Scary Increase In Police Officer Casualties

By: Priscilla Yau

Officials are worrying whether or not the recent increase in police officer
shootings is a coincidence. This past weekend, at least eleven officers have been shot
throughout the country.
This problem started on Sunday when four cops were injured in a precinct where
a gunman took fire in Detroit, another two were shot in a Walmart parking lot in
Washington, and an officer in Indianapolis was severely injured in a traffic stop shooting.
In Detroit, a 38-year-old gunman walked into the precinct and started shooting.
Commander Brian Davis and two other officers are critically injured and are undergoing
surgery and treatment currently. The fourth officer shot was a female sergeant that was
wearing a bulletproof vest.
Two sheriff deputies were non-severely wounded when a 31-year-old gunman
Anthony Martinez began shooting at them in a Walmart in Washington. A female
teenager was shot in the scene and died later at the Tacoma General Hospital; details
don’t show if she was an innocent bystander or knew the shooter. However, the third
deputy that was left unwounded returned fire and killed Martinez, leaving the scene with
two dead and two injured.
In Indianapolis, 29-year-old officer David Moore was shot twice in the face and
hit in the spine, but is still alive in critical condition at Wishard Hospital. Doctors
announced that the shooting injured key blood vessels to the brain but did not directly
injure the central nervous system. Moore was attacked on Sunday when suspect Thomas
Hardy began shooting after running away from allegedly robbing a nearby Dollar General
store.
On Monday, incidents in Florida and Oregon left two officers dead and a U.S.
Marshal and another officer critically injured. Sergeants Tom Baitinger and Jeffrey
Yaslowitz were shot dead and a U.S. Marshal (whose name was not released) was injured
while approaching the home of a known sex offender in St. Petersburg, Hydra Lacy Jr., to
arrest him for an aggravated battery charge. Lacy was also shot dead at the scene.
In Lincoln City, Oregon, Officer Steven Dodds was shot multiple times during a
traffic stop for speeding. The shooter drove off and continued running away when other
officers started chasing the green utility SUV. The shooter was never caught and the
officer is still in critical condition at the hospital.
Spokesman for the International Union of Police Associations Richard Roberts
said, “While all the shootings don’t appear to be connected, they have one thing in
common. We don’t have any data, but there seems to be a type of criminal out there
looking to thwart authority.” According to the National Law Enforcement Officers
Memorial Fund, the total fatalities in 2011 is seventeen, an eleven percent change from
last year which had nineteen total fatalities.