Thursday, October 3, 2013

Where would police PR be without "officer safety"

The breaking story of shots fired near the Capitol sent legislators, staff, and media, ducking for cover. It appears now that it was not an attack on the Capitol rather just a related police matter. Suppose the good legislators, staff, and media some of whom reported breathlessly and excitedly on the presumed ongoing attack were to find out that the shooting was merely friendly fire from the friendly swat team conducting a drug raid across the street. You can bet there would be hell to pay and somebody's career disappear faster congressional ethics in a lobbyist's office.
A like incident recently happened in that beacon of enlightenment and fiscal integrity, Detroit, but the traumatized witnesses were school children. Right. Police conduct a raid across the street from a school and got of a couple of obligatory rounds at some pit bulls, sending the children screaming and running for cover.
The Detroit Free Press lamely reports;
Detroit Police Chief James Craig said today that officers will give greater scrutiny to location and timing when they prepare to execute search warrants.
Gee don't put yourself out, Chief.
The chief went on to explain that the cops could not have given the school a heads up on the raid because it would jeopardize "officer safety". The department says it has changed its policy regarding raids but it can't tell the public what changes it made.
Jones said at a news conference Wednesday that the department “implemented policy changes to prevent this from happening in the future.” Craig and Jones declined to detail the changes, citing a need to protect officers’ safety.
This guy has a future with the Obama administration as soon as he learns to substitute "office safety" with "ongoing investigation".

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