This month marks the four-year anniversary of protests over the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, an incident met with a heavily armed police response that stoked widespread concern.

While proponents say militarized police units enhance officer safety and prevent violence, critics argue these tactics are targeted at racial minorities, and diminish trust between citizens and law enforcement.

A study published by Jonathan Mummolo, assistant professor of politics and public affairs at Princeton University, reveals that militarized policing is ineffective in decreasing crime and protecting police, and may actually weaken the public's image of the police.

Mummolo tested several claims about the costs and benefits of militarized policing using a combination of administrative crime and officer safety data, records of when and where militarized police units were created and deployed, and survey experiments.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2018-08-militarization-police-safety-reputation.ht...