Category Archives: Police Militarization

Bellingham Residents Express Concern Over Rising Crime Rates

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Neighborhood Policing - City of Bellingham

KGMI reports that the Bellingham City Council, mayor and other leaders heard from residents about their concerns about public safety at a virtual community meeting held on Monday, May 16th.

Residents expressed concerns about housing prices, drug deals in their neighborhoods and rising crime rates. Chief Deputy for the Bellingham Police Department Don Ahlmer told the meeting that while crime rates are up, the numbers have to be viewed with perspective.

“If you look at the numbers for aggravated assault, if a seven year average is 124, the last three-year average is roughly 50 more a year. You’re looking at one more assault a week . . . So, numbers are numbers . . . But I don’t want the public or anybody watching this to think, oh my gosh, there’s like a hundred extra assaults a day.” ~ Deputy Almer, Bellingham Police Department

Mayor Seth Fleetwood said the city needs more police officers.

“We’re fortunate to have a police department that is exceptional, made up of capable, caring, highly confident, trained professionals,” said Fleetwood. “But our staffing levels are down and we’re doing all we can to staff back up. And I know that we’re going to get there.”

Click here to watch a YouTube video of the meeting.

My opinion? The concerns of Bellingham’s citizens reflect national trends that crime – especially homicides and manslaughter – has increased. Covid disrupted every aspect of life in the past two years. Social services and supports that help keep crime down vanished overnight. Schools could no longer keep unruly teens safe and distracted. A broader sense of disorder and chaos could have fueled a so-called moral holiday, in which people disregard laws and norms.

Citizens are righteously concerned with crimes happening in their backyards. And yes, we need solutions. The solutions involve training and hiring police officers who are not racially biased. We need police officers who won’t conduct illegal searches/seizures. And we need police officers who won’t go about policing poverty. These practices strain the criminal justice system. They also burden impoverished people with fines for minor offenses and fracture the relationship between police and minorities.

Please contact my office if you, a friend or family member are charged with a crime. Hiring an effective and competent defense attorney is the first and best step toward justice.

No More Police Chokeholds

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emi koyama (@emikoyama) | Twitter

Excellent article by Melissa Luck of the yaktrinews.com reports that House Bill 1054 would limit law enforcement officers from using controversial police tactics like chokeholds and tear gas.

I-940 & Police Misconduct

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Wonderful article by  of the Seattle Times  reports that Initiative 940 (I-940) gives an opportunity to prosecute police for deadly shootings in Washington state.

With Thursday’s expected delivery of signatures for Initiative 940, years of debate and stalemate over Washington’s deadly-force law look to be coming to a head. If I-940 qualifies, state lawmakers — and probably ultimately voters — will face big decisions on a charged issue.

De-Escalate Washington

De-Escalate Washington didn’t just pull together the bare-bones 260,000 signatures for I-940, which would make it easier to prosecute law-enforcement officers for alleged misuse of deadly force. The group hopes to turn in about 360,000 signatures Thursday to the Washington Secretary of State’s office, according to Leslie Cushman, the group’s policy director.

In his article, O’Sullivan reports that community advocates have argued Washington’s law — considered the nation’s most restrictive for holding officers accountable for unjustified use of deadly force — is overdue for a change. Right now, an officer can’t be convicted of a crime for using deadly force if he or she acted in good faith and without malice, or what the law calls “evil intent.” That makes it nearly impossible for prosecutors to bring criminal charges even if they find an officer committed a wrongful killing, according to a 2015 report by The Seattle Times.

I-940 would change the law to a more detailed, multipart threshold that considers what a “reasonable officer” might have done under the circumstances. It would also take into account an officer’s intentions to determine if she or he acted in good faith.

The initiative also requires more de-escalation and mental-health training for law- enforcement officers.

O’Sullivan also writes that the effort comes on the heels of high-profile shootings including the deaths in Seattle of Che Taylor and Charleena Lyles by white officers of African Americans and other minorities in recent years have underscored concerns about law enforcement.

Family members of several victims of police shootings have been involved in the campaign, including Che’s brother Andrè, who chairs De-Escalate Washington.

