Most Hamden Residents Do Not Think Police-Involved Shooting Was Justified: Quinnipiac Poll

A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday found that a majority of Hamden residents believe the shooting in New Haven involving a Hamden police officer was not justified.

According to the poll, 66 percent of residents believe the shooting on April 16 was not justified. However, 62 percent of residents approve of the job Hamden police is doing.

There were racial differences in the attitudes about police in the poll, according to Quinnipiac University. The shooting was not justified according to 88 percent of black residents, 60 percent of white residents and 68 percent of Hispanic residents. The overall approval of Hamden police is 50 percent among black residents, 67 percent among white residents and 66 percent of Hispanic residents.

"This survey suggests that Hamdenites regard the incident as an aberration, rather than indicative of how the Hamden Police Department operates," Quinnipiac University School of Law Professor William Dunlap said in a statement.

Seventy-nine percent of Hamden residents said they can trust the local police to do what is right, the poll found. That includes 85 percent of white residents, 67 percent of black residents and 78 percent of Hispanic residents.

The poll found 70 percent of Hamden residents said the officers involved in the shooting should be disciplined including 64 percent of white residents, 91 percent of black residents and 74 percent of Hispanic residents.

Only 38 percent of Hamden residents said the officers should be fired while 36 percent of all residents said the officers should face charges, according to the poll.

Fourty-seven percent of Hamden residents said that local police do not have enough training to know when they need to fire their weapon. And 93 percent of residents said they support the use of body cameras that are automatically activated by an action such as when the officer opens the door of a police car of by the sound of gunfire.

Quinnipiac University said they surveyed 1,699 Hamden adults from May 2-May 6 and there is a margin of error of +/- 3.1 percentage points.

You can read the full poll here.

The poll comes after a police-involved shooting in New Haven on April 16 where a Hamden police officer and a Yale police officer opened fire on a car with two people inside.

Police found the car and said it matched the description of a car believed to have been involved in an attempted armed robbery earlier that night.

The passenger of the vehicle was shot. The driver was not.

The shooting led to multiple protests and pushes for accountibility and transparency.