
Is the Psychology of Deadly Force Ready for the Courts? - sohkamyung
https://undark.org/article/psychology-deadly-force-ready-courts/
======
SpikeDad
Interesting article. I wonder if there's evidence that the mindset of a police
officer reflects the general public.

Sorry to have to generalize here but I've had a lot of exposure to police over
my life as a volunteer EMT and an ex wife who's department was part of a
police department. I have a lot of friends who are police officers.

They have one thing in common (mostly) - they think they're right about every
situation. I don't think the general public thinks the same way.

Of course I have no idea if that's a selected behavior or something they learn
during their time as police officers. I can certainly see how it's a
beneficial behavior from a stress standpoint but we can see how it turns out
with respect to these deadly force encounters.

I have a lot of respect for law enforcement but also personal knowledge enough
that their decision making strategies are not like mine.

~~~
pjc50
Well, if you had a gun and permission to shoot people for being
"uncooperative" or "resisting" or "refusing to obey orders", you'd be right
all the time too.

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turc1656
The real issue here is whether or not this same logic will apply to the
average citizen. And we know it won't. Nor should it. At the end of the day,
we are responsible for our actions with only _very, very_ few exceptions that
are already laid out in the law (i.e. temporary insanity, severe mental
illness, etc.). It sounds like what is being argued for my Miller is that we
expand the exception list in a _big_ way. One that society likely will find
unacceptable. Also, I'd be really curious to see if Miller wants to apply this
same standard to everyone across the board. Because right now, if I shoot
someone - even if in self defense - there's a good chance that I will be
charged and have to defend myself in court to prove it was in self defense and
a lawful act because the bar for me being apply to apply deadly force is very
high.

The rules are already very different for cops in the current state of affairs.
They already have every advantage and already face extremely low odds of being
charged. As the article mentions, only 96 officers have been charged since
2005, which is ridiculous. We've seen a lot of absurd cases that were major
news where officers weren't even charged. Sure, I would bet that the
overwhelming majority are totally legitimate. But I also think there are way
too many that go un-charged.

And I'd bet my life (no pun intended) that this same logic will definitely not
apply to the average citizen if they shoot another citizen. And I'd bet my
child's life that this logic would never, ever, ever be used in defense of a
citizen if they had the gall to shoot (gasp) a police officer.

We the people bear some responsibility for this situation of officer
shootings. Juries routinely either fail to indict in the grand jury or acquit
if it actually goes to trial far too often. And these jurors themselves do not
apply the same standards that would apply to the rest of us.

Accounting for population difference, on a per capita basis US police officers
shoot citizens at a rate _37 times_ more frequently than the UK. Now, you can
either choose to believe that the US has 37 times more serious violent crime
that would justify that level of violence by cops. Or you can choose to
believe there is a problem with US the way US police go about their business.

~~~
adrianratnapala
> Accounting for population difference, on a per capita basis US police
> officers shoot citizens at a rate 37 times more frequently than the UK.

The UK is not a good example, since it is one of the few countries where most
cops don't have guns.

~~~
turc1656
I get your point, but I have to disagree. The fact that the UK can have its
officers not carry by default and armed officers only show up for the most
extreme situations is a testament to how they are conducting their operations.
They had only five deaths in 2017 due to officer shootings. Four of those were
terrorist attacks. So their response time is good enough to stop terrorists
with lethal force while also not resulting in extra civilian deaths and still
keep their beat cops gun-free.

~~~
dfsegoat
You can't extrapolate that model to the USA, where there are more firearms
than citizens [1].

This means that the average risk / threat an officer may encounter in
otherwise routine situations are quite different than the UK, which has very
strict firearms policies, since they decided to ban almost all firearms in
1988 / 1997.

1 -
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/19/there...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/19/there-
are-more-guns-than-people-in-the-united-states-according-to-a-new-study-of-
global-firearm-ownership/)

~~~
HarryHirsch
And even with all those firearms available to US citizens, only about 40
police officers are shot dead every year in the US. Being in law enforcement
isn't as dangerous as the police unions would like you to think.

~~~
danielvf
I live in the South, and know two officers currently working on the street.

In the last five years, between the two of them: someone tried to run the
officer over with a truck in a dark alley, a man pointed a shotgun at the
officer's head from a few feet away (while carrying three guns and 400 rounds
of ammo, and having previously fired several rounds through a house wall), a
fleeing criminal pulled to the side of the road and opened fire at the
officer, and while responding to an officer who had been shot in the woods,
were ambushed by the suspect, who killed the officer next to him, and sent my
acquaintance to the hospital for a month.

