Do We Still Remember?

SHERIFF CLARKE REMEMBERS TROOPER WERNER FOERSTER WHO WAS MURDERED BY ONE OF THE FBI’S MOST WANTED

By: Sheriff David A. Clarke, Jr. (Ret.)

There is a saying that is uttered and repeated during National Police Week every May and after a law enforcement officer is killed in the line of duty. It simply states, we will never forget. Every law enforcement officers' death in the line of duty leaves all of us who serve, past and present, with an empty feeling as the somber and solemn process begins to lay the officer to rest. Flags are lowered to half staff. The community where the officer served turns out to line the street where the funeral procession drives by. A line of police cruisers from agencies all over America flashing red and blue take down lights follow the hearse that transports the slain officer to the church and then to the cemetery where taps and a twenty-one gun salute ring out before the casket is lowered into the ground. I always say to myself, there but for the grace of God go I. I made it nearly 40 years in law enforcement. I have attended funerals for officers killed in the line of duty from other agencies and those from my own agency, some of whom were colleagues and partners.

As I write this piece, the New York Police Department just honored one of their officer’s killed in the line of duty. I watched the funeral procession into the church and couldn’t help but notice a woman holding a small child following the coffin into the church. It was the officer’s wife holding the one-year old child of the slain officer; a child too young to know what was going on and who will never know his father as he grows up. That was numbing to me. I have worked with the group that assists the survivors of officers killed in the line of duty. It’s called COPS -Concerns of Police survivors. I have talked to surviving spouses and children long after the event. I walk away numb. I have attended numerous Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Day observances both local and the national one held in Washington DC. There is a memorial wall that contains the names of over 20,000 cops killed in the line of duty. Every officer should make the journey to the nation’s Capital and visit the wall. It will be a sobering experience especially when you see names inscribed who you know personally.

There is one name inscribed on the wall that I made particular effort to look for on a visit to Washington D.C. It may be an obscure name to many and may have been to me as well except that in my journey across America in support of the service, courage and sacrifice of officers past and present as the war on cops was in full bloom, I ran into a Trooper from the New Jersey State Police in 2017. He told me the story of one of their Troopers, Werner Foerster, who was viciously killed during a traffic stop. He told me that the killer was a fugitive from justice and asked if I could use the platform I had gained with my profile as sheriff having reached national attention, to bring light to the fact that the killer remains at large.

I did some research about this officer and learned that in 1973, Trooper Werner Foerster responded to back up another Trooper on a traffic stop on the Jersey Turnpike. A shootout quickly ensued. An occupant inside the vehicle fired shots striking one Trooper. Foerster was wounded in the gunfire exchange and as he lay on the ground, the female assailant exited the car, took his weapon which was laying next to him and fatally shot him in the head. That female was

Joanne Chesimard. She uses the alias Assata Shakur. Chesimard at the time was a member of the revolutionary group, the Black Panther Party. She later aligned herself with another violent group called the Black Liberation Party. Her life of crime included participation in murder, robbery and kidnapping. She was charged in several instances but not convicted. Chesimard was convicted in the assassination of Trooper Foerster in 1979 and sentenced to life in prison. Foerster was survived by a wife and a 3-year-old son. But the story doesn’t end there.

In 1979 Joanne Chesimard with the assistance of several other armed Black Liberation Army members was able to escape prison. She remained at large until she was located in Cuba. She was granted asylum by Cuban President Fidel Castro where she remains today. The U.S. government does not have diplomatic relations with Cuba so having her extradited back to serve out her sentence is not likely to happen. She is in her mid seventies today. One of her accomplices has been recently paroled by the New Jersey Supreme Court who ruled he was no longer a threat to society at 85 years old. It is why I have advocated for it to be a federal capital crime to murder a police officer, punishable by death upon conviction. Few states allow the death penalty even for murder. This would make for consistent prosecution.

Another sickening twist to this is that Chesimard is talked about and viewed in the black community like she is some sort of folk hero. In stories about her today she is described as a political activist and even as a cultural icon. No she isn’t. She is a scumbag, stone-cold cop-killer. She is currently listed on the FBI wanted top terrorist list to this day, the first female ever listed on an FBI terrorist wanted list. She was recently depicted in an array of black civil rights people including Frederic Douglas, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. This is part of the cultural rot that exists in the black community today when they list her among the truly admirable black civil rights greats as if she is some modern-day Harriet Tubman or Sojourner Truth. No black parent with daughters should use Chesimard as a role model or someone to look up to. She has authored several books and given several interviews with U.S. journalists. Protests should have been held at any bookstore with her filth on their shelves. I find this repulsive and so should everybody.

When Joanne Chesimard aka Assata Shakur dies, the US State Department should request that her body be returned to the U.S. In a symbolic gesture, her body should be transported to the state prison she escaped from and her next of kin notified that they could claim her body there. If no one steps forward, then she should be buried in a pauper's cemetery in an unmarked plot used for unclaimed bodies to die in obscurity.

That would be justice for Trooper Warner Foerster. I would never forget that.

Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. is former Sheriff of Milwaukee Co, Wisconsin, President of America’s Sheriff LLC, President of Rise Up Wisconsin INC, Board member of the Crime Research Center, author of the book Cop Under Fire: Beyond Hashtags of Race Crime and Politics for a Better America. To learn more visit www.americassheriff.com