Legal Decision-Making Regarding Alleged Police Excessive Use of Force Incidents
摘要
Civilian contact with police officers is common, but unfortunately, these encounters do not always end positively. Occasionally, these incidents result in police use of force (UOF), with a portion becoming legal cases that assess the legality of the force used. In this chapter, we examine what the scientific literature suggests about juror decision-making in cases involving potentially excessive UOF. We begin the chapter with a discussion of the various decision-making points throughout the legal process in which jurors’ judgments can impact the case. We reference the importance of grand, civil, and criminal jurors. Next, we turn to the various factors that influence jurors’ decisions in police UOF cases, including the influence of juror, victim, and defendant characteristics. Following this, we review the legal standard jurors must utilize when making their decisions in criminal and civil UOF trials—the reasonable officer standard. We summarize the limited research on how the reasonable officer standard relates to jurors’ decision-making and discuss avenues for future research. To conclude, we discuss the importance of the inclusion of psychological theory in future research endeavors, practical implications for policymakers and legal cases, and make recommendations for future scholars interested in juror decision-making in police UOF cases.