Number of fatal police shootings England and Wales 2004-2019

In 2018/19 the police in England and Wales fatally shot three people, compared with four in the previous reporting year, and six in 2016/17. Between April 2018 and March 2019, there were 13 incidents where the police discharged firearms, five more than in 2017/18 and the highest in a single reporting year since 2008/09.

How many police officers are armed?

  There are over 149 thousand police officers in England and Wales, covering a population of approximately 59.4 million. Of these 149 thousand police officers, the number of armed police officers was just over 6.5 thousand. In general, the police in the United Kingdom do not have a tradition of carrying firearms, with the country having some of the strictest gun laws in the world.

 Comparisons with the United States

  Among developed countries the United States is something of an outlier when it comes to police shootings. In 2020, it was estimated that the police in the United States fatally shot 999 people. Between 2015 and 2019, the rate of fatal police shootings among Black Americans was 30 per one million people, 23 per million people for Hispanic Americans and 12 per million people for white Americans.