Sunday, December 11, 2016

Case study: Why to question (another) enhancement for assaulting police officers

Governor Greg Abbott has responded to recent ambush killings of police with a suggestion to make murder of a police officer a "hate crime" and to "increase criminal penalties for any crime in which the victim is a law enforcement officer."

Though Grits has long opposed most enhancements, considering the one-way ratchet applied to criminal penalties to have surpassed any real need for additional punitiveness in Texas by around the turn of the century, in the scheme of things, I don't mind the symbolic gesture of creating another "hate crime." It's already a capital offense to murder a police officer, so the difference is purely semantic.

However, the penalty for assaulting a peace officer is already significantly enhanced, with murders of police securing a death sentence or life without parole and lesser assaults bumped upward by one offense category. So we should already be witnessing any possible benefit from enhanced criminal penalties on reducing the number of murders of police officers. If that strategy worked, we wouldn't be having this discussion!

The problem is, criminals don't carry around pocket copies of the Penal Code to read in their spare time at the bus stop. Killing a police officer and standing trial for it is a one-time life event during which offenders typically only contemplate potential consequences after the fact. Nobody is weighing penalty thresholds in their mind's eye at the moment they assault a cop. Or if they are, they have resigned themselves already that they will die if the officer does.

OTOH, there may be good reasons why one wouldn't want to boost the penalty by two categories (instead of one) just because the victim is a police officer. For example, in September, Sgt. Rick Van Houten, a police union president out of Fort Worth, allegedly assaulted another officer at a CLEAT convention on Padre Island then fled the hotel before local police came. His department investigated the incident and decided it was worth only a three-day suspension. Does anyone think the situation really merited prosecution as a felony if his department would let him back on the job so quickly? Van Houten was even allowed to participate in meet-and-confer negotiations while on restricted duty because of the incident.

Many people accused of assaulting a police officer, just like Sgt. Van Houten, claim they were defending themselves against unwarranted aggression. And there's little doubt that those claims are sometimes true. The difference is, because Van Houten himself wears a badge, he's more likely to be believed in the absence of video evidence.

Yes, cops receive lenient treatment compared to civilians when they hurt other people or break the law. But perhaps the best way to achieve justice is neither to punish cops more harshly nor to mandate felony incarceration for relatively minor altercations like this one. Instead, perhaps average citizens should be afforded the same protections and benefit of the doubt they'd receive if they were a member of a protected class like politicians or police officers. The punishment afforded the union boss is closer to "justice" in this situation than if the law demanded he be prosecuted for felony assault.

When considering whether to change the law, legislators should assess how Sgt. Rick Van Houten should be treated, not some hypothetical scary black guy conjured up for purposes of pushing a cause. If Sgt. Van Houten deserved a felony rap, fine. But if not, don't mandate that outcome for people who commit the same offense but don't wear a badge.


sunray's wench said...

I would suggest that 'hate crime' used in this context is misleading at best and at worst devalues the term in relation to any other crime carried out with the motivation of hate towards a particular race, ethnic group or religious group. While the police contain all of those groups, they do not constitute a specific group by themselves, and as you say Scott, there are already plenty of penalties available to the courts.

charles said...

Note to Greg: "No need to pander, you're already Gov".

john said...

ridiculous---what about the historical and ongoing COPS' WAR ON AMERICA? ABBOTT (& others) grandstand/pander, because who would speak against him??!
COPS have been trained and/or politically used, to hate and punish the poor--notably American blacks!! Every baloney TV show & movie highlights hunting down any poor dog who kills a cop. The cops, lawyers & FBI have had a million shows lying how great they are.
Judges claim vast immunity. Cops kill you and "fear for their lives." You'll be jailed--OR WORSE--for "resisting arrest," or fighting back when you JUSTLY fear for your life. Cops are trained to try and escalate any encounter. "I can't breathe!"
The system also has forced Cops to be at fault, raising revenue.

Be in denial, all you want, but watch it never stop.
OR, SEE the documentary, "13th." Speak & discuss the truth; put pressure on the Cop unions & Courts. All our lives, the "good" lawyers and politicians have allowed the few "rotten" ones to run amok. Today corporations buy off "our" "representatives." (SEE the bribes per votes, on the database, at
Lawyers, like most successful businessmen, are isolated enough to think they're doing okay--working the system, SO THEY WON'T HELP FIGHT THE CORRUPTED JACKALS.

Gritsforbreakfast said...

I no more believe there is a cops' "war on America" than I believe extremist rhetoric about a "war on cops." Both are hyperbolic foolishness and the type of thing this blog exists to rebut. It's actually possible to have rational, respectful, adult conversations on these topics. We are not at war.

Lee said...


You already know that answer to this as I have posted it here a number of times.

According to the gospel of the State of Texas all human life is not equal and some human lives are worth more than others. Police officers are first caste citizens and therefore are more important lives that deserve additional protection under the law that ordinary citizens are not worth. The State of Texas will not seek a death sentence for the single murder of a barber, real estate agent, clergy, dentist, cashier, teacher trucker, mechanic or anyone with civilian employment as it is considered less serious (and sometimes not punished at all). The homicide of a police officers on the other hand must be avenged with blood.

Again the simple answer is that the State of Texas does not regard all life as precious and equal and that wording found throughout our nations founding documents is really bullshit (according to the State of Texas).

Anonymous said...

Nowhere is the disparity between the police and the public more obvious than when a cop is convicted of a child sex crime. Out of the 60,000 convictions in the past 4-years, less than 20% of cops were required to register as sex offenders.

Anonymous said...

I'm a bit behind on my GFB reading. Labeling "on police" crimes as hate crimes profoundly diminishes the meaning behind the label. Hate crimes are committed around characteristics and practices that for the most part cannot be changed AND are intended to relay a message to a group. It's possible the latter may be behind some attacks against cops but one's profession is not a core, unchangeable facet of one's identity.