Using Latent Homicide-by-Police to Re-evaluate the Racial Threat Hypothesis

• In Event: Race and Police Violence

Abstract

In the past, racial threat theory has been used to suggest that percent minority will have a positive-decreasing association with homicide-by-police (HbP). Many older studies using official data find a positive association; however, recent studies that incorporate media-based data find no association or a negative association between percent Black and HbP. This study re-examines the racial threat hypothesis using a structural equation model that accounts for both official and media-based rates. I find that a city’s percent Black and Black-White housing segregation are associated with lower latent HbP. My findings do not support a curvilinear association between percent Black and HbP. In addition, I do not find support for a relationship between percent Hispanic/Latino and HbP or between Hispanic/Latino-White housing segregation and HbP. I suggest that the seemingly contradictory findings between older and newer studies may be an indication that the association has changed over time. I further discuss the difficulties of discerning whether a negative association should be viewed as favorable or unfavorable for Black communities and the necessity of applying more nuanced versions of threat and structural discrimination theories to the study of geographic variation in HbP.

Author

• Sarah Fry, Northwestern Oklahoma State University