FBI Study: 'De-Policing' Is the New Norm

Mounted Police at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Photo Credit: Tyler O'Neil, PJ Media.

A declassified report prepared by the FBI titled “Assailant Study — Mindsets and Behaviors” reveals some unsurprising, but alarming attitudes by police toward their jobs.

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The study confirms that the “Ferguson Effect” is real and that the culprits are anti-police rhetoric spouted by Black Lives Matter and other activists as well as a lack of police support by politicians.

Washington Times:

“Nearly every police official interviewed agreed that for the first time, law enforcement not only felt that their national political leaders [publicly] stood against them, but also that the politicians’ words and actions signified that disrespect to law enforcement was acceptable in the aftermath of the Brown shooting,” the study said.

Are you listening, Barack Obama? Are you listening, Eric Holder?

As a result, “Law enforcement officials believe that defiance and hostility displayed by assailants toward law enforcement appears to be the new norm.”

The report examined 50 of the 53 incidents last year in which officers were killed in the line of duty, excluding the three cases that involved minors or perpetrators who remain unknown.

Most of the assailants who used deadly force against officers did so in an effort to avoid being taken into custody, but 28 percent were motivated by hatred of police and a desire to “kill law enforcement,” in some cases fueled by social and political movements.

“The assailants inspired by social and/or political reasons believed that attacking police officers was their way to ‘get justice’ for those who had been, in their view, unjustly killed by law enforcement,” the study said.

The perpetrators said their animus toward police was based on their own experiences as well as “what they heard and read in the media about other incidents involving law enforcement shootings.”

Those charged in the July 2016 shootings of police in Dallas and Baton Rouge “said they were influenced by the Black Lives Matter movement, and their belief that law enforcement was targeting black males,” the report said.

Five officers were killed in the Dallas ambush, which coincided with a protest against police shootings of black men in Louisiana and Minnesota, while three officers died in the Baton Rouge massacre.

Last year was particularly deadly for police: Sixty-four were shot and killed in the line of duty, a 56 percent increase from 2015. Of those, 21 were killed in ambush-style attacks, “the highest total in more than two decades,” according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. (emphasis mine)

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There has never been clearer evidence that Black Lives Matter activists referring to police as “terrorists” and claiming that they are deliberately targeting black males for death directly relates to the assassination of police officers.

And when former President Barack Obama failed to stand behind officers involved in controversial shootings of civilians and former Attorney General Eric Holder sicced Justice Department investigators on individuals and entire local police departments, policemen nationwide felt vulnerable and abandoned by those who should support them.

The real-world consequences of this are that officers are more reluctant to do their job of serving and protecting their communities. Police are human. They have families they want to return to every night. When politicians attack them, they feel there is no recourse but to avoid situations where they may be targets, or where the possibility exists of confrontations with the minority community.

And don’t forget the role of the media. Without the doting, loving coverage that gives BLM legitimacy and encourages politicians to get face time on TV by agreeing with them, there wouldn’t be the crisis that we’re in today.

The press wouldn’t give the Klu Klux Klan that kind of coverage. So why give the haters from BLM all the media exposure they’re getting?

There are problems with individuals in almost every police department. Some are incompetent, some are racist, some are not psychologically cut out to be cops. But to condemn an entire department — or as BLM does, every cop in America — for the actions of a few is illogical.

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It also leads to the situation we have today, where police are on the defensive and, for various reasons, are reluctant to engage with criminals and get them off the streets.

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