BRING BACK THE FEAR

BRING BACK THE FEAR
By Lt. Randy Sutton (Ret) 

When did the police become America’s punching bags. I mean that literally as well as figuratively. Was there a defining moment? Or did our country gradually morph into a society where the authority of law enforcement officers has eroded to the point where even grade school children no longer fear consequences from confrontations with the police.

Now I know that simply using the word “fear” in a conversation about law enforcement is in and of itself politically incorrect. I mean after all, if one was to listen to all of the political rhetoric coming from senators, congressmen, governors, mayors and all assorted others who consider themselves experts in law enforcement and community relationships, the police should work tirelessly and relentlessly to reform themselves into a kinder and gentler culture. Every discussion concerning violence and law enforcement always and inevitably will center around fault. Whose fault? I will give you just one guess: the police. 

Let’s take a short walk down memory lane. Remember just a few years ago when everyone from the media to the President of the United States Barack Obama were crying out for body-worn cameras to be issued to every police officer in the United States? Why? To protect the public from those mean old bullies, the police. The word “reform” was the rallying cry for politicians, the media and social justice warriors. So, quite literally millions and millions of dollars have been spent on equipping law enforcement officers across the United States with body-worn cameras. But I wonder if you have noticed this, when was the last time that you heard these demands for body-worn cameras? The answer is you probably haven’t. Why? The answer is also simple. The reality is that the use of body-worn cameras has revealed that law enforcement officers are acting appropriately, not using force unnecessarily and have shown that it is actually the police who need to be protected from the public. And once again I mean this both physically in terms of assaults against them and in the thousands of frivolous and concocted complaints filed against them for everything from excessive force to sexual assault. Yes, the evidence is quite clear. The vast majority of law enforcement officers in this country do their jobs as they are expected to.

Yet the war against cops continues not only unabated, but is accelerating. Every single day a law enforcement officer puts on his uniform and goes out on patrol they are quite literally putting their lives on the line. The murder rate against officers continues, shootings of officers take place almost daily in this country and physical assaults have become commonplace. The important question here is why? I am going to relate my theory and I am going to relate my solution. I am pretty sure that the International Association of Chiefs of Police won’t be adopting it. As to my theory of why? Because all of the “reforms” the law enforcement has been called upon to make have been all too successful. All of the mandatory training in de-escalation techniques, Sensitivity Training, Implicit Bias, and Community Relations combined with law enforcement administration’s heavy-handed disciplinary processes relating to use of force incidents have sufficiently intimidated working cops into becoming minimally aggressive in order to survive the political environment. Some refer to this as de-policing, and that is an accurate characterization. It is simply a matter of survival. Not necessarily physical survival but political survival.

 What does this look like? It means less proactive police work. It means fewer car stops looking for criminals. It means fewer pedestrian stops looking for guns, drugs and fugitives. It means fewer physical encounters, it means getting out of the patrol car less, it means taking fewer risks as in, “You’ll never get in trouble for the car stop you don’t make.” In other words, it means the bad guys are winning. When the police are afraid to do their job, not because of the physical dangers but because of the political dangers, society as a whole becomes a much more hazardous place to be.

I told you before that I also had a solution. Everything that I just talked about concerning the factors of de-policing empowers criminality, civil unrest, violence and injustice. Why? Because when people figure out that there are no consequences for their actions, the reality is that the ugliness of human nature is unleashed. Robbers find it easier to rob, thieves find it easier to steal, drug dealers deal their poison with impunity and our very society becomes threatened. I believe it is time to “bring back the fear.” Fear of consequences first and foremost, and that includes the fear of the police. Does that sound harsh? Well I believe that a little fear is healthy. I think the fear is a deterrent to criminality. I think that someone should be fearful of putting their hands on a law enforcement officer. I think that someone should be fearful of pulling a gun on a cop. I think that someone should be fearful of becoming argumentative and disrespectful to a police officer and resisting arrest.

I served as a police officer for 34 years, and I will tell you this as sure as I’m sitting here, I lived this rule: If you try to hurt me I’m going to hurt you back. If you try to kill me, I’m going to kill you first. Simple. Those are the rules of the road. It is time for police leadership to stop surrendering to political whims and fantasies. Law enforcement is often messy, law enforcement is often ugly, and law enforcement is always dangerous. It is the responsibility of political leaders and it is the responsibility of law enforcement leaders to make the playing field as safe as possible for the men and women who serve in our nation’s law enforcement agencies. That means understanding that law enforcement officers will need to use force, including deadly force, to accomplish their mission and safeguard their own lives. And no amount of political correctness should stand in the way of allowing our country’s cops to do with they are paid to do: Serve and protect … and that includes protecting themselves.