ABSTRACT

The high-profile deaths of Eric Garner and George Floyd have led to legislative actions banning the use of neck restraints by law enforcement officers. The debates behind these policy changes are important, but they are also entirely lacking in any data on the actual use of neck restraints. We write neither to defend nor condemn the use of neck restraints by law enforcement; rather, we seek to provide information to assist with data-driven decision-making about the technique. We present data from a police department in Washington State where, prior to the May 2021 statewide ban on use of neck restraints, officers had used them quite regularly: 230 times over the previous eight years. Results indicate that neck restraints were typically used when dealing with subjects who were physically non-compliant or actively resisting police, were associated with use of other physical tactics (rather than weapons), yielded a lower rate of injury to subjects but a higher rate of injury to officers, and resulted in no subject fatalities.

摘要

埃里克·加纳 (Eric Garner) 和乔治·弗洛伊德 (George Floyd) 的高调死亡导致立法行动禁止执法人员使用颈部约束装置。这些政策变化背后的争论很重要，但它们也完全缺乏有关颈部约束实际使用情况的任何数据。我们写信既不是为了捍卫也不是谴责执法部门使用颈部约束装置；相反，我们寻求提供信息以协助有关该技术的数据驱动决策。我们提供了华盛顿州警察局的数据，在 2021 年 5 月全州范围内禁止使用颈部约束装置之前，该部门的警官经常使用它们：在过去八年中使用了 230 次。结果表明，颈部约束通常用于处理身体不服从或积极抵抗警察的受试者，