And I don't even live in a high crime area of country!

~~~
HarryHirsch
Hey, I've got anecdata, too! My previous institution is on the hook for half a
million dollars after an officer-involved shooting. This was a civil
settlement, without admission of liability, the usual kind. The officer was
permitted to resign. He had racked up an unusual number of disciplinary issues
already but was never disciplined for that incident, when he severely injured
the student. The police captain was also permitted to resign, even though
there were severe concerns about discipline in the force he was overseeing.
There was never a criminal trial for either of the two, there rarely is,
because of the unholy alliance between the district attorney and the cops.
Probably both are working for other police forces nearby, they _love_ officers
with a disciplinary record, it shows a willingness to go along and bend the
rules.

But this is the important anecdote:
[https://www.wrdw.com/content/news/Diabetic-man-has-
episode-t...](https://www.wrdw.com/content/news/Diabetic-man-has-episode-
tased-by-police-502822791.html)

A diabetic man became hypoglycemic and confused, he led the police on a car
chase and was then manhandled by two officers after he crashed into a ditch.
He would like changes in protocol and can only pussyfoot around the real
issue, police brutality, because everyone agrees that he deserved a beating.
Or something. As is usual, there is nothing to see here, district attorney
sides with the cops.

Whatever anecdotes one has, citizens are more at risk from the police than the
other way round.

------
btilly
Given the replication crisis, is psychology ready for much of anything?

Yes, I admit that this is snarky, but it is also uncomfortably true. There is
good evidence that things said by psychology that also fit common sense are
probably true. However things said by psychology research studies have a good
chance of being false. And things concluded by individual psychologists upon a
chain of research based on those studies should be viewed with significant
skepticism.

This will change when psychology can get from their current 50% replication
rate (on a good day) to having a significant body of established research that
we have good reason to believe is about 90% likely to be replicable. Until
then I'd advise against placing too much trust in anything that it says which
you can't find independent reason to believe.

~~~
SpikeDad
You have hopes that psychology is a robust enough science that it can improve
it's replication rate? Not sure there's evidence of this at all.

~~~
btilly
Yes, I have hope that psychology is trying to replicate what they thought were
established results. After a few rounds of that we'll have a limited body of
knowledge that has been successfully replicated enough that, despite the
overall replication rate, we can trust those results.

Once that body of reasonably certain psychological observations is established
and starts growing, it will be possible to make some statements about
psychology with a high degree of confidence. But whether that coalesces into a
paradigm about how to understand people that turns it into a recognizable
science is another story.

~~~
SpikeDad
Seems difficult to imagine such positivity with replication considering how
much psychological science depends on subjective information from subjects
using "evaluation tools".

Who knows what it means when I answer the question "How depressed am I" with
5?

------
markbnj
It feels to me like the question of how humans react to life-threatening
situations is less relevant here than the question of how humans judge what
_is_ a life threatening situation. Are you in imminent danger of death if you
encounter a teenager walking away from you in the middle of the street at
night? I think most people would judge that situation to be non-life-
threatening and I guess the jury in the referenced case agreed.

------
chmod775
Seems to be missing the fact that if you are unable to handle stressful
situations you have no business being a police officer in the first place.

Becoming a police officer is akin to stating: "I will approach confrontations
level-headed and try to deescalate" and I'm sure police officers receive
training to that end as well.

~~~
vorpalhex
Nobody is prepared to handle life-or-death stressful situations. Training at
least makes those experiences less terrible, but the only life-or-death stress
response you have born in you is your fight-or-flight meant to ward off
primarily large predators.

~~~
aqme28
Sure, no one is fully equipped to handle the moment of their death, but that's
not what is being talked about here.

Training should equip officers for the not-uncommon case when a suspect has a
knife but is otherwise nonthreatening.

~~~
vorpalhex
> when a suspect has a knife but is otherwise nonthreatening

A knife is a deadly weapon. Even a non-deadly strike from a knife means a loss
of organs (lung puncture, liver intrusion), limbs, facial tissue, eyes, etc.
If someone is threatening with a knife (attacking cop cars, etc), especially
if they are not acting entirely sanely, they are an active life-or-death
threat and yes, you might absolutely be walking into the moments before your
death.

Even if you have a gun, you have at best a few heartbeats to make a judgement
call if they decide to lunge for you. Especially if your firearm is in it's
holster, in the time it takes for an attacker to lunge at you, you need to:

1\. Establish a positive grip on the firearm

2\. Defeat any safety measures on the holster (snaps, buttons, interlocks)

3\. Clear the holster with a duty sized firearm

4\. Draw firearm to combat position

5\. Secure off hand grip to firearm

6\. Obtain sight picture

7\. Check target and backstop

8\. Squeeze trigger

The person who intends to kill you meanwhile needs to do the following:

1\. Lunge forward with knife angled outwards

If it's available in your area, I recommend taking a use-of-force seminar and
seeing how well you do with the above kind of scenario.

