The ambush-style murder of Sheriff Deputy Darren Goforth at a gas station in suburban Houston on Aug. 29 has added new urgency to warnings about a growing "war on cops" in America. After the arrest of the suspect, an African-American man named Shannon J. Miles, the local district attorney called for more public support for law enforcement.
"It is time for the silent majority in this country to support law enforcement," said Devon Anderson, the Harris County DA. "There are a few bad apples in every profession. That does not mean there should be open warfare declared on law enforcement."
The notion of growing "warfare" against police stems in part from a statistical jump in the number of law officers murdered — "feloniously killed," in the jargon of the FBI's numbers.
In 2014, the year of the Ferguson protests and increased media attention on police misconduct, 51 officers were killed nationwide. That was a jump from the 27 killed in 2013 and many took it as a sign of greater danger for police.
Seth Stoughton, a former police officer and an assistant law professor at the University of South Carolina, calls that interpretation "nonsense."
"It's misleading to compare one year to another year," he says.
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7 comments:
It's the other way around. The cops are at war with us. All their military gear. This isn't Afghanistan........ Yet!
which isnt remotely true.
10:46 am - I don't care if the police use tanks as long as the peace can be maintained. If people don't want a confrontation with the police, then just obey the law and act like human beings. These rioters and agitators, like Sharpton, are the most anti-Americanism people around and need to be locked up or deported. The rioters and agitators use any excuse to destroy the fabric of America. Maybe the next time we should just exterminate this garbage as it riots and destroys and be sure to show this extermination on national tv as a preventative. If you don't like America then leave and take your filthy culture with you!
12:53 PM
baaa
you mean sheriff mike lied? oh yeah, he's a cop
That group of people who support LE, as it is today, are not a 'silent majority'. They are a muted minority. LE has taken the unconstitutional provisions given them by post 9/11 legislation and turned it against Americans. SWAT teams breaking down doors of innocent people's homes and murdering them over unsubstantiated information gleaned from lying 'informants'. Minor traffic stops escalating into more citizen murders. Unarmed Americans shot to death for little or no reason what so ever. This is what LE is today and anyone who supports it is a fascist. LE serves our fascist tyrannical leadership, not you Mr.& Mrs. America. They serve only to fill the coffers of that greasy corrupt government and are charged to remove anyone who dares to speak out against that corruption.
No, Mr. Kaste, the war against LE corrupting and overreach will not come to an end because some mythical group of supporters begin to chime in their support. The truth is, there is very, very little support for LE under it's current MO.
Life expectancy of an officer is 67. Shift work and high stress pay a toll on the body.
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