Number Of Officers Killed In The Line Of Duty Drops To 50-Year Low While Number Of Citizens Killed By Cops Remains Unchanged
from the mean-streets-'meaner'-for-civilians dept
The go-to phrase deployed by police officers, district attorneys and other law enforcement-related entities to justify the use of excessive force or firing dozens of bullets into a single suspect is "the officer(s) feared for his/her safety." There is no doubt being a police officer can be dangerous. But is it as dangerous as this oft-deployed justification makes it appear?
The annual report from the nonprofit National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund also found that deaths in the line of duty generally fell by 8 percent and were the fewest since 1959.This statistical evidence suggests being a cop is safer than its been since the days of Sheriff Andy Griffith. Back in 2007, the FBI put the number of justifiable homicides committed by officers in the line of duty at 391. That count only includes homicides that occurred during the commission of a felony. This total doesn't include justifiable homicides committed by police officers against people not committing felonies and also doesn't include homicides found to be not justifiable. But still, this severe undercount far outpaces the number of cops killed by civilians.
According to the report, 111 federal, state, local, tribal and territorial officers were killed in the line of duty nationwide this past year, compared to 121 in 2012.
Forty-six officers were killed in traffic related accidents, and 33 were killed by firearms. The number of firearms deaths fell 33 percent in 2013 and was the lowest since 1887.
We should expect the number to always skew in favor of the police. After all, they are fighting crime and will run into dangerous criminals who may respond violently. But to continually claim that officers "fear for their safety" is to ignore the statistical evidence that says being a cop is the safest it's been in years -- and in more than a century when it comes to firearms-related deaths.
So, the excuses -- and the justifiable homicides -- mount. Even as the job becomes safer for police officers and crime stats continue to drop from their mid-1990s highs, the rate of deaths at the hands of law enforcement remains unchanged. According to statistics from the Bureau of Justice, 4,813 people have died while being arrested by police officers. 60% of those were homicides, a rate of ~400 per year.
Look at Seattle. As Reason points out, 20% of its 2013 homicides were committed by police officers -- 6 out of 29 total. A city with nearly 650,000 residents (and an infinite amount of chances to kill each other) only managed to outpace the city's ~1,800 officers by a 5-to-1 ratio. One homicide per 300 officers versus one homicide per 22,000 residents. Again, being a criminal shortens your lifespan, and officers will more often find themselves in dangerous situations, but the disparity here is enormous.
Efforts have been made over the past several years to make things safer for police officers. The ubiquitous use of bulletproof vests has contributed to this decrease in firearms-related deaths, as has a variety of policies aimed at reducing high-speed chases. But very little effort has been made to decrease the number of people killed by law enforcement. (Notably, Seattle's police chief attributes the high homicide numbers to not "effectively managing" interactions with people with mental health issues.) Some deaths are nearly impossible to prevent, but there are others where the situation has been allowed to deteriorate far too quickly or a shoot-first mentality has prevailed. The escalating adoption of military equipment and tactics has also contributed to the steady "justifiable homicide" count.
I'm aware that statistical aggregation isn't the same thing as moment-to-moment reality. Just because you're less likely to be shot today than at any other time in the past 100+ years doesn't mean today isn't your day. But the narrative push by officers to present their job as persistently deadly doesn't jibe with the death totals. The First Rule of Policing ("get home safe") is a crutch for bad cops. Cops are getting home safe now more than ever. It's those on the other side of the blue line that haven't seen their chances improve.
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Filed Under: homicide, killing, police, police brutality
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O nice, you just described what the Brazilian police is in general. And amusingly we call it "Military Ploice of [insert state]. It's actually a heritage of the dictatorial years of Brazil when the police was not meant to protect but rather to suppress and oppress.
I'm not as optimistic as to say our police is walking towards being more human and oriented to serve the citizenry. Not yet. But being able to compare both countries in this aspect even if minimally is rather troubling considering the US should be standing for other ideals and values.
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Odds of getting shot
Which makes for a lot of unsolved murders by cops.
