Author: Duane Wolfe
By Andrea Noble The Washington Times
WASHINGTON — Police in the D.C. area have seen an uptick in the number of fatal shootings involving officers this year, saying officers increasingly are coming under attack.
"One of the things we’re seeing more of is people attacking police instead of running," said Kristopher Baumann, chairman of Metropolitan Police Department’s Fraternal Order of Police union. "It’s a disturbing trend. We’ve had two officers shot this year."
Prince George’s County police reported the most significant increase — eight fatal shootings, compared with one last year. The Metropolitan Police Department has a similar number — five people killed in police-involved shootings in the District this year, compared with zero in 2010.
Fairfax County police report two fatal shootings this year, after two nonfatal shootings in 2010. Montgomery County police reported four departmental shootings in both 2010 and 2011, with one fatal each year. Arlington County Police Department reports no fatal shootings. The Alexandria Police Department could not be reached.
The shootings appear to be the result of a wide range of circumstances — from officers facing suicidal shooters and homicide suspects to people with mental-health issues. But officials also say the increase comes at a time when more officers are coming under attack.
In Prince George’s County, it has been an "unprecedented year," with three county police officers wounded in the line of duty, department spokeswoman Julie Parker said.
Statistics provided by the department show that from Jan. 1 through Aug. 8, county police reported 338 assaults on police officers, a number that projects to be roughly comparable to 2010, when there were 592 such assaults.
Last year, there were 16 assaults on officers that involved a handgun, while police recorded 11 such attacks through Aug. 8 this year.
Police say attacks involving handguns are likely to generate a forceful response.
"If someone is engaging us with a firearm, we are going to engage back," Prince George’s police spokeswoman Capt. Kara Lloyd said, adding that officers will use force equal to what is being used against them. "We’re being confronted by a lot of firearms."
Of the 15 total police-involved shootings in Prince George’s this year, 13 involved people armed with guns. Two of the fatal shootings occurred this month.
The county’s most recent police-involved shooting occurred Dec. 17, when Officer Michael Owen Jr. fatally shot a man who police said aimed a gun at him. Officer Owen, a two-year veteran, said he saw Rodney Deron Edwards, 35, lying in a grassy area along the side of a road and pulled over to help. That was when, police said, Edwards pointed a handgun at Officer Owen and another officer, and both returned fire.
Just three days earlier, county officers fatally shot a man during a standoff at the man’s home. Police said James Henry Peoples, 43, called police to report he was contemplating suicide. When Peoples came out of the house with a gun in hand and ignored commands to drop it, five officers opened fire, killing him.
The latest D.C. shooting also involved a man carrying a gun. Police were investigating a Dec. 12 report of a man thought to be high on PCP who was firing a gun in a Northeast neighborhood. They encountered Michael Epps, 20, who refused to drop the weapon when ordered, police said. At least four officers fired, killing Epps.
The number of assaults against MPD officers in 2011 is not available. However, data collected by the FBI shows a slight increase in the number of assaults on city officers from 2009 to 2010 — 969 to 998.
The National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund reports that the number of officers killed across the country has increased this year. As of Dec. 21, 65 have been killed in the line of duty, compared with 59 in 2010.
Mr. Baumann said specialized training at the MPD’s shooting range has helped officers prepare for an attack.
"They’ve done a really good job responding to those increases and making officers think about taking cover," Mr. Baumann said.
He said part of the training includes instructors re-enacting scenarios that officers have faced on D.C. streets.
But police-involved shootings often raise concerns in the community, as did the fatal shooting this summer of a mentally ill man in the District’s Mount Pleasant neighborhood.
Officers fatally shot Jean E. Louis, 55, after he barricaded himself in a bathroom in his Northwest home, then attacked an officer with a screw driver, police said.
Prince George’s County and the District have faced federal oversight because of concern about their police departments’ use of force. Prince George was under Justice Department oversight from 2004 to 2008 after a series of officer shootings and in-custody deaths.
In 2001, D.C. police entered into a memorandum of understanding with the Justice Department governing the use and display of force. The agreement ended in April 2008 after the District made substantial changes to the way it reports and investigates the use of force.
"We’re always concerned with police shootings," said Arthur Spitzer, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of the Nation’s Capital. "The good news, at least in D.C., is D.C. police instituted a pretty good system of investigations every time there is a shooting by police."
Copyright 2011 The Washington Times
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