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Who Wants This Job?
I have been in the law enforcement business for more than 40 years, more than 30 of it with the Los Angeles Police Department. During this time, I have seen the pendulum swing between favorable and grim conditions in the profession, but today the pendulum seems to have defied the laws of physics, so far has it swung in what police officers would call the wrong direction. The anti-police mob, having destroyed so much since the summer of George Floyd, continues its attack, albeit via political means rather than assaults, arson, and looting.
I refer you to my latest contribution over at PJ Media, where I describe an effort among some in Los Angeles city government to make it easier for the chief of the LAPD to summarily fire an officer with whom he becomes displeased. Keep in mind that the position of police chief in Los Angeles, as in most other cities today, has devolved into an almost purely political one. The current LAPD chief, Michel Moore, is little more than a politician in uniform, and, like everyone else in city government, a leftist one.
Current law grants LAPD officers due process, including an evidentiary hearing, before they can be terminated. Moore and others wish to change this so as to allow him to sack an officer at his pleasure. In today’s environment, when cops fear that at any moment some encounter with a criminal suspect will go wrong and launch them into some nightmarish ordeal, how confident can any of them be that Moore or some future chief would not offer up their head on a salver in order to appease the mob?
I invite you to read the piece and offer your comments here. I apologize in advance that I may not be able to respond right away, if at all. I’ll be on the road today and internet service at my destination is spotty to non-existent, but I promise to answer any questions when conditions allow.
Published in General
There comes a point where you can no longer make excuses for people, or continue to find room in your heart to pity them.
If this is what the people of LA have voted for, then there is nothing to be done about it. You can’t save people from themselves.
I’m concerned about unfair accusations against the police, but I’m not convinced that civil service protections are a good thing. Why shouldn’t cops face the same reality as the rest of us, subject to being fired if our boss doesn’t think that we did a good job?
There might be some good reasons for this, but my inclination is toward “at will” employment.
Because police chiefs are willing to throw cops under the bus to save their own hides.
Welcome to the private sector.
I sympathize with what you’re saying, plus police work may be a unique enough profession that warrants exceptional treatment regarding termination. However. Jerry has a point.
How many split-second life-or-death decisions do you make at work?
Doctor s are often at will employees.
Too often it seems like the system protects the bad more than expels the good.
Maybe there is a good middle ground?
Cops should be backed up for the hard job. They should be fired for violating civil rights.
I have seen too many videos of the police escalating situations for the “crime” of disrespectful behavior towards the police.
Maybe the problem cannot be solved and we must put up with citizen abuse in order to reduce crime.
There is both external and internal stress in police work. In the present moment we are seeing police chiefs moving from department to department like college football coaches.
There is a divide between line cops and admin cops which is not entirely new. There are good admin cops, but there are admin cops that are a problem. Policing on the streets is a messy business and there are some cops that put in the minimum amount of time to get off the street. Some of them are incompetent, and some of them are cowards. They become Monday morning quarterbacks and will throw officers under the bus.
The incompetent admin cops and cowards provide a good deal of internal stress. Eventually that ends proactive policing.
Amen to every word.
There are also a lot of cops – far more than admins I’d think, simply because of the inevitable ratio of “indians” to “chiefs” – who go from one department to another as they get fired and/or sued etc, but are never reported to background-checking agencies or have their LEO credentials cancelled due to misconduct.
It’s hard to argue with this. If the people of L.A. (not to be confused with LA, the abbreviation for Louisiana) ever decide they want law enforcement, they can have it again. Although I expect they’ll find it takes a lot longer to get it than to lose it.
The expression “take one for the team” was about sacrifice for the collective benefit of the guys on the field. When it is about comfort levels for the PR department, the moral dynamic changes. Being tossed to the mob to provide momentary political benefit for complete weasels has nothing to do with “team” in any meaningful way.