The risks posed as police officers serve warrants was highlighted on Monday when four law enforcement officers who were part of a U.S. Marshals Task Force, were fired upon and killed in North Carolina while serving an arrest warrant, the Associated Press reports. The attack in Charlotte also left the suspect dead and wounded four other officers, becoming the worst attack on police in the U.S. since 2016. From a larger perspective, the tragedy underscores the limits of even the best-trained officers and the unpredictability of the alleged criminals being served.
Alexis Piquero, a University of Miami criminology professor and a former director of the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, said that while officers prepare for danger, shootings are unavoidable because officers can’t predict how a suspect will react. All it takes is “a high-caliber weapon (and a) person with really evil intentions,” he said. That unpredictability is heightened for fugitives who are determined to avoid being in custody. “A lot of these guys don’t want to go back to jail,” said Tre Pennie, executive director of the National Fallen Officer Foundation. “And if it’s not a surprise, they got time to prepare. They’re going to do everything they can to keep from going back to jail.” In Charlotte, authorities will likely conduct an “after-event analysis” that will include interviewing officers and neighbors, Piquero said. The lessons learned will be of interest to law enforcement agencies across the country, he said, to make sure officers “can prevent this from ever happening again.”
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