Police Fatalities Spike in 2007

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2007Dec27/0,4670,PoliceDeaths,00.html

US Police Fatalities Spike in 2007

Thursday, December 27, 2007

WASHINGTON - A record number of fatal traffic incidents and a double-digit

spike in shooting deaths led to one of the deadliest years for law

enforcement officers in more than a decade.

With the exception of 2001, which saw a dramatic increase in deaths because

of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, 2007 was the deadliest year for law

enforcement since 1989, according to preliminary data released jointly by

the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund and Concerns of Police

Survivors.

The report counted the deaths of 186 officers as of Dec. 26, up from 145

last year. Eighty-one died in traffic incidents, which the report said

surpassed their record of 78 set in 2000. Shooting deaths increased from 52

to 69, a rise of about 33 percent.

"Most of us don't realize that an officer is being killed in America on

average every other day," said Craig W. Floyd, chairman of the National Law

Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.

Officer fatalities have generally declined since peaking at 277 in 1974, the

report said. Historically, officers have been more likely to be killed in an

attack than to die accidentally and shootings outnumbered car crashes. But

those trends began to reverse in the late 1990s. This year, about six of

every 10 deaths were accidental.

Floyd credited technology improvements with helping reverse the trend.

Safety vests save lives and non-lethal devices such as electric stun guns

prevent some fatal encounters, he said. He attributed the spike in shooting

deaths to the increase in violent crime nationwide.

"Law enforcement is the front line against violent criminals," he said.

Of the 81 traffic deaths this year, 60 officers died in car crashes, 15 were

hit by cars and six died in motorcycle crashes.

Police departments have worked to limit high-speed chases and only seven of

the car crashes were attributed to such pursuits, Floyd said. Crashes

involving a single police cruiser responding to a call were far more common,

he said.

After traffic crashes and shootings, physical causes such as heart attacks

were the leading cause of death, contributing to 18 fatalities. Other causes

of death included smaller categories such as airplane and boating accidents,

for an additional 18 fatalities.

Texas led the nation with 22 fatalities followed by Florida (16), New York

(12), and California (11). The report includes the death of 17 federal law

enforcement officers, including five Air Force Office of Special

Investigations agents killed in two bombings in Iraq.

The report counted six times in which multiple officers were shot and killed

in the same incident, such as the September shooting in Odessa, Texas that

left three officers dead while responding to a domestic violence call.

Domestic violence and traffic stops were the circumstances that most

commonly led to fatal police shootings this year, the report found.

The average age of officers who died in 2007 was 39. Most were men and had

served an average of about 11 years in law enforcement.