Chicago Officers May Soon Have to Make 1 Required Call to Chase Suspects on Foot
As if a police officer’s job weren’t difficult enough amid today’s toxic anti-cop environment, Chicago’s Democratic mayor, Lori Lightfoot, now wants officers to get permission from a supervisor before pursuing a suspect on foot.
Lightfoot hasn’t made a final decision yet but vowed to release details about the potential policy change “soon,” WFLD-TV reported.
“No one should die as a result of a foot chase,” the mayor said Wednesday.
She made the remarks amid mounting calls for her resignation following the March 29 death of Adam Toledo, a 13-year-old Latino boy who was shot and killed during a police chase less than a second after appearing to drop a handgun.
John Catanzara, Chicago’s police union chief, reviewed the bodycam footage of the incident and called the shooting “100 percent justified.”
Chicago police already have to get a supervisor’s permission before launching a car chase, but the new policy would now require them to get permission before embarking on foot chases.
Since cops are often forced to make split-second decisions when chasing down and apprehending suspects, this onerous new policy ultimately would result in more crime and the streets being even less safe for law-abiding citizens in the city.
Alderman Brian Hopkins, a Democrat, conceded that adding this new layer of bureaucratic red tape could result in more criminals roaming the streets of Chicago. But oh well, c’est la vie.
“Of course that raises obvious problems,” Hopkins told WFLD. “In the time it would take to do that, the person you’re supposed to be chasing is actually long gone. The point would be moot then.”
He added that the vehicle-pursuit policy already has emboldened suspects to resist arrest more often by fleeing.
“We’re seeing more vehicles flee from police officers because word has gotten out that they’re probably not going to get permission to chase you,” Hopkins said.
Lightfoot also acknowledged that the new policy could fuel more criminality in her already crime-infested city. But to her, it’s apparently more important to handcuff the police than to ensure public safety.
“I don’t want people out there who are dangerous to think, ‘Well, if I just run, then I’m safe. I can continue to wreak havoc.’ We can’t live in that world either,” the mayor said.
Given the horrifying crime escalations in Chicago, you’d think Lightfoot would want to empower law enforcement so her city would be safer. But no, the opposite is happening.
There is no doubt that Democrats and their media lapdogs have made a concerted push to disempower and destroy the police.
It’s obvious in their demonization of law enforcement through their glowing support of the anti-cop Black Lives Matter movement, the Democrats’ rabid push to eliminate bail requirements, the mass releasing of prisoners from jail over coronavirus concerns, and the burdensome new rules being foisted on officers in the performance of their jobs.
According to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, part of the anti-police hostility is to punish law enforcement because it’s one of the few remaining institutions in the country that’s not controlled by Democrats.
“Law enforcement is one of the very few institutions remaining in this country that the left has not yet controlled,” Carlson said in June.
“Democrats hate the police because they don’t control the police. Very simple.”
During the 2020 presidential race, the only two institutions that donated more to former President Donald Trump than to then-Democratic candidate Joe Biden were the New York Police Department and the U.S. Marines.
Institutions by donations pic.twitter.com/30hnvqXSgZ
— Fact-Checker Poso (@JackPosobiec) March 31, 2021
As with everything Democrats do, Carlson said, the left’s “defund the police” hysteria is just another way to acquire more control over Americans, by stoking panic and fear while eroding your feelings of self-reliance and siphoning away your civil liberties.
“Defund the police is a move toward authoritarian social control, cloaked in the language of identity politics,” he said.
“Already, in the middle of a total breakdown of law and order as we watch our cities burn, you are seeing new moves to prevent you from defending yourself and your family in the middle of it.”
He added that Democrats have cynically weaponized race as part of a naked power grab — all while brainwashing the gullible public into believing it’s because they care about black lives.
“No matter what they tell you, it has very little to do with black lives,” Carlson said. “If Democratic leaders cared about saving the lives of black people — and they should — they wouldn’t ignore the murder of thousands of young black men in their cities every year.”
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