A total of 38 law enforcement personnel have been murdered thus far in 2021, equating to a 41% rise compared to data from 2020, according to tabulations made by the Officer Down Memorial Page. By June 19 of last year, 27 officers were pronounced dead in situations considered homicides out of a total of 50 who died similarly throughout 2020 as a whole.
In 2019, 24 officers were killed in the same frame, equating to a 58% increase this year, while in 2018, 33 were killed in a similar fashion, a 15% rise. In 2017, 27 were murdered, a 41% rise, and in 2016, only 22 were pronounced dead in circumstances considered homicides, equating to a 73% uptick in 2021.
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In total, 58 policemen were murdered in 2019, 59 were pronounced dead in circumstances considered homicides in 2018, 54 were killed deliberately in 2017, and 72 were killed in all of 2016.
Thus far this year, 153 law enforcement personnel, in addition to nine K-9 officers, have been pronounced dead when COVID-19, duty-related illnesses, drownings, accidental vehicle crashes, and 9/11-related ailments are factored in.
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Iowa Correctional Officer Robert McFarland was pounded to death with a hammer on March 23, Sgt. Dominic Vaca of the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department in California was shot dead through an ambush in pursuit of a fleeing motorcyclist on May 31, and Officer Dominic Jared Winum of the Stanley Police Department in Virginia was riddled with bullets throughout a traffic stop before he could exit his patrol car on Feb. 26.
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In one of the most well-known incidents on April 2, U.S. Capitol Police Officer William Evans was rammed and killed with a car outside the Capitol building in Washington by a knife-wielding man who was later shot dead. Evans later laid in honor within the Capitol Rotunda, an honor seldom kept for anyone other than a prominent U.S. political figure or foreign dignitary.
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Earlier in June, FBI Director Christopher Wray brought the spotlight to what he called a "troubling" trend in police killings.
"Over the past year, we’ve seen a troubling uptake in violence against members of the law enforcement community," Wray announced on June 10 during testimony before the House Judiciary Committee.
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"To put that in perspective, that’s almost two law enforcement officers shot and killed every week, and that’s not counting all those officers who’ve died in the line of duty facing the countless other inherent dangers of the job, like racing in pursuit of a suspect, and dying in a car accident, or drowning in an attempted rescue, or even the scores of officers who have died from COVID-19, because law enforcement, of course, kept coming to work every day, right through the teeth of the pandemic," he continued.
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