De-policing the new normal

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FBI report finds officers ‘de-policing’ as anti-cop hostility becomes ‘new norm’

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An unclassified FBI study on last year’s cop-killing spree found officers are “de-policing” amid concerns that anti-police defiance fueled in part by movements like Black Lives Matter has become the “new norm.” “Departments — and individual officers — have increasingly made the decision to stop engaging in proactive policing,” said the report by the FBI Office of Partner Engagement obtained by The Washington Times. The report, “Assailant Study — Mindsets and Behaviors,” said that the social-justice movement sparked by the 2014 death of 18-year-old Michael Brown at the hands of an officer in Ferguson, Missouri, “made it socially acceptable to challenge and discredit the actions of law enforcement.”

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The report also found that the trend toward drug decriminalization and reduced sentencing had emboldened perpetrators, making them believe that “consequences no longer exist for criminal acts, especially drug offenses.” “Across the country, law enforcement link the decriminalization of drugs to the increase in violent attacks on law enforcement,” said the study. Such factors have “had the effect of ‘de-policing’ in law enforcement agencies across the country, which assailants have exploited.” The report cited an example in which an officer was slammed to the ground and beaten but refused to shoot the assailant “for fear of community backlash.” “The officer informed the superintendent that the officer chose not to shoot because the officer didn’t want his/her ‘family or department to have to go through the scrutiny the next day on the national news,’” said the study.

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