Keller Sheppard

• Northeastern University

Research on relevance of race and community context for police shooting mortality is underdeveloped. We collected data on 623 police-involved shootings in the state of Texas to examine which incident- and county-level factors are associated with shooting outcomes. In doing so, we incorporate a novel incident-level variable: distance from incident t...

Purpose This study investigates the relationship between perceptions of Trauma-Informed Care (TIC), burnout, and turnover intentions among juvenile justice staff members in residential commitment programs. Methods Drawing data from a sample of Florida juvenile justice staff, a series of two-level mixed-effects linear regression models nesting staf...

Trauma exposure is pervasive among juvenile justice involved youth. A growing appreciation for the prevalence of trauma and the challenges it poses to successful treatment has prompted youth serving organizations to adopt policies and practices that are consistent with trauma-informed care (TIC). Despite increased interest in integrating TIC into s...

Less-than-lethal weapons, such as conductive energy devices (CEDs) and chemical sprays, have proliferated across law enforcement agencies over the past 30 years. This study reports on the findings of the first systematic review of the effects of police use of less-than-lethal weapons on citizen and officer harm. Following Campbell Collaboration gui...

Public perceptions of police legitimacy and effectiveness have been challenged by recent high-profile use of fatal force incidents by the police. Prior scholarship suggests that that controversial incidents involving police use of force can engender distrust of the police. Further, the neighborhood effects literature has demonstrated the importance...

Police use of deadly force represents a pressing public policy issue with implications for police-community relationships and equitable access to justice. A growing body of literature considering the structural factors influencing officers’ exposure to potential violence suggests that context plays a pivotal role in officer use of deadly force. Thi...

Objectives Existing research on the effects of body-worn cameras (BWCs) have found largely consistent results regarding direct significant reductions in citizen complaints and often also report reductions in use of force reports. However, few studies have examined possible spillover effects onto untreated officers. This study explicitly tests for d...

Objectives Use of lethal force by police officers has incited riots, inspired social movements, and engendered socio-political debate. Police officers also assume a high level of risk during police–citizen encounters. Yet, existing studies tend to center on these two phenomena independently. Additionally, the under-utilization of multilevel researc...

Literature has documented racial and ethnic disparities in resident fatalities by the police and police fatalities by residents. Yet, there has been a lack of research on police-resident relationships within Hispanic communities. Additionally, research has rarely considered the relevance of social context for fatal police-resident encounters or exa...

One of the central debates animating the interpretation of gun research for public policy is the question of whether the presence of firearms independently makes violent situations more lethal, known as an instrumentality effect, or whether determined offenders will simply substitute other weapons to affect fatalities in the absence of guns. The la...