Why It's Still So Rare For Police Officers To Face Legal Consequences For Misconduct
On Friday, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was arrested and charged with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter after he was caught on video pressing his knee on George Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes, even though Floyd told him repeatedly he couldn’t breathe. And now Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison is adding a second-degree murder charge, in addition to charging the three officers who were on the scene when Floyd was killed.
The fact that Chauvin was charged at all was significant. The elevation of the charges — and the fact that the other three officers are also being charged — is even more so. That’s because it’s still quite rare for police officers to be prosecuted. A review of the data we have on police prosecutions shows that it’s uncommon for police officers to face any kind of legal consequences — let alone be convicted — for committing fatal violence against civilians.
The data we have on police misconduct is, admittedly, far from perfect. There is no national system for reporting police misconduct, and state agencies are often reluctant to release any details about investigations into police wrongdoing.
That means some of the most reliable data sets on police misconduct — usually focusing on shootings — come from journalists, researchers or political activists who study it, not the federal government. And according to data from Philip M. Stinson, a criminal justice professor at Bowling Green State University, who collects one of the most reliable data sets on police prosecutions, only a handful of police officers are charged with murder or manslaughter every year.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-its-still-so-rare-for-police-officers-to-face-legal-consequences-for-misconduct/
