The distribution of police use of force across patrol and specialty units: a case study in BWC impact
The objective of this study was to examine differences in use of force by police patrol and specialized units, and the impact of body-worn cameras (BWCs) on use of force in these groups. We used administrative data from the Tempe (AZ) Police Department collected during a randomized controlled trial (RCT) of BWCs. t tests of means and ARIMA models were constructed to analyze unit-level variation in use of force. We found that Tempe officers in specialized units use substantially more force than patrol officers.