Police feeling under siege after attacks: Attorney General

[July 21, 2016]    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said on Wednesday that American police officers were feeling under siege following the recent attacks in Dallas and Baton Rouge and that the Justice Department was offering training as one way to help.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch testifies before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S. July 12, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Asked what she thought was the cause of the attacks on police officers, Lynch said "we see a number of different causes." She noted that a police captain in Kansas City, Kansas, had been killed on Tuesday while responding to a call, the kind of work police everywhere do daily.

"We have also seen, as you are aware, situations where officers have been directly targeted and ambushed," she added, referring to the Dallas and Baton Rouge attacks, which left eight police officers dead.

"Certainly law enforcement is feeling under siege because of these incidents and they are tragic," Lynch told a news conference, encouraging the public to be as supportive of police as possible.

(Reporting by Julia Edwards; Writing by David Alexander; Editing by Eric Walsh)

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