{"id":{"repo_id":"washington","oai_identifier":"oai:digital.lib.washington.edu:1773/48028"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/washington/oai:digital.lib.washington.edu:1773/48028","repository":{"repo_id":"washington","name":"University of Washington","base_url":"https://digital.lib.washington.edu/server/oai/request"},"display":{"title":"Examining the scope of homicide-suicide perpetrated by law enforcement: A population-based retrospective study using multiple frames, 2003 - 2017","abstract":"Background: Domestic violence perpetrated by law enforcement is an understudied public health issue. Previous studies examining the prevalence domestic violence by law enforcement primarily rely on convenience sampling and self-reported measures, producing unreliable estimates. Homicide-suicide events, as a subset of domestic violence offenses, present a unique opportunity for study given the data collection practices of existing public health surveillance infrastructure. The present study contributes to the literature by using population-based data and vital statistics to estimate a single subset of domestic violence offenses: homicide-suicide perpetration. Methods: We joined homicide-suicide perpetration data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) with population data from the American Community Survey for the years 2003 – 2017, analyzing the joined data as a multiple-frame sample. Our exposure of interest was occupation type, classified as employment in (a) law enforcement, (b) military occupations, (c) other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. Our unexposed reference group was persons in all other general occupations. To address issues of exposure misclassification, we applied conservative and anti-conservative classification methods. Our outcome of interest was perpetration of single-suspect homicide-suicide. Primary analyses used robust Poisson regression to calculate incidence ratios and 95% confidence intervals. Secondary analyses described years-of-life-lost (YLLs) to homicide victimization by homicide-suicide perpetrators, stratified by perpetrator occupation. Results: Compared to the incidence of homicide-suicide perpetration among persons employed in all other general occupations, law enforcement (aIRR = 1.6; 95% CI: 1.2 – 2.1), military personnel (aIRR = 3.7, 95% CI: 2.7 – 5.0), and persons employed other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations (aIRR = 2.9, 95% CI: 2.1 – 4.0) were at an elevated risk for homicide-suicide perpetration when exposure was classified conservatively. Using anti-conservative exposure classification yielded higher point estimates with largely overlapping confidence intervals. Altogether, homicide-suicide perpetrators from law enforcement, military, and other life-threateningly dangerous occupations were responsible for approximately 6 – 7% of the total homicide-suicide victim count and 6 – 7% of the total victim YLLs. Conclusions: Law enforcement officers commit homicide-suicide at a higher rate than the generally employed population, as do military personnel and persons employed in other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. NVDRS and ACS data can be joined and analyzed as a multiple-frame sample for the study of rare health outcomes.","abstract_html":"Background: Domestic violence perpetrated by law enforcement is an understudied public health issue. Previous studies examining the prevalence domestic violence by law enforcement primarily rely on convenience sampling and self-reported measures, producing unreliable estimates. Homicide-suicide events, as a subset of domestic violence offenses, present a unique opportunity for study given the data collection practices of existing public health surveillance infrastructure. The present study contributes to the literature by using population-based data and vital statistics to estimate a single subset of domestic violence offenses: homicide-suicide perpetration. Methods: We joined homicide-suicide perpetration data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) with population data from the American Community Survey for the years 2003 – 2017, analyzing the joined data as a multiple-frame sample. Our exposure of interest was occupation type, classified as employment in (a) law enforcement, (b) military occupations, (c) other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. Our unexposed reference group was persons in all other general occupations. To address issues of exposure misclassification, we applied conservative and anti-conservative classification methods. Our outcome of interest was perpetration of single-suspect homicide-suicide. Primary analyses used robust Poisson regression to calculate incidence ratios and 95% confidence intervals. Secondary analyses described years-of-life-lost (YLLs) to homicide victimization by homicide-suicide perpetrators, stratified by perpetrator occupation. Results: Compared to the incidence of homicide-suicide perpetration among persons employed in all other general occupations, law enforcement (aIRR = 1.6; 95% CI: 1.2 – 2.1), military personnel (aIRR = 3.7, 95% CI: 2.7 – 5.0), and persons employed other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations (aIRR = 2.9, 95% CI: 2.1 – 4.0) were at an elevated risk for homicide-suicide perpetration when exposure was classified conservatively. Using anti-conservative exposure classification yielded higher point estimates with largely overlapping confidence intervals. Altogether, homicide-suicide perpetrators from law enforcement, military, and other life-threateningly dangerous occupations were responsible for approximately 6 – 7% of the total homicide-suicide victim count and 6 – 7% of the total victim YLLs. Conclusions: Law enforcement officers commit homicide-suicide at a higher rate than the generally employed population, as do military personnel and persons employed in other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. NVDRS and ACS data can be joined and analyzed as a multiple-frame sample for the study of rare health outcomes.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Valencia, Esteban Jesus"],"institution":null,"degree_name":null,"degree_level":null,"degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":["Kernic, Mary A"],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2021,"date_issued":"2021-10-29","date_published":"2021-10-29","updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:58:10Z","subjects":["Homicide-suicide","Law enforcement","Multiple-frame sampling","Occupational-spillover","Officer-involved domestic violence","Public health","Epidemiology"],"languages":["en_US"],"rights":["CC BY"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/1773/48028","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier.uri"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor.advisor","label":"Advisor","values":["Kernic, Mary A"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Valencia, Esteban Jesus"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.accessioned","label":"Dc Date Accessioned","values":["2021-10-29T16:21:03Z"]},{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2021-10-29T16:21:03Z"]},{"key":"dc:date.issued","label":"Date","values":["2021-10-29"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["Thesis"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Homicide-suicide","Law enforcement","Multiple-frame