Police Shootings & Violence

After a police officer fatally shoots someone, it can take days or even weeks before the public or his supervisors hear the officer's version of what happened.

In many states, that so-called cooling off period is carved out in state law or in a police department's contract. That opportunity to take some time before undergoing questioning by investigators angers community activists and others seeking reforms of police departments around the country who believe it gives officers time to reshape their story to justify a shooting and avoid getting fired or charged.

Community members gathered in Fort Worth Sunday night to protest the shooting death of Atatiana Jefferson by a Fort Worth police officer. A white officer fatally shot Jefferson, a black woman, in her home early Saturday morning.

Evidence from the trial of a former Dallas police officer convicted of killing her neighbor has fueled new questions about whether accused officers are treated differently than other suspects, including testimony that a camera in the cruiser where the officer sat after the shooting was flipped off and that her sexual text messages with her partner were deleted.

Law enforcement in Texas released more information Monday afternoon about the investigation into this weekend’s mass shooting which killed seven people and injured 23.

After five years of investigations and protests, New York City's police commissioner on Monday fired an officer involved in the 2014 chokehold death of an unarmed black man whose dying cries of "I can't breathe" fueled a national debate over race and police use of force.

An Arlington police officer accidentally shot and killed a woman behind a shopping plaza when he fired repeatedly at a dog believed to be hers that was running at him, authorities said.

Police body camera video footage shows a man who called 911 to request help crying, pleading then going limp as arresting officers restrain him. Soon after, a paramedic says he's dead.

As public interest in fatal police use of force continues, a growing number of police departments have begun using body-worn cameras as tools for transparency and documentation of civilian interactions.

A Texas police officer has been arrested on a murder charge after he fatally shot the driver of a truck reported stolen from a Dallas suburb earlier in June.

The family of the 22-year-old man who opened fire on a Dallas courthouse say he had received mental health treatment and that they believe he wanted to be killed.

Cellphone video recorded by Sandra Bland, a black woman found dead in a Texas jail in 2015 following a confrontational traffic stop, shows for the first time her perspective as a white state trooper draws his stun gun and points it at close range while ordering her out of the car.

The former Dallas police officer who fatally shot an unarmed black man in his own home told a 911 dispatcher "I thought it was my apartment" nearly 20 times as she waited for emergency responders to arrive, according to a 911 recording obtained by TV station WFAA.

Prosecutors have dismissed at least nine cases that were investigated by former white Dallas police officer  Amber Guyger, who has been charged with murder in the fatal shooting of Botham Jean, an unarmed black man, in his own apartment, according to court records.

An attempt to serve a search warrant at a suspected drug house quickly turned into a gunbattle that killed two suspects and injured five undercover narcotics officers, including four who were shot, Houston's police chief said.

The indictment of former Dallas police officer Amber Guyger on a murder charge in the killing of an unarmed black neighbor marks the latest development in a national conversation on issues of law enforcement and race.

A dozen days after an unarmed black man was shot and killed in his apartment in Dallas, the white off-duty police officer who killed him remains on the job.

Officer Amber Guyger’s continued employment — she’s currently on paid administrative leave — has stoked the growing anger surrounding the unprecedented shooting and become a point of contention in the state’s highest-profile political campaign.