Ferguson effect
The Ferguson effect is the theory that increased distrust and hostility towards police can cause officers to engage in less proactive policing, leading to an increase in violent crime rates. The theory was developed after police saw an increase in violence following the 2014 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The term was coined by Doyle Sam Dotson III, the chief of the St. Louis police, to account for an increased murder rate in some U.S. cities following the Ferguson unrest. Data suggests that violent crime was elevated and rose more in cities where concern about police violence was greatest.
Background
The term was coined by St. Louis police chief Sam Dotson in a 2014 column in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Dotson said in the column that, after the protests in Ferguson caused by the shooting of Michael Brown that August, his officers had been hesitant to enforce the law due to fears of being charged, and that "the criminal element is feeling empowered" as a result.The term became popular after Heather Mac Donald used it in a May 29, 2015, Wall Street Journal op-ed. The op-ed stated that the rise in crime rates in some U.S. cities was due to "agitation" against police forces. She also argued that "Unless the demonization of law enforcement ends, the liberating gains in urban safety will be lost", quoting a number of police officers who said that police morale was at an all-time low. In 2015, Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago, suggested that nationwide backlash against police brutality had led to officers disengaging, which, in turn, had led to violent crime increasing.
In May 2016, FBI Director James Comey used the term "viral video effect" when commenting on significant increases in homicide rates in many large U.S. cities in the first half of the year. Comey specifically singled out the cities of Chicago and Las Vegas. The term was also used by Chuck Rosenberg, director of the DEA.
In October 2016, the Ferguson effect was cited in a case in which a Chicago police officer was beaten for several minutes by a suspect but chose not to draw her service weapon, worried of the media attention that would come if she were to shoot the suspect.
Research
Crime
- A February 2016 University of Colorado Boulder study looked at crime statistics from 81 U.S. cities and found no evidence of a Ferguson effect with respect to overall, violent, or property crime, but did identify an increase in robbery rates after the shooting of Michael Brown. The study concluded that "any Ferguson Effect is constrained largely to cities with historically high levels of violence, a large composition of black residents, and socioeconomic disadvantages."
- A March 2016 study by Johns Hopkins University researchers Stephen L. Morgan and Joel Pally noted a large decline in arrests and a spike in violent crime in Baltimore after the death of Freddie Gray, consistent with a Ferguson effect. However they highlighted certain qualifications and caveats that made it unclear whether the crime spike should be regarded as evidence of a Ferguson effect.
- A June 2016 University of Missouri study by Rosenfeld, published by the National Institute of Justice found that there was an "unprecedented" 16.8% increase in homicides in 56 large cities over the course of 2015, and examined the Ferguson effect as one of three plausible explanations recommended for further research. Rosenfeld stated that "the only explanation that gets the timing right is a version of the Ferguson effect" and that it is his "leading hypothesis".
- Another 2017 study showed that after the shooting of Michael Brown, police traffic stops declined while hit rates went up on police searches in the state of Missouri. The study found no relationship between changes in police activity and crime rates.
- In 2018, USA Today reported that there had been a sharp increase in Baltimore homicides after the local death of Freddie Grey in April 2015, showing 527 occurring in the three years prior, versus 859 in the three years following; and this was accompanied by police taking an apparent blind eye to ordinary street crime, with a nearly 50% reduction in police reports of spotting potential violations themselves.
- In June 2020, Harvard economist Roland Fryer and Tanaya Devi released a paper showing evidence of the Ferguson effect. Across 5 cities where a viral deadly shooting preceded an investigation into crime and policing, they found that the violent crime rate increased, resulting in an additional 900 homicides and 34,000 excess felonies across 2 years. They suggest this was due to changes in the quantity of policing. Other theories, such as changes in community trust, contradicted the data in key ways.
Negative publicity of police
- According to Vox, "a 1999 study by criminologist Robert Ankony found that when police feel more alienated from, and negatively toward, members of the community, they're more likely to retreat from 'proactive' policing and do only what they need to do to respond to crimes."
- A 2015 study found that the Ferguson effect made police officers less willing to engage in community partnership. The study also suggested that officers who have confidence in their authority and perceive their police department as fair are more willing to partner with their communities, "regardless of the effects of negative publicity".
- A 2016 study by sociologists Matthew Desmond and Andrew V. Papachristos concluded that black people were afraid to call 911 after a heavily publicized violent beating of an unarmed black man by white police officers. After the police beating of Frank Jude in October 2004 was reported in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, there was a 17% drop in 911 calls, and a 32% increase in homicides. "Our research suggests that this happened not because the police 'got fetal' but because many members of the black community stopped calling 911, their trust in the justice system in tatters," they wrote.
- A December 2016 study found that police deputies who thought their supervisors were more fair were less likely to perceive danger, be unmotivated, or think that civilian attitudes toward the police have become more cynical since the shooting of Michael Brown.
- A 2017 study surveyed officers in a police department in the southeastern U.S., and found that they believed that negative publicity of police negatively affects civilians enough to increase crime rates. The study also found that negative publicity increases officers' perceptions of a police legitimacy crisis and fear of being falsely accused of misconduct.
Criticism
President Obama also said in a 2015 speech to the International Association of Chiefs of Police that although gun violence and homicides had spiked in some U.S. cities, "so far at least across the nation, the data shows that we are still enjoying historically low rates of violent crime", and "What we can't do is cherry-pick data or use anecdotal evidence to drive policy or to feed political agendas."