It’s a loss of respect for cops that’s led to so many more cases of people acting boldly and trying to hurt them, says Jim Fuda, Executive Director of Puget Sound Crime Stoppers, which he says comes from incidents like the killing of George Floyd that Fuda says doesn’t reflect the attitudes or behaviors of most officers.
Fuda says the law enforcement officers he talks to say they’re counting their days until retirement and thinking about their families. “They are husbands, wives, uncles, cousins,” Fuda says, “They want to live their life like everybody else, and they go out there and do what has even become more of a thankless job, and trying to do the right thing and, you know, to be gunned down needlessly…it just gets to be too much.”
Fuda says he also lays part of the blame on a lack of support for police from politicians and a criminal justice system that allows a revolving door of people with extensive criminal histories let back out on the streets with a sense that there are few or no consequences for their actions.
Fuda acknowledges the need for changes in policing, especially since they can’t even answer all the calls they have now, but he says the clear majority of cops on the street are out there trying to follow the rules and protect people, not harm them. Still, he says the current environment is why so many officers are racing toward their retirements or even leaving the profession early.
Fuda’s big concern is that with not enough officers on patrol, people will begin to take the law into their own hands, which he says could actually put more people in danger.
