Presidential Commission On Law Enforcement Says Pretty Much Everyone But Cops Are To Blame For The Shitty State Of American Policing

Failures

from the building-relationships-through-[re-reads-report]-blaming-taxpayers dept

[Note: this is one of what will probably be several posts covering the Commission’s 332-page report. There’s a lot to cover in here and one post simply isn’t enough to cover everything in it. Stay tuned.]

President Trump took office and immediately declared war on Americans. The only good people are government people. And the best people of all are law enforcement people, who were immediately elevated above those they served by the new leader of our nation.

One of the fundamental rights of every American is to live in a safe community. A Trump Administration will empower our law enforcement officers to do their jobs and keep our streets free of crime and violence. The Trump Administration will be a law and order administration. President Trump will honor our men and women in uniform and will support their mission of protecting the public. The dangerous anti-police atmosphere in America is wrong. The Trump Administration will end it.

First, there is no right to “live in a safe community.” Second, Trump failed to end the “dangerous anti-police atmosphere.” The “atmosphere” isn’t wrong, as cops proved again and again. It’s deserved. And it needs more than presidential proclamation to turn it around.

Four exceedingly long years have passed. Trump is a few weeks away from exiting the office he was incapable of running. But one final shot is being delivered by his Justice Department — the culmination of months of research and years of pro-cop agitation.

The Presidential Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice has released its report — one mandated by a 2019 Executive Order. In it, Trump ordered the Commission (now missing its chief rabble rouser, recently-resigned AG Bill Barr) to conduct a “modern study of the state of American policing.” The report is supposed to give America guidance on fighting crime and addressing multiple law enforcement issues. Perhaps more importantly, the report is supposed to “promote the rule of law,” a term Trump has used repeatedly during his tenure, but only when the rules and laws aren’t being applied to him.

The report [PDF] lists the issues the Commission attempted to address. It leads off with presumably the most important issue: the perceived screwing of law enforcement agencies by all and sundry.

Respect for the Rule of Law and Law Enforcement focused on the trend of diminished respect for law enforcement and the laws they enforce. The group specifically evaluated how under-enforcement of the criminal law in certain jurisdictions affects public safety, public perception of law enforcement and the laws it enforces, police resources and morale, and the rule of law. The group also evaluated how to increase respect for law enforcement and how a lack of respect for law enforcement impacts public safety and the rule of law.

“Diminished respect.” This should have forced the Commission to examine why respect has been diminished. Instead, the Commission focuses on non-cops and non-issues. There’s definitely a problem here. It just isn’t what the Commission thinks it is.

The report says it’s not the protests, it’s the riots — ignoring the fact that there was plenty of needless escalation by law enforcement during the policing of these protests. Being angry about police violence apparently threatens public safety, folks.

This new public safety dynamic—while hopefully temporary—is exacerbated by the confluent civil unrest events and protests against law enforcement that continue to unfold in the aftermath of several high-profile use-of-force incidents. In particular, on May 25, 2020, the death of George Floyd at the hands of police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, sparked protests in cities and towns across the nation, which were sometimes overtaken by those intent on exploiting the situation for their own means. Law enforcement is sworn to uphold the constitutionally protected activities of those whose only intent is to exercise their legitimate right to protest, yet radical elements that bring violence and property destruction further strain law enforcement resources.

Fortunately, the Commission isn’t as short-sighted as the man directing its efforts. There’s a balance to be struck. But the lack of respect for law enforcement can’t be laid at the feet of the policed. Respect is something earned, not something assumed. And law enforcement has done little to ensure its respect is earned. That’s not how the Commission sees it, though.

Disrespect for law enforcement, unfortunately, readily becomes a disrespect for the law itself, which threatens the social order. Following the killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, which transpired during the work of this Commission, the civil protests against alleged police abuses were accompanied by significant lawlessness and increases in crime across many jurisdictions, and are a timely reminder of the importance that citizens have collective trust in their law enforcement to protect and serve their communities. The Commission’s review of law enforcement, therefore, rests on the foundational principle that law enforcement officers are the primary guarantors of communal safety. As such, government policies and programs should foremost promote public trust in law enforcement, but also deter abuses by police that undermine that trust.

While it’s nice to see the Commission recognize law enforcement has played a role in its current disrespect quandary, these agencies have had years to fix endemic problems. But instead of fixing it, they’ve chosen to ignore, if not actually condone, officer misconduct. This problem didn’t develop overnight. The current protests are the end result of years of indifference. The report recommends positive changes…

To that end, the Commission has recommended jurisdictions enhance officer training on using force and develop special procedures for investigating and prosecuting officer-involved shootings which promote accountability, transparency, impartiality, and due process.

… before stating that it’s non-cop Americans who are really the problem:

Ultimately, however, the first and greatest reason for the use of force by police remains that individuals do not respect or comply with the lawful commands of law enforcement officers.

Resisting abuses of power is unamerican. Take your beating and hire a lawyer, says the Commission.

