Page 8 The Skanner January 10, 2018
Honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Nielsen
Chicago Police Shooting Data May Reveal New
cont’d from pg 6
Ways to Reduce Deaths and Racial Disparity
White women.
Further, 14 percent of
Black women have an-
nual incomes of $50,000
or higher with ages 35–
49 enjoying the highest
income within the Black
female cohort.
For millennial wom-
en, 81 percent have nev-
er been married, up
from 71 percent in 2005
and, with an average
household size of 2.47,
29 percent of total Black
American households
contain a married cou-
ple.
Black women also
have embraced the so-
cial media movement
#BlackGirlMagic,
a
term that describes a
cross-platform gather-
ing of empowered Black
women who uplift each
other and shine a light
on the impressive ac-
complishments of Black
women.
According to the re-
port, Black women
“over-index by 29 per-
cent for spending three
to four hours each day
on social networking
sites and by 86 percent
for spending five or
more hours each day on
social
networking
sites.”
Especially adept at us-
ing technology and so-
cial media to trade opin-
ions
and
offer
recommendations,
Black women 18 and
older, more than any
other
demographic
group, have taken so-
cial media and adopted
it for higher purposes,
the report found.
Whether they are
buying cars, jewelry,
smartphones or beauty
products, the advice, re-
ferrals and feedback
they
receive
from
friends and community
play an important role
in Black women’s pur-
chases, the report said.
Forty-three percent of
Black women say they
like to share their opin-
ions about products
and services by posting
reviews and ratings on-
line; 47 percent agree
that people often come
to them for advice be-
fore making a purchase.
“The trend of Black
women becoming in-
creasingly
educated
and driving the buying
power of Black house-
holds,
means
that
they are making pur-
chase decisions that his-
torically they didn’t
make,” said Bianca
Blake, a marketing spe-
cialist.
“Couple that
with trends of the mil-
lennial generation mar-
rying and starting fami-
lies later, the Black
woman becomes an in-
dependent
decision
maker for much more
of her journey through
life, as opposed to abid-
ing by decisions made
by her parents, hus-
band or heavily influ-
enced by her children.”
Nirej Sekhon
Georgia State University
(THE CONVERSATION) The De-
partment of Justice (DOJ) is cur-
rently investigating the Chicago
Police Department.
The high-profile police shooting
of teen Laquan McDonald — com-
bined with the city’s efforts to
prevent the public from learning
about it — prompted the investiga-
tion.
Given that the Justice Depart-
ment is playing hardball with Fer-
guson, Missouri — suing the city
following its refusal to voluntarily
enter into an agreement to reform
its police department and courts
_ advocates in Chicago may also
expect something important to
change as a result of DOJ involve-
ment.
In a recent paper, I analyzed 259
Chicago police shootings that oc-
curred between 2006 and 2014.
These are all of the incidents for
which Chicago’s Independent Po-
lice Review Authority had made a
completed report of investigation
publicly available as of last month.
My analysis of these incidents
suggests that police reform in Chi-
cago, like that in Ferguson, must
include a critical examination of
the enforcement tactics that police
departments use in poor, minority
communities.
Better discipline and training
are part of the solution, but they
are unlikely to make dramatic
difference by themselves. To cre-
ate meaningful change, we must
look beyond officer shooters in
high-profile cases like that of Mc-
Donald and Michael Brown.
We shouldn’t just ask how offi-
cers might best manage suspects
during an encounter, but why cer-
tain police-civilian encounters oc-
cur at all.
Police Shootings in Chicago
There is no such thing as a “typ-
ical” police shooting, but many
share common features. For ex-
ample, in nearly 50 percent of the
259 incidents I reviewed, police of-
ficers shot during or immediately
following a foot chase.
In my view, not all of these chas-
es were necessary. We expect offi-
cers to chase and subdue a murder
“
In reality, it is
hard to know
how many bad
apples there
are in any given
department
suspect who fires shots at officers
as was described in one of the re-
ports I read. But we ought to feel
differently when officers chase
and shoot a young Black man
whose only offense was “looking
in the officers’ direction” or “grab-
bing his…waistband and turning
away.”
Egregious high-profile shootings
like McDonald’s too quickly lead
us to the conclusion that the prob-
lem is “bad apples” – cops who use
their badges as cover for racist ag-
gression.
The implication is that there
are relatively few “bad apples” as
compared to “good cops.” And that
those “good cops,” with the right
training, will only shoot when nec-
essary.
Discipline and training are not
enough. In reality, it is hard to
know how many bad apples there
are in any given department be-
cause neither police departments
nor unions are keen on divulging
that information.
This is just one of many obsta-
cles to punishing police officers
for misconduct. The public was
rightly frustrated, for example,
when it emerged that Chicago Po-
lice Officer Jason Van Dyke, who
shot Laquan McDonald, had a long
history of civilian complaints for
excessive force and racist slurs.
Had Van Dyke been appropriately
disciplined for any of his earlier
brutality and racism, perhaps Mc-
Donald would be alive today.
But in a city like Chicago where
there are tens of police shootings
every year, it is hard to argue that
every cop involved with a shooting
is a “bad apple.”
My review of the available cas-
es reveals that it’s not just racist
cops who shoot. In the shootings I
examined, the demographic pro-
file of officer-shooters looks much
like the demographic profile of
the department as a whole. Police
shootings cannot be reduced to
a simple story about White-on-
Black racism because many of the
police officers doing the shooting
are Black.
Most police shootings in Chicago
are unlike the Laquan McDonald
case in that officers typically claim
a firearm threat prompted them to
shoot. In nearly 80 percent of the
See CHICAGO on page 9