Bad numbers, and that's why if you're ever involved in a situation with a police officer, you'd best become a human statue because anything will get you killed, even breathing.
Not good odds for civilians-and it's the result of the militarization of the police, both physically and mentally.
We're all the bad guys now.
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Re: Odds of getting shot
But cops have at least one layer of bureaucracy between them and the courts and prosecutors almost never ignore the findings of the review board, so cops get judged not guilty by their fellow cops -- and never see the inside of a courtroom for what would be manslaughter or even murder if anyone else did it.
And this despite the fact that a cop can use deadly force when threatened with deadly force because s/he is a citizen, not because s/he is a cop!
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Re: Re: Odds of getting shot
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Yes, they are expected to shoot to kill even when knocking on someones door and it being answered by a kid holding a game controller. The kid was already home, the officer still has to get home.
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How do the good cops not see what is happening?
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Re: Re: Re: Odds of getting shot
The problem is not the police defending themselves. The problem is police launching preemptive strikes just in case.
If that's what they are trained for, then all trainers need to get dismissed and replaced by sane trainers with sane priorities. Then all the mistrained police officers need to be trained properly, and those who fail to show any sane regard of human life need to get dismissed as well and get replaced by policemen with a conscience and work ethic and the knowledge that their job's purpose is to make the life of the citizens safer, not more dangerous.
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Sounds about right. It also sounds like a sign of just how totally corrupt law enforcement in the US has become.
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We may just find there are plenty more dangerous professions out there that dont have the ability to shoot at will and be almost guaranteed getting off no matter how bad the call was.
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Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
Builders and bus drivers don't deserve to be in the same sentence as first-responders. As for first-responders, only police go to every single call. Every. Single. One.
You won't find any other profession -- even military -- that puts you in harm's way more often and with less predictability.
-C
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You were saying?
Pg. 53, 'Police Protection'. Total fatal injuries, 133, 86 by 'Violence and other injuries by persons or animals', 39 due to 'Transportation Incidents'.
Pg. 1, 'Crop production'. Total fatal injuries, 245.
Pg. 2, 'Animal production'. Total fatal injuries, 148, 124 from cattle ranching alone.
Pg. 5, 'Construction'. Total fatal injuries, 738, 129 from 'Construction of buildings', 156 from 'Heavy and Civil engineering construction', 423 from 'Specialty trade contractors', 148 of which are from 'Foundation, structure, and building exterior contractors'.
Pg. 8, 'Manufacturing'. Total fatal injuries, 327.
Pg. 18, 'Wholesale trade'. Total fatal injuries, 190, 109 of which come from 'Merchant wholesalers, durable goods'.
Pg. 20, 'Retail trade'. Total fatal injuries, 268, 135 of which are from 'Violence and other injuries by persons or animals'. 86 of those fatalities are from 'Food and Beverage stores', of which 66(76%) of the fatalities are due to the just mentioned 'Violence and other injuries by persons or animals'.
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Re: You were saying?
I know of a case of a guy who sat in flatbed tow truck cab, while coworker used electrical winch located just behind him to pull large trash container . Just before end of Friday shift. Got decapitated.
Looks like Darwin Award to me. Nothing in his job duty made it unsafe. His own stupidity did. But stats fail to account for that.
Then there is that dumb construction worker hoisted 50 feet in cherry picker and moving the whole machine on wheels on Manhattan street/sidewalk, because lowering himself each time to move was too time consuming. C'mon.
Or try Mr. Rappeti' handiwork:
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2011-07-20-new-york-crane-collapse_n.htm
All you read is dry totals for a group.
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Re: Re: You were saying?
The stats may make for dry reading, and not take into account avoidable accidents, but unless you feel like going through each case on an individual basis, to determine which fatality was the fault of the job vs the person, it's all you've got to go off of.
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Re: You were saying?
Also, these numbers don't say deaths per manhours. These statistics give us nothing to judge how risky one profession is from another.
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Re: Re: You were saying?
