Suicide Behind the Badge

More police officers die by suicide than in line-of-duty, data shows

Every year, more law enforcement officers, firefighters and corrections workers are lost to suicide than to on-duty crashes, accidents and assaults combined.

That’s according to Blue H.E.L.P., a nonprofit that provides information and support for law enforcement officers, and the creator behind National Law Enforcement Suicide Awareness Day, which falls on Sept. 26 each year.

Law Enforcement Suicide Data Collection (LESDC) 2022 Statistics

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The weight of the badge: Customs and Border Protection responds to rash of agent suicides 

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is dealing with a crisis all its own: a spike in suicides among agency staff. 

The issue was first widely publicized in December of 2022 when three Border Patrol agents died by suicide within a month. The agency has been keeping internal tabs since 2007: in that 17-year span, there have been 149 reported deaths, with a spike of 15 in 2008 and 14 in 2022 out of a workforce of around 20,000 Border Patrol agents and 60,000 total employees.

 A study tracking deaths of law enforcement officers more generally found that life expectancy for those in the line of duty is age 66, 12 years lower than the general population. “Working long hours and responding to high-stress situations, our men and women in green and blue are being pushed to their breaking point every single day,” Congressman Tony Gonzales wrote in a press release.

In May of 2023, the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) published a report, presented to the heads of CBP and ICE, that pinned the blame on overwork — as well as “poor public image” and “violence or threats of violence.” 

While the number of agents has remained relatively stable, migrant encounters along the border have ballooned 143% since 2019. 2022 saw a record 800 recorded migrant deaths; the agency also estimates a 303% increase in “gotaways,” or migrants that were detected but never caught. 

The result is demoralizing. Half the respondents to the report’s survey said they had been asked to take on extra duties and nearly a quarter struggled with “work-life balance.” Twenty percent said they felt that they were unable to perform their “primary law enforcement duties” as a result of the extra work. 

As part of its “Shine a Light” initiative, CBP hired renowned “suicidologist” Kent Corso — an Iraq War-veteran turned psychologist turned world-renowned mental health consultant — to help illuminate the path. One of Corso’s initiatives included recording a podcast that collects stories from within the agency that humanizes the internal struggles many agents face.  There are 21 stories accumulated in this podcast so far.