For Pat Spearman, black and blues lives matter

PHILADELPHIA

It was a feature of both political conventions, the ongoing debate between “Black Lives Matter” and “Blue Lives Matter.”

Both conventions featured law-enforcement officials on hand to support the nominees of the two major parties. Democrats featured mothers whose children have been killed in police shootings or criminal gun violence. Republicans highlighted law-and-order speakers such as Rudy Giuliani and ex-Attorney General Michael Mukasey.

So, which is it: black or blue?

For answers, I turned to a Nevadan who’d come to speak at the Democratic convention — state Sen. Pat Spearman.

As an African-American, she’s seen racial discrimination firsthand. But Spearman has also worked as a police officer, spending nearly her entire U.S. Army career in the military police before retiring at the rank of lieutenant colonel.

As you might suspect, the answers are neither easy nor simple.

Spearman said every cop is taught certain rules about continuum of force that start with an officer simply showing up and rise all the way up to the use of deadly force. It’s vital that those steps be followed properly; when they’re not, Spearman said, it’s unsafe for the officer and for members of the public.

But she said officers are trained to control their emotions, to withhold judgment while keeping order and to resolve disputes as peacefully as possible. As a result of that training, she said, they should be held to a higher standard.

I asked Spearman if there was a “war on police,” or if she sensed that officers felt they had targets on their backs after police shootings in cities from Las Vegas to Dallas to Baton Rogue, and many others in between. (According to The New York Times, 66 officers have died on duty through July of this year, an average of two per week. Half of those deaths were the result of shootings.)

Spearman said no, that most people respect and even support law-enforcement. (To be sure, when the chief of the Dallas Police Department challenged protesters to put down their signs and pick up applications, nearly 500 would-be cops did precisely that.)

But Spearman allowed that police use of force is different today because of technology. “Now every phone is a camera,” she said. Even a garden-variety traffic stop gets passers-by to hit “record.” And the fact that video images exist has expanded the impact of police use-of-force stories.

Spearman said reforms need to come from inside departments, all the way down to the squad-car level. If an officer exhibits discriminatory behavior or seems overly aggressive when it comes to using force, his or her partner needs to act.

“I have an obligation to get them help, or get them off the force,” said Spearman, who recalled that as a young officer she busted an NCO who used racial and ethnic slurs during a bar fight in Korea. “We have got to clean up our ranks.”

Added Spearman: “The fact that we have people in our ranks who don’t deserve to wear the badge puts us all in jeopardy,” she said. “And good police officers don’t deserve that.”

Some officers have called for the return of a more aggressive mentality when it comes to policing, one that emphasizes keeping order and protecting officers from harm. Softer models of modern policing leave cops vulnerable to becoming victims of violence, according to this philosophy. But Spearman says she’d urge a return to the “constable on patrol” or community policing model, one that calls for officers to learn about — and become a part of — their communities.

The bottom line: It’s impossible for Spearman at least to choose between her black life and her blue life. She values both. “Back the blue, but remember the two,” she said.

Steve Sebelius is a Review-Journal political columnist. Follow him on Twitter (@SteveSebelius) or reach him at 702-387-5276 or SSebelius@reviewjournal.com.