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. 2020 Aug;19(3):1041-1066.
doi: 10.1111/1745-9133.12507. Epub 2020 Jul 20.

Gun victimization in the line of duty: Fatal and nonfatal firearm assaults on police officers in the United States, 2014-2019

Michael Sierra-Arévalo  1 , Justin Nix  2
Affiliations

Gun victimization in the line of duty: Fatal and nonfatal firearm assaults on police officers in the United States, 2014-2019

Michael Sierra-Arévalo et al. Criminol Public Policy. 2020 Aug.

Abstract

Research summary: Using open-source data from the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), we analyze national- and state-level trends in fatal and nonfatal firearm assaults of U.S. police officers from 2014 to 2019 (N = 1,467). Results show that (a) most firearm assaults are nonfatal, (b) there is no compelling evidence that the national rate of firearm assault on police has substantially increased during the last 6 years, and (c) there is substantial state-level variation in rates of firearm assault on police officers.

Policy implications: GVA has decided strengths relative to existing data sources on police victimization and danger in policing. We consider the promises and pitfalls of this and other open-source data sets in policing research and recommend that recent state-level improvements in use-of-force data collection be replicated and expanded to include data on violence against police.

Keywords: danger; firearm assault; gun violence; policing.

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Conflict of interest statement

CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT The authors confirm that they have no conflict of interest to declare.

Figures

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6-year average rate of firearm assault on police by state, 2014–2019
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National rate of firearm assault on police, 2015–2019
FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Monthly firearm assaults on U.S. police, 2014–2019
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
National rate of firearm assault on police, 2014–2019
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Total firearm assaults on police by state, 2014–2019
FIGURE 4
FIGURE 4
6-year average rate of firearm assault on police by state, 2014–2019
FIGURE 5
FIGURE 5
6-year average rate of firearm assault on police by state, 2014–2019
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