You simply do not care that you have changed the entire thread from police actions int the US to black homicides in the entire world.
I don’t know why you feel you have to beat around the bush, when everyone can plainly see you are in the bush.
EMichael,
There is a difference between pointing out the parameter of the problem and changing the subject.
If you go to a doctor with symptoms of diabetes and ther doctor suggests, among other things, diet and exercise, it isn’t because he/she is changing the topic from the pain you are suffering to some other irrelevant issues.
geez
Yeah, the end result is death, I got it. Still have a problem figuring out the connection(other than death) between a police shooting in St. Louis and a homicide in Ethiopia, but that’s just me.
Emichael,
It’s evident of course and has been since Mr. Kimel’s first post on black on black v white on white killings (a year ago?) and in every one of his posts since then that he isn’t interested in providing understanding to AB’s readers or in understanding himself.
As best I can figure he rejects all sociological academic research (except selective stuff with law enforcement based thinking) for reasons I can only conjecture aren’t in alignment with his a-prior beliefs. This beliefs appear to me to align with a race based understanding of his world-view and value system…. though he uses “culture” as his cover term.
There are huge amounts of academic research on the topic and that research has been widely published and widely available. He ignores it for a reason… i.e. his agenda.
Emicheal,
A clear example:
Every academic research on the subject has shown that there’s no difference between Black v White victimization or crime rates in rural regions but only in high density environments. Mr Kimel ignores this well documented fact.
Another example:
Every academic research shows that racial segregation increases Black crime rates in the U.S. and shows the underlying socio/economic foundations for this phenomena Mr. Kimel ignores this.
Another less obvious example:
Some counties and cities in the US publish their police killings on an annual basis … broken down by race of person killed, whether armed and if so with what weapon type (knife, gun, bottle, etc.) or not armed, and other factors. This information is available but requires detailed searches of law enforcement jurisdiction (local city or county) and whether by Sheriffs dept or Police dept or combined forces.
Mr. Kimel has made no apparent effort to pursue the data which is available with concerted time and effort required to obtain it.
Finally, I have been fortunate enough to have lived next to or across the street from cops and know others pretty well by pure chance over time, Some are out and out racists (even in liberal SF Bay area), are macho types who suppress their wives (interesting factoid on a vey limited sample I admit) , and love their stories about how they shot or tried to shoot some low life bastard who just happened to be Hispanic or Black on the “other side of town”.. On the other hand some are straight up racially unbiased, not the macho control freak types and have never had to draw their weapon working the same beats and part of town as the macho types. This isn’t by pure chance.
Police forces all know this and some don’t mind while others go to huge efforts to eliminate attitudinal problems even in training.
I know well, very well, and since he was a kid, including his family with whom our family celebrated Xmas Eve’s together, skied together, partied together… a now head of a Florida jurisdiction Swat type team … they’re not called “Swat” but they are the teams used in Florida for extreme criminal activities … drug trade, homeland security, ports, etc. and in every case where a person is holed up with hostages.
According to this guy, during training, if there’s even one indication that the trainee may be “macho” or racist, or attitudinally “superior” they are summarily dismissed from training. The lengths the trainers go to find out and flush out these types from their trainee’s is extreme…. putting them in “impossible” situation exercises, putting them under extreme physical and mental stress, listening to anything they say in close quarters; He says only 4 in 20 trainees get past 1st base and only 1 in 20 get past second base, and this is AFTER they’ve been given the psychological profile tests and screening.
This guy’s unit (100 members) has been in operation under his direction for 5 years … and they’ve had 2 killings in that time…. he says there’s almost always a way to avoid killing a suspect if you don’t want to kill people.
Granted this is an elite unit… charged with the most difficult types of law enforcement in the most extreme circumstances…. but it’s telling that this level of screening and training seem to be working. And yes its economically expensive… but that’s where the issues always is.
Oh did I mention that the head of this unit was born and bred in CA and didn’t have a racist bone in his body? And he says most Floridian native males are racists even though they “act” like they’re not (one of the major reasons so few trainee’s make the cut during training)
Longtooth,
Yeah, um, no. I’m going to continue to recommend data over what you term “all sociological academic research.” And here’s why:
First off, this doesn’t pass the smell test. But it also doesn’t fit data that is available to all. For example, about a decade ago, the Bureau of Justice Statistics put together info on Black victimization rates. Appendix Table 3 contains actual figures for urban, suburban, and rural for Black and White victimization rates per 1000 people.
Region – Black victimization rate – White victimization rate – difference
Urban: 17.4. v. 10.8 = 61% difference
Suburban: 11.2 v. 6.2 = 81% difference
Rural: 6.7 / 5.7 = 18% difference
So the facts say one thing, and “[e]very academic research on the subject.” I’ll stick with the facts, thank you.
