Law Enforcement and the Erasure of Victimhood Among Black and Latinx Survivors of Gun Violence

Background and Purpose: Gun violence is predominantly concentrated within Black and Latinx communities, resulting in extensive physical harm, psychological trauma, and social disruption. Despite these circumstances, Black and Latinx survivors of gun violence often encounter law enforcement responses that undermine their victim status. Existing scholarship highlights racialized distrust of police, secondary victimization, and obstacles to formal help-seeking among survivors of color. However, limited research comparatively centers the perspectives of both Black and Latinx survivors and fails to account for how law enforcement influences their perception of victimhood following firearm violence. Utilizing Nil Christie's framework of the "ideal victim" and Monica Bell's theory of legal estrangement, this study investigates how Black and Latinx firearm survivors and their families interpret their post-victimization interactions with law enforcement and how these interactions affect their status as legitimate victims. We contend that these encounters constitute a process of victim erasure, wherein racialized institutional practices systematically deny moral and legal validation to survivors of color.

Methods: This paper is based on a larger qualitative study involving Black and Latinx survivors of firearm violence (N = 34) and their family members (N = 16), who were recruited from two racially distinct communities in Chicago: one predominantly Black and the other predominantly Mexican and Mexican American. To ensure participant safety and encourage candid responses, semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted separately with survivors and family members. The analysis employed an inductive, team-based thematic approach, which included iterative rounds of open and focused coding, followed by consensus-building debriefings.

Results: Analysis revealed four interrelated themes: the criminalization and misrecognition of victims, wherein survivors were perceived as suspects rather than individuals deserving of care; disbelief, stigma, and victim-blaming, characterized by officers' contempt, trivialization of harm, and attribution of blame to survivors' behavior; investigatory abandonment that involved minimal case follow-up and inadequate and nonresponsive communication; and neglect of victim service needs, with law enforcement failing to inform survivors of available resources, including victims' compensation. Across all themes, survivors attributed their treatment to their racial or ethnic identity instead of standard features of criminal investigation. The findings indicate that victim erasure functions as a cumulative institutional process, perpetuated by a moral and carceral logic that presumes Black and Latinx survivors to be guilty, thereby rendering them ineligible for state protection and justice. This logic is not solely the result of individual officer bias but is entrenched in institutional structures that have historically associated Blackness and Latinx identity with criminality and unworthiness.

Conclusion and Implications: The study advocates for reforms that mandate survivor-centered and culturally informed protocols in law enforcement practices and significant investment in community-based service organizations as primary infrastructure. Because law enforcement acts as gatekeepers to justice and victim support, survivors remain vulnerable to physical harm and trauma. Future research should explore how the carceral and moral logic that underpin victim recognition varies by gender and immigration status, and how structural policy reforms in law enforcement may begin to disrupt cycles of erasure and exclusion.