Ran across this comment recently on Facebook: (Was initially going to author a Facebook post in response, but I probably have a bit too much to say for that forum.)
“40 Police Officers, count ’em…40, have been killed year to date so far. Yet the lamestream media, the Al Sharpton’s, Jesse Jackson’s, Barrack Hussein Obama’s, Eric Holder’s and other race baiting a-holes SCREAM police brutality and racism when a thug and/or criminal is killed by police.
Where are the protests and rallies demanding that thug criminals stop killing police officers?”
And I thought – wow, 40? That seems like a lot. Have there really been 40 cops who were “killed by thugs” this year? So, I took about 20 seconds of my day to answer the question. (Google is amazing – wish more people used it.) And here is how the 44 line of duty deaths this year break down for police officers nationwide:
9/11 related illnesses: 2
Accidental: 1
Automobile accident: 12
Accidental gunfire: 2
Heart attack: 11
Motorcycle accident: 1
Struck by vehicles: 2
That is 31 of the 44 deaths that had absolutely nothing to do with any thugs. So what about the other 13? Let’s take a look.
Vehicle pursuits: 2 (Both officers crashed their cars while pursuing vehicles. The operators of the vehicles being pursued were immediately arrested.)
Assault: 1 (An officer sustained a concussion breaking up a large bar fight in 2005. He underwent surgery where there were complications that made him a quadriplegic and eventually died 10 years later. The person who pushed him to the ground was immediately arrested and then convicted and served 3 years in prison.)
So, it doesn’t look like those 3 cases involved thugs intentionally killing cops either. What about the remaining 10 deaths? Well they were all from gunfire. So this must be what the original poster is pissed about. Let’s take a look at the 10 cops killed by gunfire year to date.
Every one of those 10 cops was shot and killed while performing their duty. Of the 9 suspects (1 suspect killed 2 officers), 5 were shot, 4 were killed. The 5 suspects who lived were all arrested.
So, not 44. 10. Still tragic. But 10. How does that compare to the number of citizens killed by cops? It’s hard to say.
Here’s a list of 420 so far this year: http://killedbypolice.net/
And how many of these families saw justice? I’m guessing not many.
According to the most recent data available from BLS, law enforcemnt has a 10.6 fatal injury rate. That’s a dangerous job for sure and puts it in the same neighborhood as some other dangerous occupations like: painters (9.4), supervisors of mechanics (11.0), passenger transportation workers (11.8), and waste management services (11.2). Thankfully the cops don’t work in these industries: farmers (22.9), mining machine operators (26.9), roofers (40.5), aircraft pilots (50.6), fishermen (75.0), or loggers (91.3).
So, do blue lives matter? Of course. The protesters aren’t claiming otherwise. They are pointing out the huge disparity in the application of force against their community and the lack of justice when cops kill their sons. There is a real problem in this country with excessive and unwarranted police force. If you can’t see that, put down the Fox News and try google. It’s your friend.
thebosnlocker 
Oh Boats, I wish so much there were more folks like you who do their homework instead of blindly following the bigoted rabble-rousing clowns at faux noise!!
You and I both Monique. I’m such a fan of skepticism. Love people who question everything and form their own opinions.
Of the 420, how many of them were bad shootings? Meaning the cop should be brought up on charges. So when you take out all those who REALLY were threatening a cops life and where the cop had every right to shoot him, how many were unjustified? NO…I am not going to read all of them to find out. So the real question is, of those that were bad shootings, where is the justice for those. Thoughts?
First of all, apologies for the delay in approval. Hockey game last night. Actual work this morning.
I would first just point out that the point of my post wasn’t to say that 420 people were murdered by cops. I never said that. I was trying to point out how easy it is to research something rather than take it at face value because it fits your own personal prejudices and beliefs and then run with it. It was very easy for me to verify the “40 cops were murdered by thugs” point. I only had to look at 44 cases and I found that 44 isn’t the actual number. As for the specifics of the 420 people killed by cops, I’m like you – no time or desire to wade through that much data.
But, just for the sake of speculation, where do you think the number lies? If you had to take a guess, have there been more than 10 people who were killed by cops that didn’t deserve to die this year? Whatever the number is, do you think cops were immediately arrested and charged in 100% of the cases? I think we can both agree that the number of people who are unnecessarily killed by cops is higher than the number of cops killed by thugs. And I think we can both agree that it is much more likely for the family of a murdered cop to receive justice for their family member than the family of someone killed by a cop. And that is what the protests are all about.