WASHINGTON, DC, Jan 14 – Cop killers had an unprecedented record year in 2021, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. 458 police officers lost their lives on the job – a number that has never been seen before in the annals of police history in the United States. Sixty-two of those deaths were caused by gunshots; in 19 of those incidents, the cops were ambushed.
The fund reported that “According to preliminary data compiled by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund (NLEOMF), as of December 31, 2021, 458 federal, state, tribal and local law enforcement officers died in the line-of-duty in 2021. This is an increase of 55% from the 295 officers killed during the same period last year and is the highest total line-of-duty officer deaths since 1930 when there were 312 fatalities.”
The bad guys that perpetrated these crimes against law and order were abetted by the COVID pandemic, according to the organization’s report. Police officers, like health care providers, are particularly in danger of succumbing to the disease. The fund says that 301 of last year’s police fatalities were due to COVID, up significantly from the 182 officers who died from the virus in 2020.
As regards the 62 firearms fatalities, the fund reported that:
- 19 were ambushed and killed
- 8 were investigating suspicious activities or persons
- 7 were attempting an arrest
- 7 were killed responding to domestic disturbance calls, which led to a tactical situation and an ambush
- 7 disturbance calls, which led to a tactical situation
- 3 were killed during traffic enforcement, which led to an ambush
- 3 were fatally shot responding to burglary or robbery in-progress calls
- 3 involved drug-related investigations
- 2 were killed during tactical encounters
- 2 were inadvertently and accidentally shot and killed
- 1 was killed during an encounter with a suicidal subject
We’ve come a long way from the days when citizens went out of their way to tell a beat cop; thanks for your service. These days your neighborhood sentinels are more likely to be spit upon. As a result, more and more experienced police officers are retiring or taking a kinder, gentler job. Even more, are having regrets that they joined the police force in the first place.
As Jack Rinchich, president of the 4,000-member National Association of Chiefs of Police, told U.S. News, “There’s no doubt in my mind that what’s transpiring in our nation today is contributing to the lack of retention and the difficulty in hiring new officers. A lot of cops right now, in view of the environment, are saying, ‘Hey, I’ve gone 20, 30 years without being sued, shot, or divorced. I’m going to get out while I have an opportunity.”
Police departments across the nation are losing officers daily and are finding it harder and harder to recruit replacements. That’s bad news for law enforcement and good news for the “Defund the Police” anarchists. America’s law-abiding citizens are caught in the middle.
Mike Neilon at the Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police told U.S. News, “It’s the perfect storm. We are anticipating that the department is going to be understaffed by several hundred members because hundreds of guys are either retiring or taking other jobs and leaving the department.”
Haverford Township Police Chief John Viola in Delaware said,” It’s something that all departments have recognized as something that’s getting harder and harder. People don’t want to be police anymore. It’s a good job and good-paying job, but when you look at national news every day, people just don’t want to be officers.”
Chief Viola added that annually as many as 300 men and women used to apply for a job in his department, but these days he’s lucky if he has 70 applications a year.