Law Enforcement-Assisted Suicide

Abstract

This study describes historical, personality, behavioral, and situational factors of law enforcement-assisted suicides, which are also known as suicide-by-cop (SbC) subjects. These factors were then used to compare differences between SbC subjects who successfully forced officers to shoot them and those subjects who were unsuccessful. SbC subjects appear to share several risk factors with other suicide victims. This study detected some differences in the characteristics of the SbC subjects who were successful in forcing the officers to intervene with lethal force and those who were not. Substance abuse, previous suicide attempts, stressful life events, length of residency in the location of the incident, and homicidal conversation during the SbC incident did have weak relationships with the outcome of the incident.

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