Deadly Police Chases and Community Opportunity—Understanding and Addressing Concentrated Risks

By
Hannah S. Laqueur
August 26, 2026

Jama Network Open

Objective:

To examine the correlation between neighborhood opportunity and the incidence of fatal police pursuits across US counties.

Approach:

Study Design: Linked the Childhood Opportunity Index with a national database of pursuit-related deaths from 2017–2021 and applied negative binomial mixed-effects models.

Key Findings:

Counties in the lowest neighborhood-opportunity tier had a 63% greater incidence rate of fatal pursuits than those in the highest tier.
Positive associations were observed for education, health and environment, and social and economic conditions.
The study highlights the spatial clustering of police-related harms in disadvantaged communities.

Interpretation:

The concentration of fatal pursuits in low-opportunity counties suggests a correlation with broader social and structural disadvantages.

Limitations:

County-level opportunity scores may obscure significant local variations.
Fatal pursuit data may be incomplete due to underreporting and lack of a national tracking system for police pursuits.
The study cannot differentiate between the frequency of pursuits and the lethality of those pursuits.

Conclusion:

Further research is needed to understand the factors contributing to the higher fatality rates in low-opportunity areas and to evaluate the impact of policy changes on pursuit-related incidents.