~~~
aqme28
None of that is relevant here. This was a man _walking away_ with his back
turned. That's what I meant by nonthreatening.

~~~
vorpalhex
If someone threatens your life with a deadly weapon, the fact that they've
turned their back for a moment and headed towards other people (innocent
people, your comrades, etc) doesn't make them not a threat anymore. As a
police officer, you have an obligation to keep the public safe, and that
includes from knife wielding nutcases.

Yes, it'd be great if cops could bear hug everyone into submission, but that's
not the reality of the situation.

------
pjc50
The key question is: is the "stress" argument ever going to be successfully
deployed to exculpate someone who, in a stressful situation with a weapon,
shoots a police officer?

No, of course not. The American use of deadly force by police is far in excess
of other first-world countries, and it has become a deadly part of the culture
war. Various people have commented that the US troops in the occupation of
Iraq had more restrictive rules of engagement.

~~~
turc1656
Exactly. We've seen countless examples of _" I thought he had a gun"_ and _" I
feared for my life"_ from cops. Can I shoot someone if I think they have a gun
but, oops, it turns out I was wrong? I'd be fine, right? I'm sure I wouldn't
face any serious consequences.

And therein lies the problem. There's a separate set of (lower) standards
applied to the very people who are trained for this sort of thing and who are
_allegedly_ held to a higher standard.

~~~
CompanionCuuube
>Can I shoot someone if I think they have a gun but, oops, it turns out I was
wrong? I'd be fine, right? I'm sure I wouldn't face any serious consequences.

If the totality of the circumstances show that a reasonable person would
believe that they had a gun and there was a threat to your life, then I would
expect you not to have serious consequences in the form of criminal penalties.

~~~
Thiez
> If the totality of the circumstances show that a reasonable person would
> believe that they had a gun and there was a threat to your life, then I
> would expect you not to have serious consequences in the form of criminal
> penalties.

Police officers have guns, and I suspect some minorities might reasonably fear
for their lives when confronted by the police... I'm sure the bar for
'reasonable' fear is much higher for civilians.

~~~
turc1656
Yes, this is precisely the point I'm trying to make. The standards that are
applied are not equal, yet police officers are not only allegedly held to a
higher standard, but they are also bound to follow all the existing laws
because they are citizens themselves. There isn't an exemption made that
allows them to violate the law or have a different set of criteria apply to
them when determining if a crime has been committed. The only exception to
that rule I am aware of is in cases of undercover operations - officers are
able to obtain permission in advance from their handlers for certain crimes
they expect to be required to commit (i.e. bribing someone or buying drugs).
Outside of that, no exceptions exist that I know of.

------
edflsafoiewq
This looks like nothing so much as the old determinist's "how can you be
morally culpable when the outcome was predetermined by natural laws?" dusted
off and dressed up with some psychology jargon.

~~~
intralizee
I think the jury would have a better time first understanding predetermination
& determinism, than the psychological jargon as you put it. Maybe
psychologists have found a stigma against determinism by the free will
thinkers and so they find the need to dress it up as something else.

------
dsfyu404ed
The current system has two sets of rules, one for cops, one for everyone else.
It's like how in medieval Europe a knight would be justified if he cut down a
normal person in circumstances where a normal person could not engage in
violence against another normal person. That's all fine and dandy (I'm being
sarcastic when I say that) except that out current societal norms and laws
prohibit double standards like that. This is just an attempt at bastardizing
science and law in order to uphold the double standard when what we really
need is to apply the same standard to police use of force as we do to normal
people

------
onemoresoop
Dr. Laurence Miller: "His fee as an expert witness in cases that require
travel is $10,000 per day of testimony"

I don't know how Mr Miller gets to be an expert witness but it seems to me
that Law Enforcement pays him quite well to be in the business of being a
witness...

~~~
CompanionCuuube
Hint: it's those letters in front of his first name.

