US cops; Gunfire Fatalities UP 26% in 2009

[russ1943]

Number of US cops killed by gunfire spikes in 2009
By COLLEEN LONG (AP) – 1 day ago
NEW YORK — Across the nation, 2009 was a particularly perilous year for officers involved in gun disputes.
Preliminary statistics from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund show the number of working officers killed by gunfire rose more than 20 percent from 2008.
Small spikes have been common over the years. But experts say they are surprised by the number of officers this year who have been specifically targeted.
Those include an officer gunned down in his patrol car while waiting for backup in Penn Hills, Pa., and four near Seattle who were ambushed in a coffee shop.
Police studies professor Eugene O'Donnell at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York says the trend "should be cause for grave concern." http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jq2tCn7DWNVZqLpr5ReGKkyc-C6gD9CHUGKO0



National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund: Gunfire Fatalities UP 26% in 2009
The total number of law enforcement officers actually killed declined to 123 thru December 21 2009 compared to 2008. The major reason for the decline was a 21% decline in traffic Incidents. The gunfire fatalities increased from 38 to 48 for that same time frame. http://www.nleomf.org/facts/officer-fatalities-data/
http://www.kfoxtv.com/news/21951038/detail.html http://forums.leoaffairs.com/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=94262&start=0&st=0&sk=t&sd=a


(For comparison, England/Wales with one fifth the population of the US has had three (3) officers, total, killed with firearms since 1997, about a dozen years.)http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs09/hosb0209.pdf Page 38

[cliffordu]

1. Antarctica had ZERO gun fatalities last year

If you don't count the horrible penguin on penguin violence....

[eqfan592]

2. Yet homicide rate is down 10% in general.

Interesting. I wonder if you have an overall point to make with this, though? Any thoughts as to why this number is so high this year in particular, as well as how to combat it?

The case in the Seattle area seemed to involve the police being specifically targeted. We had a police officer ambushed recently in my area by at least 3 people. Are these just isolated incidents, or were police officers more specifically targeted this year for some reason?

[cabluedem]

3. For the sake of our police, we need to crack down on gun-ownership. nt

[Tejas]

5. For the sake of our police, we need to crack down on the revolving door justice system.

[benEzra]

7. Ummm, no. Sending the police to "crack down" on 40% of U.S. households

would have a devastating effect on the social contract and the police-public relationship, and would not make anyone safer.

[SteveM]

8. Do you support longer prison terms for repeat violent offenders? Or...

just some more "gun-control" legislation?

[cabluedem]

11. I support removing guns from unstable antisocial people. Most gun owners fit that bill. nt

[AtheistCrusader]

14. I support removing free speech from excitable irrational posters.

Not really, but that makes about as much sense as what you just posted, considering all three recent shootings of Police officers in my state, were perfomed by assholes with no legal right to possess a firearm.

Targeting law abiding firearms owners will have no benefit in this situation.

[pipoman]

17. You...are an idiot..n/t

[SteveM]

18. How reckless and disingenuous...

You say "Most gun owners fit that bill ." This is a sweeping and deeply prejudiced statement that would rank right up there with any bigot's. Since I am sure you realize gun prohibition is a hopeless goal, then you express your sentiments because you really want to uncork your animosity in front of everybody. You are an example of where extremes of left and right come to meet.

[eqfan592]

21. Wow, if you want to see a possibly unstable, antisocial person....

...you should take a look in the mirror, cabluedem.

[PavePusher]

26. See my post #24.

Got an answer?

Or are you just a bigot?

[taurus145]

34. You really should seek help

brain injuries are nothing to be ignored. You must have had a massive brain trauma causing you to post such inane bullshit.

It's either that or you're searching for a socially acceptable way to spout your bigotry - and failing mightily.

What group are you going after next; people of color, people of faith, short people, tall people? After all, willfully ignorant bigotry can be very flexible.

[Callisto32]

37. Actually, I love people, and animals. I eschew violence. I own guns.

I do, however, not care to socialize with people that me that I am unstable and antisocial... And, yet, here I am, posting, in spite of myself.

[slackmaster]

9. Gun ownership is not the issue

The problem is criminality.

[spin]

19. Most gun control laws have focused on honest citizens...

I agree that we need to crack down on gun ownership, CRIMINAL gun ownership.

[PavePusher]

24. Are you volunteering to do so yourself?

Or are you going to send hired goons... with guns?

[rd_kent]

32. You are a hit-and-run posting coward........

[Callisto32]

36. For the sake of EVERYONE we need to END THE DRUG WAR!

[tisfortomi]

4. For the sake of our police, we need to crack down on gun-ownership...

...by violent felons.

[cabluedem]

12. The problem is that many gun owners commit crimes becuase they have a gun. nt

[DonP]

13. WTF!!!

Is this another case of Gun "Chi" where they give off invisible rays that make otherwise law abiding people commit crimes?

Or did you just reach way the hell up your colon this morning to pull that one out?

You sound like a freakin' Freeper blaming sex education for all teenaged sexual activity - no proof or examples - just because.

[AtheistCrusader]

15. Cluck cluck gibber gibber my old man's a mushroom, etc

[spin]

20. Estimates show 80 million gun owners with 300 million firearms ...

if your argument had any merit there would one hell of a lot more crime.

In the time frame from 1973 to 2007 millions of new firearms were purchased by civilians in the United States. By your theory crime should have skyrocketed.