The number of deaths (or even assaults) on cops is, compared to the man-hours put into the occupation, extremely low.
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Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
Is the job dangerous? Yes. Is it so uniquely dangerous that they deserve special praise or mention? Absolutely not.
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Re: Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
Garbage collection is also several times more dangerous than police work. If police deserve to be excused from obeying laws or to receive special praise because of the danger and necessity of their job, then garbage collectors deserve it more.
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Re: Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
And let's not forget that a construction worker seeing a precariously bad stacked number of boxes does not have the option to remove the danger to himself by shooting the stack.
He has to unstack the whole thing to get the danger under control.
And yes, getting a dangerous situation under control in a conscionable manner respecting the value of life may well be precarious for a policeman. That's what their training should focus on rather than being cold-blooded killers.
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Re: Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
Especially when you are facing humans where you are interfering in THEIR lives.
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Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
/FSM forbid that you actually pay attention to the stats, eh?
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Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
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Re: Nice comparison of apples, oranges, and random rocks.
I personally do NOT want a cop to come to my house if I needed a firman or paramedics.
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i believe firefighters were TWICE as likely to be killed on the job as donut-eaters, but they don't seem to bark and bray about it like kops do...
at that point, cabbies were the most dangerous occupation to be murdered on the job, i think about 5-6 times more likely than kops...
where are the crowds at the funerals of cabbies ? guess they aren't as human as kops...
*snort*
another factoid: i think it somewhere north of 90% of all kops NEVER are in a situation where they have to draw their guns... so, NO, they are not ALL being exposed to incredibly dangerous situations daily... fact of the matter is, the absolute WORST situation kops hate to respond to, AND where there is a higher likelihood of some bad outcome, are 'domestic disturbances', not a crack ho, or gangbanger...
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Now is a good time to educate cops and the public.
===
Whenever I come across a list of the most dangerous jobs, 'police officer' never ever cracks the top ten.
The next time you hear someone yammering on about cops 'putting their life on the line, every day', you need to speak up and point out that farmers, construction workers, loggers, fishers, and even drivers/sales workers have far more dangerous than what cops do.
===
The argument, really a lie, that what cops do for a living is dangerous is used to justify all sorts of bad behaviour and bad policies by the law enforcement system. I'd be willing to wager that as many people die from shoveling snow as policemen die from being killed in the line of duty.
This baseless argument's repeated use is used to justify isolating the police officers from their community. The cops are told, repeatedly, to only way to treat the non-police public is as a danger, something that can only be dealt with by the business end of a gun, a taser, or by overwhelming police presence.
(This argument is also promoted by the arms industry, so they can benefit from increased law-enforcement budgets. Think of this, while you're being billy-clubbed, maced, or tasered, that your wallet is also being emptied by that cop.)
This isolation creates an 'us vs them' world view - a world view that engenders strategies and tactics which have proved so brutal, so unnecessary, and, ultimately, so counter-productive in war zones.
The cops are told, over and over, to treat the non-police public as dangerous, a something that should only be dealt with with the business end of a gun.
When I posted the above-pasted snippet of comment, it was replied to with "but, but, but what cops do is sooo dangerous, they have to dealt with drug-addled crazy people!".
Jeepers, what part of "The statistics prove that being a police officer isn't dangerous" don't they understand?
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Re: Now is a good time to educate cops and the public.
-C
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Re: Re: Now is a good time to educate cops and the public.
Because reading it myself, the general gist seemed to be 'police are trained to see everyone out of a uniform as a potential threat, which both leads to isolation of the police from the general public(rather difficult to be on friendly terms with someone who you're trained to see as a threat, or someone who has been trained as such), and leads them to resort to force far quicker, and far more often, than they should.'
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Re: Re: Re: Now is a good time to educate cops and the public.
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Looking at the numbers??
Now again, we can consider VietNam a pretty big success if you consider that the actual reason given for the war was to stop Communist expansion into SE Asia -- it did that. It's all a matter of what you criteria are (hope you can see the sarcasm here!).
