With the “defund the police” gang slowly losing the argument around the country as crime runs rampant and “no cash bail” reforms wreaking havoc on communities nationwide, a new idiocy has raised its goofy head in the name of “police reform.” The limitations on police actions when the officer only has “reasonable suspicion” instead of “probable cause!”

In other words, don’t pursue, detain, use force, or interview unless you have probable cause. The Left’s assault on reason and civil order are going on ⏤ on several fronts, and while one failed policy is still in place, the trend to keep the chaos in the streets continues at administrative and legal levels. While the average citizen doesn’t realize the crippling effect of requiring probable cause instead of reasonable suspicion to stop a possible criminal, the crime fighter community knows the disaster that is coming.  

Let’s dig into what these policies cause. For the non-police folks reading this, it means you have to tell me the ending of the story before you can read the book! It means a fellow walking down the street from a business with a silent alarm going off who sees an approaching police vehicle and turns and runs can’t be detained until the officers have: 1. Determined a crime has been committed. 2. Find evidence linking that running fellow to the crime. 3. Have enough evidence to charge that jogger with the crime! 

Probable cause is what an officer has AFTER investigating, not during an investigation very often. Reasonable suspicion is what guides the investigator to find evidence, suspects, additional victims, and witnesses, and leads to the determination of the probable cause.

This new idea, demanding police have probable cause instead of reasonable suspicion, is based on the fiction that police are detaining and arresting innocent people based on race or other factors. Reasonable suspicion means simply that an actual law enforcement officer, with experience and training, perceives something as suspicious and needs to be investigated further. One doesn’t need to be a cop in most of these situations to want to look deeper into a suspicious situation! Anyone who has ever watched an episode of Law and Order or Adam One would be able to identify suspicious people, activities, or circumstances that need further investigation.

The Progressive Movement is constantly looking to handcuff police instead of the criminal. Trying to limit things like qualified immunity has been a failure at disabling police agencies, so the movement went to a strategy of hamstringing the law enforcement community from the very beginning of an investigation. 

Those who don’t understand the day-to-day use of reasonable suspicion in crime fighting may not see what an immense burden removing this tool from law enforcement creates. Worse, the effect will be the increased danger and insecurity in the very communities the activists claim to represent, not to mention the hesitation in the minds of officers during critical moments of a deadly encounter when anxiety skyrockets and their lives are threatened. The intent of the suspect is ambiguous!  

So far, as I write this, in December 2022, 302 law enforcement officers have been shot, with 56 succumbing to their wounds. While America is not quite at 1970’s crime levels, we are rapidly deteriorating to that level. We have somehow forgotten the lessons of the past, and once again, lawlessness is becoming the order of the day. The one thing apparent to me is the single-minded intent of those seeking to hinder crime fighting and my sincere doubt about their motive. What are the consequences of these types of reforms, and what social, political, and statistical data would drive this movement? How do we get the citizens of our communities to understand how absurd these restrictions are on law enforcement and how drastically will they affect our ability to fight crime?

First, our leaders need to speak out about how wrong the restrictions are and what the reality of intervening in the commission of a crime requires. Probable cause is the result of, not the initiation of, a criminal investigation often started by and sustained by reasonable suspicion. Just like the officer’s use of force has traditionally been judged based on what a “reasonable officer” would do, not what an untrained civilian, politician, or journalist thinks they would do!

Reasonable suspicion is based on the common sense of the officer, who then investigates to find and gather evidence regarding that suspicion. The ethics of policing requires the officer to gather ALL EVIDENCE of a crime showing both the guilt or innocence of any suspects involved. Eliminating suspicion is an absurd argument declaring that an investigator must already know a crime has occurred and the suspect actually did it! In other words, for the officer to know the result of an investigation without conducting the investigation. Ridiculous, sure, but any more insane than not requiring bond on an arrested suspect? More ridiculous than saying we must defund the police, empty the prisons, or disarm the law-abiding?   

Ultimately, the only winners in this odd social experiment being foisted on the American people are the career criminal, the gang banger, and extreme social activists. We need political leaders to speak out against this lunacy, and police leaders to explain to citizens whenever they can about this growing crisis.

The midterms fell flat on a chance to confront this social decay, but the grassroots need to rise up. All of you need to rise up, get involved, join a group, and become a representative in your political process. Most Americans don’t even understand when someone says we need to grow the Precinct Committeemen Movement, but it is the grassroots of any party and essential to changing the course of politics in this country.  

It is time for common sense to return to our society and for the criminal justice system to be refocused on maintaining a civil society, protecting the innocent, helping the victims, and punishing the criminals. It’s time for voters to immerse themselves in local politics and make their beliefs and expectations known to those who represent them. And it’s time for Americans to stop accepting the status quo and start demanding real solutions; the future of this nation depends on all of us.