sampling","Occupational-spillover","Officer-involved domestic violence","Public health","Epidemiology"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language.iso","label":"Language (ISO)","values":["en_US"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["CC BY"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier.other","label":"Dc Identifier Other","values":["Valencia_washington_0250O_23506.pdf"]},{"key":"dc:identifier.uri","label":"Identifier URI","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/1773/48028"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2021"]},{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["Background: Domestic violence perpetrated by law enforcement is an understudied public health issue. Previous studies examining the prevalence domestic violence by law enforcement primarily rely on convenience sampling and self-reported measures, producing unreliable estimates. Homicide-suicide events, as a subset of domestic violence offenses, present a unique opportunity for study given the data collection practices of existing public health surveillance infrastructure. The present study contributes to the literature by using population-based data and vital statistics to estimate a single subset of domestic violence offenses: homicide-suicide perpetration. Methods: We joined homicide-suicide perpetration data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) with population data from the American Community Survey for the years 2003 – 2017, analyzing the joined data as a multiple-frame sample. Our exposure of interest was occupation type, classified as employment in (a) law enforcement, (b) military occupations, (c) other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. Our unexposed reference group was persons in all other general occupations. To address issues of exposure misclassification, we applied conservative and anti-conservative classification methods. Our outcome of interest was perpetration of single-suspect homicide-suicide. Primary analyses used robust Poisson regression to calculate incidence ratios and 95% confidence intervals. Secondary analyses described years-of-life-lost (YLLs) to homicide victimization by homicide-suicide perpetrators, stratified by perpetrator occupation. Results: Compared to the incidence of homicide-suicide perpetration among persons employed in all other general occupations, law enforcement (aIRR = 1.6; 95% CI: 1.2 – 2.1), military personnel (aIRR = 3.7, 95% CI: 2.7 – 5.0), and persons employed other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations (aIRR = 2.9, 95% CI: 2.1 – 4.0) were at an elevated risk for homicide-suicide perpetration when exposure was classified conservatively. Using anti-conservative exposure classification yielded higher point estimates with largely overlapping confidence intervals. Altogether, homicide-suicide perpetrators from law enforcement, military, and other life-threateningly dangerous occupations were responsible for approximately 6 – 7% of the total homicide-suicide victim count and 6 – 7% of the total victim YLLs. Conclusions: Law enforcement officers commit homicide-suicide at a higher rate than the generally employed population, as do military personnel and persons employed in other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. NVDRS and ACS data can be joined and analyzed as a multiple-frame sample for the study of rare health outcomes."]},{"key":"dc:format.mimetype","label":"Dc Format Mimetype","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Examining the scope of homicide-suicide perpetrated by law enforcement: A population-based retrospective study using multiple frames, 2003 - 2017"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor.advisor":["Kernic, Mary A"],"dc:creator":["Valencia, Esteban Jesus"],"dc:date.accessioned":["2021-10-29T16:21:03Z"],"dc:date.available":["2021-10-29T16:21:03Z"],"dc:date.issued":["2021-10-29"],"dc:description":["Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2021"],"dc:description.abstract":["Background: Domestic violence perpetrated by law enforcement is an understudied public health issue. Previous studies examining the prevalence domestic violence by law enforcement primarily rely on convenience sampling and self-reported measures, producing unreliable estimates. Homicide-suicide events, as a subset of domestic violence offenses, present a unique opportunity for study given the data collection practices of existing public health surveillance infrastructure. The present study contributes to the literature by using population-based data and vital statistics to estimate a single subset of domestic violence offenses: homicide-suicide perpetration. Methods: We joined homicide-suicide perpetration data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) with population data from the American Community Survey for the years 2003 – 2017, analyzing the joined data as a multiple-frame sample. Our exposure of interest was occupation type, classified as employment in (a) law enforcement, (b) military occupations, (c) other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. Our unexposed reference group was persons in all other general occupations. To address issues of exposure misclassification, we applied conservative and anti-conservative classification methods. Our outcome of interest was perpetration of single-suspect homicide-suicide. Primary analyses used robust Poisson regression to calculate incidence ratios and 95% confidence intervals. Secondary analyses described years-of-life-lost (YLLs) to homicide victimization by homicide-suicide perpetrators, stratified by perpetrator occupation. Results: Compared to the incidence of homicide-suicide perpetration among persons employed in all other general occupations, law enforcement (aIRR = 1.6; 95% CI: 1.2 – 2.1), military personnel (aIRR = 3.7, 95% CI: 2.7 – 5.0), and persons employed other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations (aIRR = 2.9, 95% CI: 2.1 – 4.0) were at an elevated risk for homicide-suicide perpetration when exposure was classified conservatively. Using anti-conservative exposure classification yielded higher point estimates with largely overlapping confidence intervals. Altogether, homicide-suicide perpetrators from law enforcement, military, and other life-threateningly dangerous occupations were responsible for approximately 6 – 7% of the total homicide-suicide victim count and 6 – 7% of the total victim YLLs. Conclusions: Law enforcement officers commit homicide-suicide at a higher rate than the generally employed population, as do military personnel and persons employed in other life-threateningly dangerous or traumatic occupations. NVDRS and ACS data can be joined and analyzed as a multiple-frame sample for the study of rare health outcomes."],"dc:format.mimetype":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier.other":["Valencia_washington_0250O_23506.pdf"],"dc:identifier.uri":["http://hdl.handle.net/1773/48028"],"dc:language.iso":["en_US"],"dc:rights":["CC BY"],"dc:subject":["Homicide-suicide","Law enforcement","Multiple-frame sampling","Occupational-spillover","Officer-involved domestic violence","Public health","Epidemiology"],"dc:title":["Examining the scope of homicide-suicide perpetrated by law enforcement: A population-based retrospective study using multiple frames, 2003 - 2017"],"dc:type":["Thesis"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:58:10Z"}