Report undermines claims of police bias

AN Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation report on fatal shootings involving police officers highlights several facts: Such shootings are not common, although they have increased; those killed are typically to blame for their own fate; and most importantly, appearance of racial disparities can be created by a literal handful of cases.

The OSBI report shows 33 men died in 2015 as the result of officer-involved shootings. This alone highlights a disparity in shooting deaths. According to the U.S. Census estimates, women comprised 50.5 percent of Oklahoma’s population in 2015, yet men accounted for 100 percent of those killed by police.

That won’t surprise most people, but it underlines the fact that members of demographic groups don’t engage in illegal activity in proportion to their share of the population. Plenty of women in Oklahoma have been involved in crime, which is why Oklahoma ranks first in female incarceration nationally. Yet women don’t necessarily engage in the same types of crimes or activities that men do, such as violently resisting arrest.

What of the racial breakdown of those shot and killed by law enforcement officials in Oklahoma? Of the 33 men killed, nine were black, 21 were white, one was Hispanic and two were American Indian.

That the vast majority (63.6 percent) of those killed were white undermines claims of any racial vendetta. But some will note the census estimates only 7.8 percent of Oklahomans are black, yet blacks represented 27.2 percent of those killed by state police.

That’s certainly disproportionate. But the total number of people fatally shot by police is 33 in a state with an estimated 3.9 million residents, so just a few incidents can wildly skew percentages. Based on census data, there are more than 300,000 blacks living in Oklahoma. Nine were shot and killed by the police — about one out of every 33,900 black Oklahomans.

That figure hardly paints a picture of law enforcement officers eager to kill black Oklahomans but less inclined to kill whites.

Furthermore, racial disparities are evident elsewhere. Hispanics comprise 10.1 percent of the Oklahoma population, but just 3 percent of those shot and killed by police. American Indians represent 9.1 percent of Oklahomans, well above the 6 percent share of those killed by police.

It would be a strange form of racial bias that leads to excessive shooting of one minority group and the exact opposite for two other minority groups.

Also, there were 10 fatal shootings involving officers in Oklahoma County, but just two in Tulsa County. Given that both are metro areas, one might expect the fatal-shooting rate would be comparable in both counties, but it’s not.

The OSBI report also makes one thing clear: Those shot by the police typically have done much to make that outcome inevitable. The report found 8 percent of those killed by police gunfire were trying to escape or flee custody, 26 percent resisted arrest or detainment, 20 percent verbally threatened others before being shot, 15 percent barricaded themselves or were engaged in a standoff with police, and 13 percent attempted to grab, kick or strike an officer.

In short, any racial disparities in police shootings appear the result of statistical noise, not deliberate bias. And the fact that Oklahoma law enforcement officers resort to lethal force so infrequently is a testament to their integrity and courage.