By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
The number of law enforcement officials killed in 2015 is one of the lowest on record, according to newly released FBI data.
FBI records indicate 41 police officers were intentionally killed the U.S., a 20% decline from the year before, the Huffington Post reports.
Of the officers shot, all but three were shot by a suspect. The others were intentionally hit by cars.
“Any felonious death of a police officer is a tragedy, but the data show that the police officers’ job is not becoming more deadly,” David Harris, a professor of law at University of Pittsburgh School of Law who studies policing, told The Huffington Post.
“The FBI statistics on police officer felonious deaths show that belief that the job is growing more dangerous, because of protests against police or because of the demand for reform to police practices, is simply wrong,” Harris wrote in an email. “Belief to the contrary may be sincere, but it has no basis in fact.”
Since 1980, the average number of law enforcement officers killed each year was 64.