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@6
the entire thread and article can say this...
american cops are violent and prone to shoot first rather then ask any questions regardless of the person they are talking too....the typical cop is as bad as any thug
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Detroit Police Chief says we need more armed citizens
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja &ved=0CDkQFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.detroitnews.com%2Farticle%2F20140103%2FMETRO01%2F3010300 38&ei=hqfKUsC1C9SrkQekw4BY&usg=AFQjCNH_KdHJLtHv7QMu5sN7Whl41yfO1w&sig2=f_soe7mYyKrV__EyS yydTQ&bvm=bv.58187178,d.eW0
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Danger
In an ambiguous situation when they are dealing with random people instead of hardened criminals I expect police officers to try to resolve problems as nonviolently as possible, even if that means taking a risk. If they can't do that we shouldn't respect them for "putting their lives on the line" because this is clearly not what they are doing. I want my police to hesitate before using deadly force!
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Re: Danger
All risk can be managed with these three controls. These don't eliminate the risks, but manage them. The risk a cop has is similar to a construction work, who has to wear a hardhat and wear a harness.
Expecting a cop to increase his risk exposure because the public doesn't like it is ridiculous. How is a cop going to tell a random person from a criminal? He must treat every situation as having risk, and therefore follow the administrative and engineering procedures to mitigate it.
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guess the wise thing to do is assume ALL KOPS ARE BAD...
after all, sauce for the goose...
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I partially disagree. It depends on how much increased risk exposure is being called for. If the call is that cops use violence as a last resort rather than in the top three resorts, I think that's reasonable even if it does increase the risk to the cops a bit.
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For example we could change our laws and require only non lethal options like rubber bullets while allowing only swat to have lethal force options. Yes it would make it more dangerous for police but being a cop it a dangerous job. It is supposed to be "to protect and to serve", not "to assault and to kill". This change would save lives and make it safer for all of us. Guaranteed.
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Often the police are being attacked on things like racial profiling (making decisions based on generalizations of personal characteristics and behavior ex. Stereotyping) when in fact is this not what you are doing for them??
It's easy to not consider all the good they do when we don't hear or see it in the news (instead only seeing the negative), also it appears natural to soo many people to resist law enforcement because of its functions. But remember they serve and protect, not serve and please. I think it takes a hell of an individual to still try and help their communities after so much Criticism and negativity.
Final thought- ask yourself have you ever been involved in one of these horrendous cop murders?? I think not, so how are you in any way a fair judge of the situation. Likewise, COP ARE NOT TRAINED TO SHOOT TO KILL, BUT SHOOT TO STOP. DEATH IS UNFORTUNATELY A SIDE EFFECT OF THIS. I say this because this is how 99% of officers take their training to heart, and these are NOT the officers acting as you say "judge jury and executioner" Some deaths may in fact be wrongful, but most often it is that persons actions that put them in the grave. And they will accept that in hell, so who are you to argue their case. Bis sp�ter meine Fruende.
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All are welcome
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One other thing missing in this piece is that people in general are exhibiting less and less self control. That is to say that rather than accept a speeding ticket or other police actions against them, they become unruly, rude, aggressive, and often downright hostile.
When you combine that with a society that arms itself to the teeth for "safety", you can see where the problems come from.
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'Course, there's a pretty big problem that would skew those stats, as while an officer is almost certain to report being attacked by someone, the reverse is very much not likely to be true.
After all, if someone got beat(or say, punched in the face for 'resisting arrest') by a badge wearing thug, you really think their first response would be to report it to more people wearing badges, especially given how widespread the belief is that police will pretty much always protect their own, via the ever so infamous 'blue wall of silence'?
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kops beat/shoot/taser someone/anyone to death? justifiable, NO MATTER THE CIRCUMSTANCES... mere citizen looks sideways at a kop, and suddenly they are charged with 10 different kinds of assault on a donut-eater ? ? ?
not a level playing field, is it ? ? ?
