By Bill Gelert, Guest Columnist
The recent Bear Paw shooting incident has put the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office and Cherokee Indian Police Department SWAT in national news.
In the era of instant notoriety via television, YouTube and social media, stories involving high-stress law enforcement encounters with the public go national before the ink is dry on the local newspaper. With the speed of the distribution of initial stories and pictures, the tendency to rush to judgment is often automatic.
In addition to well-known big cities Baltimore, Minneapolis, Columbus, Louisville, Atlanta and Memphis, suburban and small towns Sanford, Fla., Ferguson, Mo., Kenosha Wis., and now Cherokee County, N.C., have all been heavily publicized, analyzed and politicized by the media and assorted victim’s rights groups before being thoroughly investigated by local, state and sometimes federal authorities. If one carefully reviews the history of these events, the initial furor has often been followed by significant changes to the story as additional facts become known and made public, yet the initial anger directed at law enforcement is unaffected and has led to calls and actions to “defund the police” or take other measures to handicap their ability to properly do their jobs.
Look at crime statistics around the country. Without exception, when implemented these measures have resulted in more crime and lessened safety and security for the community at large. Thoughtful and fairminded citizens realize no other outcome is possible.
Our sheriff and sheriff’s office deserve to be shielded against a rush to judgment in the court of public opinion, and most certainly against threats of violence or retribution directed toward our sheriff and deputies or the community at large. An anti-law enforcement climate can also result in an inability to recruit and retain high-quality professional LEOs, as a great many of the locales mentioned above have also been experiencing.
If a thorough investigation determines that changes in procedures or personnel are called for, we need to let the system work as intended and let the civilian county and uniformed law enforcement officials address the appropriate changes to be made, if any.
We elect our sheriff. We need our sheriff and deputies. In conjunction with our local police and state troopers, they are critical to our safety and security. Their jobs are already dangerous enough.
Cities and towns that have been quick to judge and irrationally react have paid, and will continue to pay, a very high price in terms of safety, security and quality of life. We need to guard against what can result when the initial public reaction is based on too little factual information and too much emotion.
We must not allow that to happen here.
The writer is a resident of Murphy.