However:



http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/glance/tables/viortrdtab.cfm







A better argument could be made that more guns results in less crime. (Better police work is probably the leading cause of the crime decrease.)

Police are actually starting to treat gangs as terrorist organizations and targeting gang members. Gangs are fighting back. We could save a lot of police officers if we stopped trying to arrest criminals and they all just sat around donut shops. Hopefully, we will not withdraw our police from the streets. If we do, this country will have and crime and violence rate similar to Mexico.

edited to add comments

[Caliman73]

22. That is a riduculous statement with no proof.

Criminals do arm themselves with firearms to commit crimes because they are effective at intimidating people, or in hurting or killing their intended victims. However the gun is not the cause of the violence, it is a tool with which people who already have criminal motivations use to carry out their crimes. The vast majority of the 80 million people who legally own firearms do not commit any crimes at all with those 200 to 300 million firearms.

[PavePusher]

27. Thou art Troll(tm).

[rd_kent]

31. That makes no sense. Can you back up your claim with facts?

[beevul]

33. Are they like people who...

Are they like people who speed because they have a car?

Or people that drive drunk because they have a car AND alcohol?

Or men that rape women BECAUSE they have penises?

People that fix things because they have tools?


Get a grip.

[taurus145]

35. Idiocy such as your knows no bounds

as does your idiotic bigotry.

It must be wonderful to be so willfully ignorant and smug, comfortable in your fantasy world. Bliss comes to mind, as in "Ignorance is..."

[Callisto32]

38. Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Epic. Logic. Fail.

[Retired AF Dem]

41. Go away

Since you haven't nothing useful to say.

[benEzra]

6. Actually, the 2009 rate is still lower that it's been in many years...

2008 was unusually low (the lowest since 1956, in fact). When you get down into events which are that rare, stochastic fluctuations represent larger percentage changes than they would if the event were more common. The "sky is falling" types said the same thing in 2007, another upward-blip year, but the trend is still downward.

[AtheistCrusader]

16. I am definetly worried about the recent trend of our Police getting targeted

Started out one or two, but now, to some violent shitbags, it seems to have become 'a good idea', or a copycat type thing.

This shit needs to stop. I can think of one place to start: Let all the non-violent offenders, like the damn pot smokers out, and keep the violent offenders in jail for the full term of their sentence.

[PeaknikB]

23. That is a fallacy

The people in prison are not there for a little bit of marijuana, if they are there because of marijuana it's because it's the 5th time they've been caught with it. Prison isn't full of people who were arrested for a baggy of marijuana.

[AtheistCrusader]

25. County jails are.

That contributes to overpopulation. Plus, I don't care if someone has been caught 5 times with a baggie of pot, or if that person is buying in bulk for personal use, but ran afoul of 'intent to distribute' mandatory penalties.

[PavePusher]

28. So they had M-J 5 times....

WHO CARES?

That's like saying I have 5 bottles of wine in my house.

[benEzra]

39. I agree 100%.

Letting violent repeat offenders out to make room for people busted for possession or cultivation of non-approved herbs makes no more sense from a public safety standpoint than locking up people for alcohol possession did.

[dmallind]

10. When you are dealing with low numbers, isolated incidents cause spikes

When four cops are killed in one planned event, that's a big jump on its own from a base of 38. There are simply not enough data to extrapolate a meaningful trend. Certainly it has nothing at all to do with gun ownership in toto. Applying any kind of ratio between number of gun owners, or number of guns, to either 38 or 48 would disppear in a string of post-point zeroes. And would be lower than the number found by applying the same ratio to the UK ironically - as there are almost zero legally owned guns there.

I'd be willing to bet few if any of these 48 were committed by people who were legally entitled to own those firearms. Cop killing isn't exactly an entry level crime (very rare cases of truly pathological types going for "suicide by cop" notwithstanding).

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

29. So now you are advocating taking firearms away from the cops. That's ridiculous.

[beevul]

30. Context is important here: Up 26 percent from "the lowest levels in 52 years."

The statistics show 2008 has been "one of the safest years for U.S. law enforcement in decades," wrote two groups: the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund and Concerns of Police Survivors.

Based on preliminary data, the groups found that 140 law enforcement officers were killed in 2008 -- 86 of them accidentally and 54 intentionally.

Just the year before, the group found 181 deaths -- 108 of them accidental and 73 intentional.

"Fewer officers were killed by gunfire in 2008 than in any year since 1956," the report says. "Preliminary data indicate 41 officers died in firearms-related incidents this year, compared with 68 in 2007, a reduction of 40 percent."

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/12/29/police.deaths.down/index.html

An increase in 26 percent from the previous years 52 year low levels.


Replaced "8" with "2".

[Euromutt]

40. So the number of fatal LEO shootings went from "remarkably low" to "just below average"

As other posters have noted, 2008 saw a remarkably low number of fatal LEO shootings compared to recent years. Here's the FBI's statistics on felonious killings of LEOs, 1999-2008 http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/killed/2008/data/table_27.html

During that period, the average number of felonious fatal LEO shootings was ~48.6, and the average would have been higher were it not for the fact that 2008, with 35 fatal shootings, was a comparatively quiet year. A 26% increase from the 2008 level gives us 44 felonious fatal shootings, still well below the average of the previous ten years.

This is a non-story. While I don't want to trivialize the loss of life, and the attendant emotional distress upon the officers' families, to suggest that we are somehow witnessing an unprecedented surge in violence against law enforcement officers is simply false.