At least 1,124 people were killed by police in 2021, according to an online database, and there were only 15 days last year when police didn't kill anyone

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At least 1,124 people were killed by police in 2021, according to an online database, and there were only 15 days last year when police didn't kill anyone
GARDENA, CALIFORNIA JUNE 20, 2020-People stand in unity at a Black Lives Matter Los Angeles rally to call for justice in the fatal shooting of KennethRoss Jr., who was shot by a Gardena police officer in2018.Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
  • Police killed people on all but 15 days in 2021, according to data by Mapping Police Violence.
  • At least 1,124 people died due to police violence last year, according to the database.
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The sisters of Carl Dorsey III described their brother as a truck driver looking to start his own trucking business, according to local digital news outlet NJ.com.

Dorsey — whose nickname was Turtle — was a father of four who was loved by his community, Nyeemah Dorsey-Bey and Madinah Person told the outlet.

On the first day of 2021, Dorsey, a 39-year-old unarmed Black man, was shot and killed by Newark Detective Rod Simpkins in South Orange, New Jersey.

There were no police shootings in Newark throughout 2020.

"So apparently, all of 2020 went by without any police shootings or killings [in New Jersey] for that matter," Person told the Jersey outlet. "But as soon as the clock hit 2021, the first person that they killed was my brother."

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Across the US, 1,124 people were killed by police in 2021 — including Daunte Wright, Valentina Orellana-Peralta, and Ma'Khia Bryant — according to Mapping Police Violence, a nonprofit organization that tracks police killings. The Washington Post estimates that 888 of them were killed by gunfire.

Researchers with the Mapping Police Violence Project collected online data using media reports and nationwide data tracking from Fatal Encounters — a comprehensive and impartial database of those killed in police encounters — to account for police killings and information on each of the cases. It is updated weekly.

There were only 15 days throughout the year where a person was not killed by the police, according to the data.

The data also highlights that most of the police killings occurred during a traffic stop, a mental health check, a disturbance, while someone was being accused of a nonviolent offense, or when no crime was occurring at all.

"Despite talk of change, the data shows police have not reduced killings of civilians. And in some cities — like Los Angeles — killings by police have more than doubled," Samuel Sinyangwe, co-founder of Mapping Police Violence, told Insider in an email.

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Representatives from the National Police Association, the National Police Organization, and the National Association of Police Officers did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Reach out to this reporter via email at tmitchell@insider.com or on Twitter @taiylersimone.

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