Police Training Focuses on the Wrong Threats

An officer’s training often has an overwhelmingly disproportionate emphasis on tactical skills such as those dealing with firearms and self-defense, which represent a small fraction of the dangers encountered on the job.

By contrast, the least amount of training is provided in the aspect that presents the greatest threat to an officer’s mortality: suicide. Each year, according to available data, police officer suicides exceed the number of police officers killed by two to three times. 

Our view, supported by extensive fact-based research, is that the more comprehensive an officer’s training the less likely that officer is to be killed or injured in the line of duty, or to kill or injure a member of the population.