I note that the difference did shrink in rural areas. The reason is fairly obvious but explaining it at this point would just get EMichael exercised again and its going to come up in a later post anyway.
The idea that you are going to post another diatribe is beyond depressing.
Couldn’t you get a gig in the WH?
I mean, you certainly have the first quality they are looking for.
Mr. Kimel
Before you spout off that sociological academic research data “doesn’t pass the smell test” you should read the information and the sources of data they use first.
In essence, I gather you don’t trust sociological academics from highly regarded universities or their research into sociology. Hmmm Maybe you feel the same about academic science research as well, huh?
Interesting.
Here’s the reason why there’s no national or even state-wide data on police killings, btw.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/mar/18/police-killings-government-data-count
The bottom line is that it’s not required by any law and because States are not federal law enforcement agents, no federal law even applies ot their policing activities.
The best national gov’t comprehensive police killings data actually comes from the CDE from “cause of death” reports by medical examiners, but even that doesn’t capture it all.
One comment.
The idea that I would be on a blog where Kimel commented would be repulsive.
But I will not access a blog where he is a poster.
I have had enough.
Here’s the reason why there’s no national or even state-wide data on police killings, btw.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/mar/18/police-killings-government-data-count
The bottom line is that it’s not required by any law and because States are not federal law enforcement agents, no federal law even applies ot their policing activities.
The best national gov’t comprehensive police killings data actually comes from the CDE from “cause of death” reports by medical examiners, but even that doesn’t capture it all.
Moskos data ( cited by Mr. Kimel) is from the Washngton Post Data base which only cites police killings by firearms. A more comprehensive data based is by the Guardian which cites all police killsings.
The Guardian Data Base is here:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2015/jun/01/the-counted-police-killings-us-database
Unfortunately both WP’s and the Guardian’s are pay walled and both begin only with 2015 data
But the Guardian’s is highly detailed:
A Florida Newspaper provided much of the detail for Florida Police killings from the Guardian Data Base:
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/a-breakdown-of-the-71-people-killed-by-police-in-florida-in-2015-8159418
For example 24% of killings were of unarmed persons, 17% armed with “other” and 8% with a knife. Other includes stick, pipe, razor blade, car, crowbar, etc.
Interestingly for two of the largest counties, in Florida, the proportion of the total Florida Population who were Blacks killed by Police were
Miami-Dade 4.2 / million population (all residents, not by race)
Duval (Jacksonville) 7.6
By race, 45% were Black (10.4 / million by ethnicity), 44% non-Hispanic White (2.7 / million), and 10% were Hispanic (1.5 / million).
In Moskos Florida data (cited and shown by Mr. Kimel) the State wide Police Kill rate for Florida is just 2.9 / million total population or ~ 1/2 to 2/3’s the metro area kill rates.
The ethnic kill rates Moskos cited for Florida was 2.3 for non-Whites and 6.6 for Blacks. Compare this to the metro Florida rates of 2.5 for non-Blacks and 10.4 for Blacks. The Florida State wide Moskos ratio is 2.9: 1 but the metro Florida data is 4.2:1… so there’s clearly a rural/metro difference that the State-wide data doesn’t recognize (as is well known and recognized by academic sociologists)
There’s far more detail shown in the newspaper article…. this is just an example of some of the detail in the Guardian’s data base.
Just BTW the Florida metro cities data shows that the kill rate by police is greater the greater the proportion of the black population
Miami-Dade, Miami, Miami Beach
– Population = 2,712,945 (total)
– Police Killings / million population = 4.42
– Black (non-Hispanic) Proportion = 17.1% (2010 census)
Jacksonville (Duval County)
– Population = 926,255 (total)
– Police Killings / million population = 7.56.
– Black (non-Hispanic) Proportion: = 28.9% (2010 census)
Interestingly the overall kill rate is ~ 1/4 the proportion of Blacks in both counties…
– Miami-Dade = 25.7 (= 4.42 kill rate / 17.1% Black Proportion)
– Duval = 26.1 (= 7.56 / 28.9%)
That’s no significant difference…and the relation is positively correlated rather than negatively correlated as shown by the states break-downs in Moskos data.:
In Moskos (Mr. Kimel’s) data the States with less than 10% Black Proportion have ratio 69.8% (= 3.91 kill rate / 5.66% Black Proportion)
States with greater than 10% Black Proportion have ratio 13.6% (=2.46 kill rate / 18.1% Black Proportion)
Why do I find this relevant? Mr. Kimel is using data on states with different ratio’s of Blacks in the population but not accounting for density .. metro / rural … when the data detail is highly differentiated by population densities, not to mention segregation in densely populated regions. His data shows the converse relation of police kill rates to proportion Black Population than metro area’s show… and yet it is the metro area’s that account for most police killings.
Mr. Kimel’s data is a) selective, b) misleading, and c) as amateurish as it can get.