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However, I'll offer rampant speculation: that number is a hell of a lot higher than the "assaulted cops" number. I'm guessing we could exceed 52,000 on the west coast alone.
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Were you trying to curl up into a ball to protect yourself from batons and the butts of expended tasers? You were assaulting those poor, poor lawkeepers, you monster.
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That's because the police don't "assault" people. They employ "justifiable force".
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People love to exaggerate threats of vague menaces
Take anti-immigrant groups claiming illegal immigrants are armed with guns and 'leaving headless bodies in the Arizona desert'.
The fact is if illegal immigrants turn violent towards law enforcement it's almost always by throwing rocks or something else nearby according to police records.
Drug gangs around the border however (which are 50% US citizens, and 50% Mexicans) do use guns when they get violent, but they aren't illegal immigrants.
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The Worst Suicide I've ever seen.
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Per capita
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I'd like to see the category of "police" broken down into several categories like uniformed police vs plain clothes vs undercover. Also I'd like see urban vs suburban vs rural. And perhaps "regular" vs "special tactics (SWAT)".
Additionally, this sort of puts the lie to control claims that more guns make the policeman's job more dangerous.
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http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cfoi.t03.htm
If you remove stats of cops who died because of their own stupiduty (such as illegal chases), then it becomes one of the safest around.
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It would be more meaningful if it were compared to the number of people in each occupation. There were 429 fatalities in "management occupations", which is more than a lot of occupations on the list, for example farming, fishing, and forestry. However, that's not because it's so dangerous, but because there are so many people doing that.
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Public Safety
Like for instance, me. I work in a pharmacy, and deal with some really would-be dangerous people. Does that mean I should arm myself and shoot to kill anyone who looks like they might go off on me?
(By the way, too-I've been in a robbery situation-not pleasant at all, but guns were not involved, although threatening behavior was.)
Yeah-the public is full of very strange dangerous people-but it does not justify thinking they're all out to kill you.
Cops think that way, and look at the results. I'm not saying that they don't get into very dangerous and risky situations, but thinking first and shooting later sometimes would be a better course of action.
At least it would save money for the police departments and cities where lawsuits are filed for civilian deaths under "unexplained circumstances"
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At the risk of being pedantic, here's a page about 'Contempt of Cop' (coined by the same):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_cop
"Contempt of cop is law enforcement jargon in the United States for behavior by citizens towards law enforcement officers that the officers perceive as disrespectful or insufficiently deferential to their authority.
It is a play on words, and not an actual crime. The phrase is associated with arbitrary arrest and detention and is often discussed in connection to police misconduct such as use of excessive force or even police brutality as a reaction to disrespectful behavior rather than for any legitimate law enforcement purpose.
Charges such as disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and assaulting an officer may be cited as official reasons for a contempt of cop arrest. Obstructing an officer or failure to obey a lawful order is also cited in contempt of cop arrests in some jurisdictions, particularly as a stand-alone charge without any other charges brought."
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2012 - 221 F 117 K (338 Total)
2011 - 201 F 150 K (351 Total)
2010 - 211 F 110 K (321 Total)
2009 - 162 F 106 K (268 Total)
2008 - 190 F 124 K (314 Total)
2007 - 192 F 107 K (299 Total)
2006 - 217 F 133 K (350 Total)
2005 - 187 F 116 K (303 Total)
2004 - 190 F 143 K (333 Total)
2003 - 201 F 145 K (346 Total)
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cj...njured_2003-2012.xls
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cj...lts_topi c_page_-2012
So the statistics cited in the article suggest being a cop is safer than ever, but when I add these statistics it paints a different picture.
More cops are living because of better equipment, better training, better tactics, better mindset and better medical care - but they are being assaulted by deadly weapons just as often as before.
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Only if the number of cops has remained steady as well.
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Seems to me that this rule nullifies all other rules. Sounds like a pretty cushy job to me.
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THINK THIS THROUGH
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We tend to forget the truth of the matter and get lost in some some numbers, so here are some for you.
