SEATTLE — King County Sheriff John Urquhart has ordered deputies to wear mourning bands across their badges in support of the two New York police officers who were fatally shot Saturday.
According to The Seattle Times, deputies generally don’t wear mourning bands for line-of-duty deaths outside the Seattle region. But the sheriff says the ambush in Brooklyn was just “so egregious.”
Urquhart instructed deputies to wear the mourning bands until midnight on the day of the last funeral in New York.
The killings escalated tensions that have simmered for months after grand juries declined to indict white police officers in the deaths of Michael Brown in Missouri and Eric Garner in New York.
Officers in New York are now patrolling in two-person cars. Urquhart said he can’t do that because of staffing restraints.
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