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Why New Mexico has one of the highest rates for killings by police

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Last week, officers with the Farmington, N.M., Police Department responded 
to a call of a domestic violence incident. Police mistakenly arrived at 
the wrong house and shot and killed Robert Dotson after he opened his door 
armed with a handgun.

New Mexico State Police are still investigating the incident, but the 
fatal shooting of the 52-year-old is just the latest example of police 
using lethal force against civilians in a state where this happens too 
frequently, critics say.

Home to about 2.1 million people, New Mexico has one of the highest rates 
of police killings per capita in the country.

Last year, 32 people — around 15 people per million — were killed by 
police in the state, according to data from MappingPoliceViolence.org. The 
project is part of Campaign Zero, a nonprofit focused on policing reform.

New Mexico is second to Wyoming, with a population of about 581,000, where 
around 17 people per million were killed by police.

"Who would have thought New Mexico would have one of the highest rates in 
the country?" said Howard Henderson, founding director of the Center for 
Justice Research at Texas Southern University. He's also a professor in 
the university's school of public affairs.

In New Mexico, the rate of police using lethal force is even higher if a 
Black resident is involved. Black people total around 2.7% of the state's 
population, yet they are nearly four times more likely to be killed by 
police than white people. Years of high-profile cases of Black people 
killed by police across the country show this is an ongoing problem due in 
part to racial bias in policing.

MappingPoliceViolence.org data reflects any incident where a law 
enforcement officer (off-duty or on-duty) applies lethal force resulting 
in a civilian being killed. This is whether the killing was considered 
"justified" or "unjustified" by law enforcement.

Critics of police response in New Mexico say a bigger gun culture in the 
state compared to much of the rest of the country and lax police training 
play a factor in the high incidence of police killings.

Police in the state's largest cities say they are making changes to alter 
how police use lethal force.

The death in Farmington "and others like it make clear the urgent need for 
statewide police reform," Barron Jones with the ACLU New Mexico said in a 
news release.

"We know that commonsense policies like requiring de-escalation and a high 
standard for when to use force keep all of us safer," Jones said. "Despite 
New Mexico having one of the highest, if not the highest, per capita rate 
of killings by police in the nation, robust legislation addressing police 
use of force did not pass this year. It doesn't have to be this way."

Gun ownership and culture play a factor
As of 2021, there were 122,968 federally registered firearms in the state, 
according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The 
data is collected under the National Firearms Act, but this reflects only 
a subsection of weapons.

Using data from the Rand Corp., CBS News reported that roughly 46% of 
adults in New Mexico had at least one gun at home in 2021. The state 
ranked 21st in a list of states and gun ownership. Texas, with more than 1 
million gun licenses and roughly 46% of adults reporting they live in a 
home with guns, ranked first.

Most of New Mexico "is rural, people rely on self protection" and there's 
more of a culture of hunting compared to the rest of the country, so high 
gun ownership makes sense, said Maryam Ahranjani, a law professor at the 
University of New Mexico.

But this likely plays a role in higher levels of fatal use of force by 
police. Officers are more likely going to respond to a call assuming an 
individual may be armed, Ahranjani said.

And in the case in Farmington, after the initial shooting of the victim, 
Dotson, his wife fired at officers from the doorway of the residence, 
according to the state police. She stopped once she realized the people 
outside her house were police.

"It makes sense from a personal safety standpoint that officers want to 
keep themselves safe too," Ahranjani said.

Local critics says there is a police training problem in New Mexico
Because of the state's high gun ownership, Ahranjani said police should be 
trained in a way that prepares them to de-escalate situations rather than 
use lethal force.

For many years, the Albuquerque Police Department, the law enforcement 
agency in the state's largest city, has had difficulties with its 
officers' use-of-force. It has been investigated by the U.S. Justice 
Department for its pattern of excessive force. Federal officials reached 
an agreement with the city to improve training and to keep tabs on its 
progress.

https://www.npr.org/2023/04/14/1169480686/police-killings-new-mexico-gun-
ownership

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Why New Mexico has one of the highest rates for killings by police Animal problems <animal.problems@negroes.usa> - 2023-12-26 20:23 +0100
  Re: Why New Mexico has one of the highest rates for killings by police Governor Swill <governor.swill@gmail.com> - 2023-12-27 04:41 -0500

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