COVER STORY - Memo To The Political Class: Do Something, Dammit

Memo To The Political Class: Do Something, Dammit
By David A. Clarke Jr., Sheriff (Ret.) Milwaukee County

Calendar year 2022 begins much like it ended in 2020 and 2021. Police officers continue to be ambushed and gunned down in areas all across the nation and violent crime continues to surge not only in large urban cities but in suburban areas as well, and still elected officials continue to wring their hands as to what is causing it and how to mitigate it.

In New York City in one week, two officers were killed in the line of duty while another two were shot and are expected to survive. In Houston, Texas, three officers were wounded in a shootout, with one dying. In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, my hometown, a sheriff’s deputy and a city of Milwaukee police officer were shot and are expected to survive. According to the National Gun Violence Archive, in the first 24 days of 2022, gunmen opened fire on cops 22 times, killing three. Another four officers have been ambushed in vehicle attacks. Even two police K-9s have died in the line of duty. According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, 2021 was the deadliest year on record for law enforcement officer deaths.

There is no doubt that there is a correlation between the animus coming from Democrat elected officials, Black Lives Matter and Antifa and the assaults against police. These groups have turned police into villains. That steady drum beat of hate with little counter narrative from people other than myself on a national level has eroded the respect and trust for police. This vilification has manifested itself in the violence against police that we are seeing.

I have two remedies that could go a long way in restoring respect for police. Keep in mind that this hate for police didn’t start overnight and it won’t turn back in the other direction overnight, but if we enact public policies today, we can start the arduous path back toward a return on a focus toward officer safety. The first is for Joe Biden to stop with his inane idea of police reform and call for making it a capital federal offense for murdering a police officer with the death sentence handed out upon conviction. Also, there should be no more than a two-year window for the defendant to exercise appeals. This would ensure consistency nationwide, since some states currently do not have the death penalty.

The second remedy is for people in Congress and every state legislature to pass a resolution condemning any more hateful rhetoric toward police. Then we would have all of these two-bit politicians on record as to their position of support or non-support of police.

Next, I want to turn toward the continued escalation of violent crime across America. It is predicted that the upward trend in street violence that we have seen in both 2020 and 2021 will continue. For a snapshot, five people were shot, killing one, in Washington D.C.; three people were gunned down in Chicago including an 8-year-old girl, and six people were found shot execution-style in a Milwaukee residence known for drug activity. In Philadelphia so far this year, there have been 90 carjackings after 750 carjackings in 2021. Milwaukee saw a record year in car thefts with over 10,000 incidents. In New York, subway crimes of homicides and rapes doubled in 2021. Just because the calendar year turned from 2021 to 2022 does not mean that cities get to start at zero in reporting as if all the crime that happened the previous year and all of the victims it claimed didn’t happen. As I said earlier here, these are trends that will continue if not abated.

The most startling thing to me is that there has not been one law enforcement executive who has put forth a comprehensive plan or strategy to combat this street violence. All I hear from the feckless city officials and police executives are platitudes. They express concern, condolence and calls for the violence to stop as if on that command alone the perpetrators will change their behavior and turn over a new leaf. They talk about looking for root causes and reinvesting in cities, which is code language for spending million more in taxpayer dollars that will lead to nothing. Police executives continue to embark on the fool’s errand of community policing. They erroneously believe that regaining and rebuilding trust with minority communities will lead to lower rates of crime. This whole community policing craze was first spawned in early 1980. We have spent billions trying to rebuild trust to no avail. This is foolhardy. Besides, the law-abiding people already trust and respect you. Get a clue.

Nothing will build trust in minority communities faster than showing them that you can keep them safe from the criminal element. Nothing will build community trust faster than to show business owners that you will protect their property from thefts and burglaries. That means suppressing crime. Business owners watching their businesses looted and then set on fire during a riot doesn’t instill community trust especially after front-line cops were given stand down orders. Neither does a mother finding out that her child was killed after being struck by an errant bullet in a drive-by shooting.

Restoring trust starts with going after and harassing known criminals. Leave everybody else alone. If an officer does not know who the perpetrators of disorder are, and who the career criminals are on his or her beat, then they aren’t worth a damn as a cop. Notice that earlier here I mentioned that 6 people were found shot execution-style in a “known” drug house. My first thought was, if the people living in that neighborhood knew it was a drug house, then why didn’t police? And if police did know, what were they doing to shut it down? It has always been an important element of successful policing to know your beat, up and down, inside and out. In fairness to front-line officers today, they do not have the resources nor the time since the defund police movement to effectively dedicate themselves to routine patrols and surveillance ops, and even if they do make an arrest, George Soros-funded prosecutors are not prosecuting criminals.

Here the plan for any police executive who wants to become the next Bill Bratton of law enforcement executives. Here is the plan for any city mayor who wants to become known as America’s Mayor a la Rudy Giuliani.

Reinstate broken windows policing. All police activities will have one objective: crime reduction. Focus on order maintenance activities. If you do not know what that is then get a copy of Bratton’s book titled, TURNAROUND: How Americas Top Cop Reversed the Crime Epidemic. Read it, study it. Copy what he did. Come up with a written comprehensive crime reduction strategy. Come up with a plan to succeed. The plan has to have measurables so you can track how well you are doing or not doing. The stuff that is yielding results, do more of. The stuff that isn’t, do less of. Have a solid information-sharing process. Information needs to move up, down and across the entire agency. Your resources are finite. Let the mayor know what you are doing. If he doesn’t approve, then go rogue and do it anyway. Dare him to fire you for trying to restore law and order in all the chaos. Let the local media know what you are doing ahead of time. Notify community stakeholders. You’ll need their support. Let the city council know and tell them you’ll need more resources. Tell them to reverse no-bail policies so you can keep repeat offenders locked away. Team up with state probation and parole offices for a full-court press against the scumbag criminals with home and vehicle searches. Notify the local United States Attorney that you’ll need grant money to lighten the load on property and business taxpayers and that you are sending career violent offenders to be prosecuted at the federal level for more certainty in prosecutions and longer sentences.

Now that you have informed everybody of what is coming down, execute the plan. Hold commanders accountable for results. Check on their progress frequently. Forget that community policing initiative BS. Am I clear?