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Sixty people have now lost their lives for the year at the hands of police, with almost a third of those fatalities occurring during the latest state of emergency. It's a figure that is almost twice that recorded over the same period (January 1 to October 3) in 2023, and a 50 per cent increase for the same period in 2024. It has reignited calls for body-worn cameras to be more widespread.
Data provided by the independent body tasked with investigating these incidents, the Police Complaints Authority (PCA), shows that the number of shooting incidents has also increased. For the period in 2023, there were 33 fatalities from 29 incidents. In 2024, there was a decrease in incidents to 25 but a jump in fatalities to 41. This year's 60 deaths came from 48 incidents, most of which occurred under both states of emergencies (SoE), during which police are given additional powers and ramp up operations.
In the first SoE, which the new year began under and ran until April 13, there were 26 fatal police shootings from 19 incidents. Since the most recent SoE was declared in July, there have been 19 (seven within the last month) killed in 17 incidents.
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