Another New York police officer killed himself Tuesday morning, continuing a rash of suicides that has claimed eight lives this year, rattled the nation’s largest police force and prompted commanders to issue urgent pleas to despondent officers to seek counseling.

More police officers commit suicide every year than are killed in the line of duty; since 2014, in New York City, an average of five officers have died each year by suicide.

But the apparent suicide of a 35-year-old off-duty officer in Yonkers put the city on track to have one of the worst years for police suicides in the last decade, and once again underscored the Police Department’s ongoing struggles to persuade officers that they should seek treatment if they are experiencing problems with mental health.

New York’s police commissioner, James P. O’Neill, declared a mental-health crisis in June and told officers that they could get confidential help from department chaplains, from peer support groups and from phone- and text-message hotlines.

That announcement came as the department grappled with four consecutive suicides in the span of weeks. On June 5, Deputy Chief Steven J. Silks, who was facing mandatory retirement, shot himself in his police vehicle. The next day, Detective Joseph Calabrese took his own life in a marsh in southern Brooklyn. Officer Michael Caddy fatally shot himself near his Staten Island precinct station house on June 14, and on June 26, Officer Kevin Preiss was found dead at his home in Long Island.

All four officers used their service pistols. Researchers have found police officers are at a higher risk of suicide than people in other jobs, because of the high stress of the work, peer pressure to keep emotions in check and constant access to firearms.

The police in Yonkers said they responded at 3 a.m. to a report of a suicide in a home in Shoreview Drive and found an New York City officer dead from a self-inflicted wound. The police said the officer was not alone in the house, but they do not suspect foul play.

The officer, who was not immediately identified, had been with the department for seven years, and had no blemishes on his disciplinary record, a law enforcement official said. He worked in the 50th Precinct and had been temporarily assigned to a detail at Yankee Stadium.

Edgar Sandoval is a metro reporter covering crime, courts and general assignments.  @edjsandoval

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