In law enforcement the FIRST & MOST IMPORTANT RULE is to get home to their family at the end of each shift. Most are hardworking honest people with families like you and I and in the prime of their lives. (Unfortunately the police world is given a bad rep by a tiny fraction of bad eggs). People who hate on the police are sorely mislead by a media that strives on hate and violence which people feed off of; because hearing all the good officers do would be boring. These are same people that boast that they are not fooled by the government and blah blah blah, not realizing that they are the ones incapable of producing a single good moral thought or decision on their own. Simply try to ask yourselves if the people hurt or injured by police are really so innocent and picked on by a paramilitaristic government, what were they doing to attract law enforcement's attention to begin with?
CLOSING THOUGHT- MOVE THE HELL OVER FOR EMERGENCY VEHICLES!!!!
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Re: We tend to forget the truth of the matter and get lost in some some numbers, so here are some for you.
Yeah, anybody shot by police was almost certainly guilty anyway... of SOMETHING. Really these trials are kind of a waste of time.
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Re: Re: We tend to forget the truth of the matter and get lost in some some numbers, so here are some for you.
Good thing the grand jury in Ferguson saved us that.
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Re: We tend to forget the truth of the matter and get lost in some some numbers, so here are some for you.
That is all anyone should be concerned about, not their job, but on getting home.
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Re btrussel
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Conclusions without basis
Police are much more competent now than in prior years.
If our police force is getting better and learning from past mistakes, you should expect to see the exact same trends. Police can't control how many deadly situations they enter, but through good training and learning from past mistakes, they can increase the odds that the police officer is the one to survive the deadly encounter rather than the criminal.
Regardless of the actual reason for the statistics you gave, you shouldn't just make up your own reasons for them and then blame cops, when it might be that they are doing their job exactly how we want them to be doing it.
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Re: Conclusions without basis
If our police force is getting better and learning from past mistakes, you should expect to see the exact same trends.
No, I would expect to see killings by police drop, as well as deaths of police.
Police can't control how many deadly situations they enter, but through good training and learning from past mistakes, they can increase the odds that the police officer is the one to survive the deadly encounter rather than the criminal.
First, you're tilting the table by describing every encounter as being between police and a "criminal".
Second, that's not that encouraging. I don't want police to survive by any means necessary, but that would lead to exactly the numbers we're seeing: huge drops in police fatalities, with numbers of people killed by police not dropping so much.
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Police work not NEARLY as dangerous as most think
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131230/15411225716/number-officers-killed-line-duty-drops-t o-50-year-low-while-number-citizens-killed-cops-remains-unchanged.shtml
Moreover, California has a particularly low cop death rate -- our CA five year average is 4.4 per 100,000 cops per year -- compared with the national average for ALL occupations in 2013 of 3.2 deaths per 100,000 per year.
http://www.governing.com/blogs/by-the-numbers/police-law-enforcement-safety-death-rates-by-stat e.html
There are many occupations more dangerous than police work. Any robust outdoor work is likely more fatal than what cops face. That includes truck drivers, construction laborers, extraction industries, farming, ranching, coaching(!) and a number of other jobs.
Here's an article I wrote in this in January, 2014:
http://riderrants.blogspot.com/2014/01/mortality-risk-for-police-and.html
Included is a list of more dangerous occupations with the numbers.
BTW, given our considerably better than average police (and firefighter) mortality rate in California, I puzzle over this anomaly:
The average California firefighter is paid 60% more than paid firefighters in other 49 states. CA cops paid 56% more.
http://tinyurl.com/CA-ff-and-cop-pay
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police deaths on duty
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That's a false dichotomy. There can be problems with both inadequate or ineffective policing and excessive use of force at the same time.
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Being a cop is less dangerous than being a garbageman, cops represent something like 20+% of all homicides in the country.
They murder about 1100 innocent people every year and 1000s upon 1000s of totally innocent dogs.
They are completely out of control
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Protect yourself by thinking ahead.
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https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/police1.jpg
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