When Force is Hardest to Justify, Victims of Police Violence are Most Likely to Be Black

After the grand juries in both Ferguson and New York City chose not to indict police officers for actions leading to the deaths of African-American civilians, I’ve seen the same few questions pop up again and again in conversations and blogs and comments:

• How do we know this is about police racism across America, and not just about the particular people involved?
• Okay, maybe blacks are more likely to be recipients of police violence, but isn’t that because they are more likely to deserve it because they are doing something criminal or aggressive?

According to FBI data,  the answers are clear:

• African Americans, especially young men, are much, much more likely to die at the hands of police then their white counterparts.
• Of those who have been killed by police, African-Americans victims are less likely to have been resisting/attacking the officer(s).  In fact, “the less clear it is that force was necessary, the more likely the victim is to be black.