Journal of urban health : bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine
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This paper examines an alternative solution for collecting reliable police shooting data. One alternative is the collection of police shooting data from hospital trauma units, specifically hospital-based violence intervention programs. These programs are situated in Level I trauma units in many major cities in USA. ⋯ Researchers working in hospital emergency departments are prohibited from recruited individuals under arrests. The trauma staff, particularly ED physicians and nurses, are in a strategic position to collect this kind of data. Thus, this paper examines how trauma units can serve as an alternative in the reliable collection of police shooting data.
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Data on police stops can be examined to reflect on the relative "opacity" of these encounters and how aggregate patterns on the nature-not just the volume-of reported stops relate to public scrutiny of the police. We hypothesize that public scrutiny on police stops is positively related to the prevalence of opaque stop practices across dimensions of "intrusiveness," "rationale," and "setting" derived from agency records. We further argue that this relationship is influenced by neighborhood conditions in the form of concentrated disadvantage, residential instability, and heterogeneity. ⋯ Results show considerable variation in indicators of opacity, particularly across precincts. More importantly, we also find that rates of complaints are higher in precincts that have more vaguely defined, intrusive stops. Results also suggest that concentrated disadvantage is independently and positively related with higher rates of public scrutiny of the police.
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This paper explores theoretical, spatial, and mediatized pathways through which policing poses harms to the health of marginalized communities in the urban USA, including analysis of two recent and widely publicized incidents of officer-involved killings in Ferguson, Missouri and Staten Island, New York. We examine the influence of the "broken windows" model in both policing and public health, revealing alternate institutional strategies for responding to urban disorder in the interests of the health and safety of the city. ⋯ We show how police killings reveal an underlying and racialized association between disorder and deviance that becomes institutionalized and embodied through spatial and symbolic pathways. If public health workers and advocates are to play a role in responding to the call of the Black Lives Matter movement, it is important to understand the interpretations and translations of urban social life that circulate on the streets, in the media, in public policy, and in institutional practice.
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Studies show that policing, when violent, and community fragmentation have a negative impact on health outcomes. This current study investigates the connection of policing and community fragmentation and public health. ⋯ Analysis of the perceptions of these factors suggests that violent policing increases community fragmentation and is a public health threat. Approaches to address this public health threat are discussed.