Lives countdown issue for Flash game

[aolle79]

I have a simple flash game with a spaceship and enemy ships. When my player gets hit and killed, the lives text field should subtract one, and then a new ship should appear. The first time the player ship dies, this all works. But starting the second time, the lives counter starts increasing by 1 every time the player ship is hit, I have no idea why. Here's my code pertaining to the player dieing:

private function playerKilled(e:Event) : void {

        scoreBar.updateLives(-1);
    }
    private function removePlayer(e:Event) {

        ourShip = new Ship(stage);
        stage.addChild(ourShip);
        ourShip.x = stage.stageWidth / 2;
        ourShip.y = stage.stageHeight / 2;
    }

ourShip.addEventListener("killed", playerKilled, false, 0, true);
public function takeHit() : void {
        dispatchEvent(new Event("killed"));
        removeSelf();

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated.