On the afternoon of April 18, 2011, Bowie County (TX) Deputy Sheriff Sherri Jones, 54, was in the basement of the Bowie County Courthouse, leading a prisoner from a mental hearing to the transport van to take him to the state institution. No one else, besides Deputy Sherri and the prisoner, was in the basement at the time.

At about 2:30 pm, the prisoner allegedly overpowered Deputy Jones, took her service weapon, and fatally shot the six-year law enforcement veteran in the head. The prisoner then stole the transport van and fled to Arkansas where he was taken into custody by authorities. Deputy Jones—a mother, grandmother, and dedicated public servant—was pronounced dead at the scene.

Sheriff James Prince said of his colleague, Deputy Jones, “This lady would not harm a fly. You could not ask for a better employee or a nicer lady,” he said. “She was a good officer.”

Unfortunately Deputy Jones is neither the first nor the last woman to make the ultimate sacrifice in the performance of duty. After all, women have been serving in law enforcement since the mid-19th century.

In 1854, the first known police matrons (also called jail matrons) were hired by New York City to search and guard female prisoners, but they were civilians with no law enforcement powers. Before long—as early as 1891, when Marie Owens was appointed to the Chicago Police Department—women were granted powers of arrest and became sworn policewomen, and by the end of World War I, there were policewomen in more than 200 U.S. cities. In 1922, the International Association of Chiefs of Police affirmed that women were essential members of any modern police department. By 1960, the number of policewomen was twice that in 1950 and almost equal to the cumulative total in the 50 years since Alice Stebbins Wells became one of the earliest sworn policewomen in 1910.

Since women first entered the law enforcement profession, 257 have had their names inscribed on the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, DC. The first was Anna Hart, a jail matron with the Hamilton County (OH) Sheriff’s Department. On July 24, 1916, she was beaten over the head with an iron bed post by a prisoner in the county jail who was attempting to escape. Matron Hart was also the first of 28 female correctional officers to be killed in the line of duty.  Following Matron Hart was Mary Davis, a matron with the Wilmington (DE) Police Department who had a similar fate when she was beaten to death by a female prisoner during an escape attempt on May 11, 1924.

Fifty years later, Washington, DC Metropolitan Police Officer Gail Cobb, 24, was gunned down while trying to arrest a bank robber she had tracked to a downtown garage on September 20, 1974. She is the only female officer in the history of her department to die in the line of duty and the nation’s first African-American policewoman to make the ultimate sacrifice.

While Officer Gail Cobb’s funeral was held nearly four decades ago, the words spoken that day by a police chaplain ring loud and true, “Her death established the fact that the criminal makes no distinction between the sexes.” 

Of the 257 female officers honored at the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, 130 were killed in traffic-related incidents, 90 were shot to death, and 33 died from various other causes. The average age of all 257 fallen female officers was 36 and the average length of service was about eight years.

The Detroit (MI) and Puerto Rico Police Departments share the unwanted distinction of having the most female officers killed in the line of duty of all agencies, with six each.

On September 11, 2001, the deadliest day in law enforcement history, 72 law enforcement officers were killed in the heroic response to the terrorist attacks.  Two of those fallen heroes were women:  New York City Police Officer Moira Smith; and Captain Kathy Mazza of the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey Police Department.

The deadliest year for women in the history of law enforcement was 2002 when 15 female officers died in the performance of duty.  Eleven women serving in law enforcement made the supreme sacrifice in 2011, and, based on preliminary information, 10 female officers were killed in the line of duty in 2012. 

One of the most recent female officers added to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial was Ellen Engelhardt, 58, a trooper with the Massachusetts State Police.  She succumbed to injuries sustained about eight years earlier when a drunk driver plowed into her patrol vehicle going nearly 100 mph. Since the crash on June 26, 2003, Trooper Engelhardt suffered from severe brain damage and was unable to walk, talk, or feed herself.

“Trooper Engelhardt loved the Massachusetts State Police and the job loved her back,” said State Police Colonel Marian J. McGovern, Engelhardt’s drill instructor when she became one of the first women on the force.

“People wanted to be in her company. She made them feel good. She did not have a heavy hand with tickets, though,” McGovern joked. “We used to laugh about it.”

From less than two percent of the law enforcement ranks in the early 1970s to about 12 percent today, women continue to make important contributions to the  profession. As we celebrate National Women’s History Month (March), we remember and honor the admirable women of law enforcement who put their lives on the line each and every day for the safety and protection of others.

 Craig W. Floyd is Chairman of the National law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund and a regular contributor to American Police Beat.  Visit www.LawMemorial.org for more information about law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty.

(NOTE TO EDITOR: This article will be published in the March 2013 issue of AMERICAN POLICE BEAT, a national law enforcement publication.  It may be reprinted in whole, or part, in your publication, but it must include the following attribution:  “Reprinted with permission of the author and AMERICAN POLICE BEAT.”)

Republished 3/23/13 0115 Hours PST