The criminal justice system affords many avenues for citizens to challenge the actions of police officers?it does not allow them to do so through physically resisting officers, nor does it allow law enforcement officers to surrender their duties to public safety whenever a subject resists. Because law enforcement has a duty to secure compliance by force, and because individuals have a legal right to challenge law enforcement force in subsequent proceedings, the Commission asserts that the primary prevention of unwarranted force by law enforcement is for citizens to “Comply, Then Complain.”

That’s right, citizens: do what the Commission says. It’s the only way cop business can be conducted as usual. Take the abuse and deal with the criminal charges.

The report ignores the reality of the situation. Most (97% [!!]) criminal charges result in plea deals, not an adjudication of the charges on their merits. Legal fees and settlements from misconduct lawsuits are paid by taxpayers. And that’s only if the touted “avenue” actually pays off. In most cases, litigants are left with nothing, having paid for a lawsuit only to see it dead-ended by qualified immunity, a shield officers wield successfully in far too many lawsuits.

The report then goes further, absolving officers of almost any responsibility for their actions.

The police did not create and cannot resolve the social conditions that stimulate crime. They did not start and cannot stop the convulsive social changes that are taking place in America. They do not enact the laws that they are required to enforce, nor do they dispose of the criminals they arrest. The police are only one part of the criminal justice system; the criminal justice system is only one part of the government; and the government is only one part of society.

Helpfully, the report says cops can’t do it all and suggests increased funding for social and mental health services. It also recommends some revamps of the criminal justice system, including greater transparency around plea deals, use of treatment courts and/or reentry services for certain crimes, and a better bail system that doesn’t punish people just for being poor.

But the report doesn’t suggest shifting funds away from law enforcement agencies to accomplish this. Instead, it suggests anything that meddles with the discretion of law enforcement officers will lead to greater disrespect and higher crime rates. The report goes on the attack against prosecutors who’ve decided to stop prosecuting some low-level crimes and suggests any politician who criticizes law enforcement is doing it solely to score political points.

Then it offers up a proactive Nuremberg defense of police officers: they shouldn’t be treated with disrespect just because they’re following orders.

Police officers may be the first and primary contact between the criminal justice system and the community, but they should not suffer the brunt of all social discontent simply because they are the agents of a system that the public primarily encounters.

It is therefore important to emphasize that law enforcement officers have an important but limited responsibility to execute the law, and that criticism towards officers should be accordingly limited to how they discharge that responsibility.

Completely failing to read the room, the Commission bemoans the fate of poor, poor ICE, which has been unfairly maligned just for enforcing the law.

Recent events in the arena of immigration law exemplify the detriment to law enforcement that occurs when executive non-enforcement violates the separation of powers. In or around 2017, after a change of presidential administration resulted in increased enforcement of immigration laws, critics of those laws attacked and vilified federal immigration law enforcement officials?the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)?for simply enforcing the laws they were sworn to uphold. The misdirected hostility towards ICE stemmed from the fallacy that it was the executive branch, not the United States Congress, that determined what laws to enforce.

It’s not that this part of the report is all bad. But it serves mostly to exonerate cops and encourage them (and prosecutors) to leverage low-level crime as a way to control communities And it does this even as it calls for law enforcement agencies to focus on the most dangerous criminals and the most violent crimes — the ones that harm communities the most.

The report says prosecutors shouldn’t be allowed to exercise blanket discretion, deeming small-time possession and non-violent crimes unworthy of their attention or resources. It says qualified immunity should remain intact, despite its contribution to the same misconduct and excessive force the Commission says cops should strive to address.

Unfortunately, even when the report is good, it’s still pretty bad. The Commission calls for building relationships with communities, but quotes Houston PD chief Art Acevedo, who is best known these days for allowing corrupt, lying cops to run wild, culminating in the killing of two Houston residents during a no-knock raid predicated on the statements of a nonexistent informant.

The Commission says law enforcement agencies should make public their internal guidelines for use of force and their investigative processes for officers accused of deploying excessive force. It calls for states to pass legislation demanding independent investigations of misconduct and excessive force deployment in cases that result in death or injury.

But in the end, the Commission’s suggestions imply it’s the public that’s to blame for failing to educate itself , rather than the law enforcement agencies that have been anything but open and transparent since their inception.

Law enforcement agencies should prioritize community outreach and developing and maintaining strong, positive relationships with various segments of the community, while providing knowledge of and appreciation for the daily responsibilities of law enforcement.

The whole thing is skewed towards placing the burden of meeting cops in the middle on the general public. The report seems to assume (based on facts not in evidence) that cops have been engaged in good faith outreach efforts for years, only to see these efforts derailed by political opportunists and “progressive” prosecutors.

The fact is that cops have cultivated an “us vs. them” mindset for years. And now that they’re reaping what they’ve spent years sowing, they’re looking around for anything that serves the narrative they prefer. The targets are the same ones listed in the Commission’s report: activists, politicians, community leaders, and reformers — anyone that threatens their status quo. The Commission says some of the status quo must change if things are going to get better. But every suggestion for change is coupled with blame (direct and implied) for the people who act as their oversight or pay their salaries.

Filed Under: donald trump, law enforcement, police, presidential commission on law enforcement