Over the last 15 years, police in Delaware have shot 56 people, three this year alone.
Officers have killed 30 of them, including an innocent robbery victim.
Nearly half of those shot were Black in a state where Black people make up just 22% of the population, according to a WHYY News analysis. That finding reinforces concerns by many First State residents that systemic racism in police forces puts a target on Black suspects.
While circumstances have varied, every Delaware police shooting has one common denominator: No officers have been charged with a crime — even in instances where their use of deadly force has been questioned by state prosecutors, members of the public and lawyers for the people shot.
WHYY News analyzed Delaware police shootings since 2005, but several veteran attorneys and law enforcement officials said they cannot recall a case even before that year where a Delaware cop was arrested for shooting someone.
That fact has led advocates for Delaware police to assert over the years that each shooting has been a “good shoot.”
That glib declaration, however, doesn’t take into account what then-Attorney General Matt Denn’s office cited in 2016 as the key factor shielding Delaware police officers from arrest: the state’s 70-year-old law governing the use of deadly force.
The law allows officers to pull the trigger if they “believe such force is necessary’’ to protect themselves or others from death or serious injury.
The Denn report concluded the law “provides a great deal of deference’’ to police because it lets their “subjective belief’’ of imminent danger govern their decision to fire their guns — a provision that “immunizes them from criminal responsibility.”
But in the wake of recent protests against police brutality across Delaware and the nation, Denn’s successor has proposed changing the law to make it easier to charge an officer with illegally using deadly force.
https://whyy.org/articles/del-police-have-shot-56-people-since-2005-but-law-immunizes-them-from-prosecution/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=engagingnetworks&utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_content=WHYY+News+Delaware:+07/03/2020
