PAX Centurion - January / March 2016

www.bppa.org PAX CENTURION • January/March 2016 • Page 29 story themselves, they don’t want their career ended early, and it’s having an impact,” Emanuel told a recent audience. Although Mayor Emanuel meant that statement as a criticism and an insult of his own Chicago police force, there is a perverse truth to what he said. In this day and age, it simply isn’t worth “sticking your neck out.” (Ed.: Thankfully, here in Boston, we have several experienced police commander-staff members who have worked the streets and support the troops in the field. Recent officer-involved shootings have been handled in a manner that quickly tamped down any brewing anti- police sentiment and diminished openings for self-appointed activists to gin-up trouble and rouse troublemakers.) In yet another perversion, current attitudes toward law enforcement have actually turned the theory of “community policing” upside down. When any and every police interaction or comment, whether said in jest or taken out-of-context can “hurt someone’s feelings” or cause them to be “offended” and consequently result in a “tab” (IAD complaint) , some police officers may avoid ancillary contact with the public out of a justifiable desire to avoid trouble and controversy. The opportunities for misinterpretation or involvement in unwanted conflict – short of an actual radio call – have become a real threat for an officer’s future. As one wise, retired veteran officer put it succinctly, “You don’t have to find trouble on this job, it will find you.” Again citing the Post’s Michael Goodwin (Oct. 28, 2015), the Times sneeringly asserted that “ there was no data to support [Comey’s statements].” Goodwin: “Actually, there is a ton of data. It’s called the rising murder rate, and the Times itself noted the frightening trend in a compelling news article last August. It reported that more than 30 cities had seen big spikes, with Milwaukee’s murder rate up 76%, St. Louis up 60%, Baltimore’s up 52%, Washington, DC’s up 44%, New Orleans’up 22%, Kansas City’s up 20%, and on and on…”. “A society that makes war on its police… had better be prepared to make peace with its criminals.” “We sleep safe in our beds at night because rough men stand ready to visit violence upon those who would do us harm.” (Quote attributed to George Orwell) . These quotations are found on the backs of T-shirts distributed by the BPPA. They are as true now as they were when they were then. Back in the 1990’s, famous Chicago Tribune writer Mike Royko wrote an article entitled “When Police are handcuffed, violence is unleashed.” The article was written about the death of nine-year old Laketa Crosby, shot down during a gang war in Chicago’s infamous Cabrini-Green housing projects. To bring police pressure and publicity to the raging crime at Cabrini-Green, then-Mayor Jane Byrne personally moved into the housing project, and police rousted the gang members. A strange and wonderful peace broke out, but was short-lived. Civil- rights activists and assorted radicals complained about “heavy- handed” police tactics, and the cops were soon forced to back down. Mayor Byrne moved out, and Cabrini-Green soon returned to “normal,” which meant that law-abiding tenants locked themselves in their apartments and the gangs controlled the projects. FBI Director Comey will soon undoubtedly find himself re- assigned to a non-controversial position before he is eventually shipped off to a gulag for “re-education.”As a very wise old detective with a stuttering problem used to say – “T-t-t-tell the truth…G-g-g-go to jail.” (Or in Comey’s case, soon-to-be transferred to the Pyongyang, North Korea regional FBI office.) People don’t like the truth…. C HICAGO – Homicides and shootings have doubled in Chicago so far this year compared with the same period in 2015, and police have seized fewer illegal guns – more possible signals officers have become less aggressive in the aftermath of a shooting video released last fall. Interim Police Superintendent John Escalante said Tuesday that he was so concerned about officers possibly holding back that he filmed a video for the department in which he encouraged them to do their jobs and assured them that a federal probe of the force was not aimed at individuals. ‘‘We are aware that there is a concern among the rank and file about not wanting to be the nextYouTube video that goes viral,’’Escalante said in the video before introducing a segment of his own to remind viewers ‘‘why we took this job and swore this oath of office.’’ The statistics come almost exactly three months after the city on the orders of a judge released the video of officer JasonVan Dyke firing 16 shots at Laquan McDonald, a black teen killed in 2014. Since that day, Van Dyke has been charged with murder, and Superintendent Garry McCarthy has been fired. The Department of Justice launched a civil rights probe of the police force, and Mayor Rahm Emanuel has sought to regain public trust in the department and his own leadership. The vast majority of the bloodshed in the nation’s third-largest city occurs in neighborhoods on the south and west sides, away from the Loop business district. In the first two months of the year, authorities recorded 95 homicides, compared with 48 for the same period last year. Thus far, there have been 406 shootings, or more than twice as many as the 180 reported in the same two-month period in 2015. The McDonald case raised concerns that officers, fearful of attracting negative attention, may be becoming more passive. Quietly, officers say they are not going to take chances that might land them in legal trouble or threaten their jobs and pensions. ‘‘I’m hearing that police are standing down because they’re afraid what might happen to them, that when they get a call, they wait to see if someone answers it first,’’ said the Rev. Michael Pfleger , a prominent Roman Catholic priest and activist on the South Side. ‘‘I get really angry about that. If they are not going to do police work, they need to get out.’’ Evidence of a pullback starts with an 80 percent decrease in the number of street stops that the officers have made since the first of the year. Escalante said he believes that decrease is largely tied to the fact that since the first of the year, officers have been required to fill out far lengthier forms than the brief ‘‘contact cards’’ they used to use. The new forms were the result of changes in state law and an agreement between the department and theAmerican Civil Liberties Union of Illinois that required Chicago police to more thoroughly document and monitor street stops. Escalante said he hopes the newer and simpler forms the officers started filling out on Tuesday will help bring those numbers back up. (Reprinted from the Boston Globe, March 2, 2016) Homicides rise in Chicago; illegal gun seizures fall By Dan Baldwin, Associated Press From FBI on page 19 FBI Director James Comey lambasted… for telling the truth…