Law Enforcement Response to I-940

O’Sullivan reports that law-enforcement groups have protested changes to the deadly-force statute. They say the new legal standard could prompt officers to hesitate in ways that could endanger themselves and others.

 “Unfortunately, this initiative will not do anything to reduce violent interactions between law enforcement and the public,” said Teresa Taylor, executive director for the Washington Council of Police & Sheriffs, which represents more than 4,300 law- enforcement officers.
However, success in the legislative session that begins in January appears unlikely. Lawmakers this year couldn’t find a compromise that satisfied both law enforcement and community activists.
My opinion? I-940 is a step in the right direction. And it’s about time. Police misconduct is a hot-button issue. Granted, being a police officer is a very difficult job. Officers make difficult judgment calls in very complex, risky and dangerous situations. That said, officers need training on diffusing situations which don’t necessarily rise to public safety and/or officer safety risks. I-940 is not made to put police in jail for doing their jobs. It’s made to foster public trust, train officers in de-esclating their contacts with citizens and avoid unnecessary shooting deaths.

Please contact my office if you, a friend or family member are charged with a crime. Hiring an effective and competent defense attorney is the first and best step toward justice.

Top Cop Says Police Militarization Endangers Public Safety.

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Excellent article by Major Neill Franklin, Executive Director, Law Enforcement Action Partnership says that the Trump administration wrongfully revoked President Obama’s Executive Order 13688, which limited the scope of a federal program that allows state and local police departments to obtain military equipment free of charge.

“I’m convinced that the 1033 Program has been one of the single greatest contributors to the public losing trust in law enforcement,” said Major Franklin.

He further said that scrapping Executive Order 13688 means police departments will again have unfettered access to high caliber guns, grenade launchers, and armored vehicles, among other forms of military equipment. “During a time when criminal justice and police reform have bipartisan support, this decision shows a clear misunderstanding both of what Americans want and, more perilously, of what’s truly effective at improving public safety.”

In his article, Major Franklin said that the use of such equipment for regular police work damages police-community relations. Militarization has eroded public trust in police, the effectiveness of law enforcement overall, and ultimately, public safety.

“Officers need to engage in crime prevention and crime fighting activities that work,” said Major Franklin.  They do not need to participate in programs that waste resources and create dangerous situations for both law enforcement and the public. He claimed that in the SWAT raids studied by the ACLU for its 2013 report, War Comes Home, 79 percent of SWAT deployments were issued to execute search warrants, mostly for drugs. Somewhere between 36 and 65 percent of those drug searches resulted in no discovery of illegal contraband. “Even if everything goes smoothly and nobody gets injured or killed during a raid, it’s still an enormous waste of time and extremely dangerous for both officers and civilians.”

“An all-too-common SWAT scenario is one where SWAT’s involvement escalates a nonviolent situation into a deadly one,” said Major Franklin. “Imagine that you are awoken at dawn by the sound of men shouting and battering down your door. You can’t hear what the voices are saying, but you realize your home is being invaded. Your instinct tells you to grab your lawfully owned gun and face the intruders. You race downstairs and make it to the front door only to find the intruders are police – and they think you have drugs. The police are scared of an armed man running toward them, and you’re barely awake. You’re confused. And then shots are fired. Nobody remembers who pulled the trigger first.”

“With each of these incidents, public trust in the police erodes,” said Major Franklin. He claimed that research shows people who don’t trust police are less likely to report a crime.  “I can tell you from experience it makes them much less likely to cooperate in investigations. Without the community to help us, police work — the hard work of solving rapes and homicides and kidnappings — becomes nearly impossible.

Major Franklin said his philosophy is instead guided by the Nine Principles of Policing set forth by Sir Robert Peel and his commissioners nearly 200 years ago, which have set the standard ever since. The very first principle is to prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force.

“I support replacing the 1033 Program with one in which officers must demonstrate competence, be trained in proper equipment usage, and may only use military equipment for hostage, active shooter, and barricade scenarios.  I believe this because I became a police officer to protect people. When people fear the police more than they fear crime itself, the legitimacy of the career I loved so much becomes meaningless,” said Major Franklin.

Please contact my office if you, a friend or family member are charged with a crime. Hiring an effective and competent defense attorney is the first and best step toward justice.