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Many police officers now carry less-lethal tools, which provide police officers with the means to apprehend resistant suspects without the need for hands-on tactics or firearms. Hopefully this reduces the risk of civilian injury and death. Still, a civilian can sustain an injury from a less-lethal tool. Since most police agencies support the use of these tools, why not use the one that works but also reduces the risk of civilian injury? Dr. Keven Petersen from the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte joins the podcast to discuss his recent study, “Less‑Lethal Weapons and Civilian Injury in Police Use of Force Encounters: A Multi‑agency Analysis,” coauthored by Christopher S. Koper, Bruce G. Taylor, Weiwei Liu and Jackie Sheridan‑Johnson.

Main Topics

• An officer’s use of force is linked to police-community relations.
• Ranking the different less-lethal force tools on the force continuum remains challenging.
• Chemical agents appear to cause the least harm to civilians.
• The impact on officer’s safety remains important.

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