Law enforcement fatalities jump 37%ATLANTA -- Two officers in an Alaska town were ambushed as they chatted on a street. A California officer and deputy were killed by an arson suspect as they tried to serve a warrant. Two officers doing anti-drug work were gunned down by men along a busy Arkansas highway. These so-called cluster killings of more than one officer helped make 2010 a particularly deadly year for law enforcement. Deaths in the line of duty rose 37 percent to about 160, up from 117 in 2009, according to numbers as of Tuesday compiled by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, a nonprofit group that tracks police deaths. There also was a spike in shooting deaths. Fifty-nine federal, state and local officers were killed by gunfire in 2010, a 20 percent jump compared with 2009, when 49 were killed. The total does not include the death of a Georgia State Patrol trooper shot twice in the face Monday night in Atlanta as he tried to make a traffic stop. Also, 73 officers died in traffic incidents, up from 51 in 2009, according to the data. The deaths were spread across more than 30 states and Puerto Rico, with the most killings reported in Texas, California, Illinois, Florida and Georgia. Ten of the shooting deaths came from five incidents in which officers were shot in groups. CUT |
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