When the penalty for a policeman's mistake is to put a criminal back out on the street, then we are hurting America; we are hurting our law-abiding citizens.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The act of policing is, in order to punish less often, to punish more severely.
Understand, our police officers put their lives on the line for us every single day. They've got a tough job to do to maintain public safety and hold accountable those who break the law.
When you have police officers who abuse citizens, you erode public confidence in law enforcement. That makes the job of good police officers unsafe.
Let me be clear: as I have said repeatedly, I do not believe that all police officers are bad, nor do I believe that most are bad. But there must be a transparent, impartial and fair system to judge those that engage in criminal or unethical acts.
The business of popularizing crime is how we expose the faults in our justice system. It's how we expose police misconduct.
Our officers are on the front lines - the first to show up on the scene of a crime. They should be respected; not ridiculed. They and their families protected; not put at risk.
Our people went out every single night trying to stop crime before it happened, trying to take people off the street that they believed were involved in crime. That made us a very aggressive, proactive police department.
At the Justice Department, we have no greater obligation than ensuring all people are treated equally under the law, and Americans must know that we will vigorously pursue criminal activity regardless of whether the crime is committed on a street corner or in a corner office.
It is up to us to change laws on the books like 'Stand Your Ground' laws and push elected officials to enact regulations that hold police officers to the same standards as the rest of society. This is why we vote.
Just because someone gets arrested doesn't mean what they are doing is wrong. Some laws are unfair and unjust.
No opposing quotes found.