Policing Police Violence : sheriff-coroners and the underreporting of police killings
Poblete Cazenave, Ruben (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Economia Aplicada)
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Economia Aplicada

Date:	2026
Description:	40
Abstract:	In the United States, law enforcement kills three people per day, yet official statistics record only half. Using detailed geo-location of police killings and exploiting spatial and temporal discontinuities in medicolegal death-investigation systems across counties from 2000–2024, I show that sheriff-coroner jurisdictions are 15–19 percentage points (≈30 percent) less likely to report killings to the FBI. The effect concentrates among Black victims and increases after high-profile killings (Michael Brown, George Floyd), suggesting public scrutiny intensifies suppression rather than deterring it. The findings highlight how institutional dependence can systematically distort official record and hinder accountability.
Rights:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, i la comunicació pública de l'obra, sempre que no sigui amb finalitats comercials, i sempre que es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original. No es permet la creació d'obres derivades.
Language:	Anglès
Series:	Document de treball (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Economia Aplicada) ; 04.26
Document:	Working paper
Subject:	Police killings ; Underreporting ; Medico-legal eath investigation office

Adreça alternativa: https://ideas.repec.org/p/uab/wprdea/wpdea2604.html

41 p, 5.1 MB

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Research literature > Working papers > Department of Applied Economics. Working papers