The year 2023 ended by setting a new record for the number of police officers shot in the line of duty. According to the National Fraternal Order of Police, more than one officer was injured by a gunshot every 24 hours (378 in total). These figures mean that since 2018 these attacks have increased by 60%. However, the number of officers killed last year was 46, the lowest of the last six years.
The National FOP report on officers shot in 2023 has just been released and the results are horrifying!
378 officers shot, highest number since we started tracking the data.
60% increase in officers shot since 2018.
115 ambush attacks that resulted in 138 officers shot.
46… pic.twitter.com/aR2vOeyi2b
— National Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) (@GLFOP) January 2, 2024
115 ambushes left 138 agents injured by gunshots
The organization highlights a fact that particularly worries them: it´s a police hunt. During 2023, 138 officers were shot in 115 ambushes which sole objective was to attack uniformed officers. 20 police officers lost their lives in these types of assaults. In addition, many of them were shot while they were eating, sitting at their post, and even "in five cases, targeted and murdered while at their home or on their way home." It should be noted that the NFO does not include the "countless" occasions in which an officer is shot but not hit by bullets.
Although the number of agents who lost their lives in the line of duty is the lowest in the last six years, the number of officers injured by gunshots has been growing year after year since 2018. This year, 237 were registered, which increased to 293 in 2019. Since 2020 the figure has not dropped below 300: 312 in that year, 346 in 2021, 331 (a slight decline) in 2022 and 378 last year.
Medical and technological improvements reduced the lethality of attacks
The president of the police organization, Patrick Yoes, highlighted that "Thankfully, because of dramatic improvements in medical trauma science and anti-ballistic technology, the lethality of these attacks has been reduced and only 46 of the officers shot in the line of duty were killed." However, Yoes expressed his regret that the number of attacks does not seem to have a ceiling:
Last year, over 330 police officers were shot in the line of duty. With the COVID-19 pandemic behind us and after so many Americans have seen the tragic consequences of the defund the police movement, it was our hope that these numbers would be a high-water mark. We were wrong.
2021, the year with the most officers murdered
Without a doubt, the darkest year was 2021, in which 64 agents were shot to death. In 2022, with 62, deaths also exceeded 60, while the rest of the courses are closer to 50: 53 in 2018, 50 in 2019, 47 in 2020 and 46 last year.
By state, Texas is the one that recorded the most attacks (39) against law enforcement. They are followed by Pennsylvania (25), California (22) and Tennessee (21). Florida and Georgia suffered 17 such attacks. Curiously, Washington DC , despite its high crime rate, is one of the places where the fewest officers were injured by gunshots (2) in the entire country.
