For the second year in a row, more than one hundred security officers have been murdered on duty
Charlotte NC January 1, 2023
For the second year in a row, more than one hundred security officers have been murdered on duty.
The 2022 year ended as it came in. Violent. Three security officers were shot and critically wounded before the 2023 New Year came in. That brought the total number of security officers shot during 2022 to 701. 123 of those security officers died from their attacks.
Eighty-eight percent of them died after being shot.
In all, 167 security officers have died while on duty in 2022.
Each year, violence against private security officers has rapidly increased to the point that even some media outlets have recently reported on it. Several have questioned the lack of training and the fact that most security officers are not armed and cannot protect themselves from their attackers.
There were 7689 assaults of security officers reported and at least 1123 armed confrontations.
While these numbers are shocking, the reality is that they are lower than what our experience tells us occurred. Many assaults, even those that were armed, do not get reported to the police by employers or by the security officers themselves and local media rarely report attacks on security personnel even when they are fatal.
Private security officers also used an increased level of lethal force during the past year. There were at least 987 times when security officers fired their weapons which resulted in at least 103 fatalities. Twenty-seven of those security officers were charged in the shootings and eighteen other shootings have been referred to grand juries for review.
The use of private security outside of their normal observe and report or access control type duties have grown exponentially during the past five years as many companies and governmental entities look to the private security industry to fill the gap that the lack of law enforcement officers and the need for protection and enforcement has created.
In 2022, 43 local and county park systems, 61 school districts, 39 tourist or business districts, nine harbors, and countless retail, residential, and commercial businesses have hired private security to be that line between lawlessness and law and order.
14 schools, hospitals, and private businesses started their own police forces in 2022, determined to control the safety of their guests, patients, students, and staff.
With all of this in mind and knowing that private security will continue to be sought out to be more proactive and engaged in enforcement and detentions of lawbreakers, we must substantially increase training, recruitment standards, and wages, and ensure that all security staff has the proper protective gear including body armor, radio communications, and defensive weapons.
Injuries and deaths of security officers will continue to rise beyond imaginable numbers if we don’t take this violence seriously and change our thoughts about what physical security has become today.
