ANALYSIS – According to recent news stories, uber-liberal state legislators in Washington State are to blame for lawbreaking motorists simply refusing to stop for Washington State troopers.
As part of the generally discredited leftist ‘Defund the Police’ movement of 2020, the crunchy granola state on the Left Coast of the country is still empowering criminals while scaling back police powers.
Most recently, a law severely curtailed pursuits by state troopers.
As the article notes:
Starting in January of 2022, Washington State Patrol says over 900 drivers have just plain not pulled over when troopers tried to stop them. Thanks to new laws passed by the state’s legislature in the wake of cries for defunding the police and scaling back their powers, criminals are taking advantage and ignoring law enforcement. What’s better, the situation is almost guaranteed to get worse.
Outlined in a report from NW News Network, the Puyallup Police Department says 148 suspects fled from officers from July 26, 2021 to May 18, 2022. Chief Scott Engle responded to a question about if that was unusual very much in the affirmative.
[Asked if that represents a significant increase, the chief wrote in an email, “I could 1,000,000% say this is completely absolutely emphatically totally unusual.”]
Since many of the fleeing drivers are in stolen cars, this is making getting away with car theft even easier. In other words, the list of unintended consequences is growing as one problem feeds another. Who could have ever predicted such a thing?
“Something’s changed. People are not stopping right now,” said Sgt. Darren Wright, a Washington State Patrol spokesperson. “It’s happening three to five times a shift on some nights and then a couple times a week on day shift.”
…It’s almost like the law is incentivizing criminals to break the law.
Well, it is incentivizing criminals, and what changed was House Bill 1054 passed by the liberal Democrat-controlled Washington State legislature last year.
King5.com reports: “Steve Strachan, the executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, and others in law enforcement connect the increase in failures-to-yield [to police] to the passage of House Bill 1054 last year, a sweeping police tactics law that, among other things, barred high-speed pursuits except in minimal circumstances.”
Under the new law, police officers can’t give chase unless there’s reasonable suspicion to believe the driver is impaired or a higher standard of probable cause to believe they’re an escaped felon or have committed a violent or sex crime.
The news site adds:
The law was part of a package of police reforms majority Democrats passed in response to the murder by police of George Floyd in Minneapolis and other high-profile police killings — reforms aimed at addressing racial disproportionality in policing.
Minority Republicans in the Legislature criticized many of the changes, including the pursuit law, and said they jeopardized public safety.
Strachan said he doesn’t dispute the need for statewide rules governing police pursuits but thinks a new law went too far.
Strachan cited a suspect driving on a suspended license which officers were pursuing in Redmond. The guy called 911 and told the dispatcher they had to call off the chase because of House Bill 1054.
You can’t make this stuff up. ADN
And this is the kind of crappy legislation we must live with under our present leadership in Washington State. It’s quite depressing. Mr. Inslee only has to look at what’s happening in Oregon and California to see how things will turn out if we continue this madness. It’s hard to believe that they’re actually making such poor decisions.
A great example for kid. Disrespect the police
Actually, that is exactly what they have been indoctrinated to do. It’s only now coming to be, but the push toward it has been going on for more than four decades.
It looks like Washington state is on the road to become another failed state. When law means little to the criminals it will lead to societal failure slowly but surely.
Another feather in Biden’s cap.
Why are democrat politicans so incredibly anti-American?
Because they don’t want the Republicans to win and take them all down for selling their souls to Soros, China, Russia, etc…. They don’t want to go to prison even though they all should be there. The corruption has gone on for years. I think many many have woken up to that fact. Thank God.
They are all puppets. FILTHY RICH PUPPETS FOR SOROS AND CHINA.
Will this be a national trend??
Stop all taxpayers money going to these States who pass laws favoring Criminals, these laws are written BY Criminals, what do you expect….
Yes, and y of those fleeing cars have no license plates and/or illegally dark glass!
That’s “many of those…”
The police have become worthless for anything. All good and seasoned officers quit and now the only ones left are those that would have never been hired in the first place. Basically, there are no police for law and order anymore.
Washington has been a DEMOCRATIC state for years. OREGON and CALIFORNIA, too. The whole west coast is left wing. All of the hippies and dopers moved to Northern California years ago. Then they moved on up to Oregon and Washington states. I hope all of those stupid dopers and drug addicts from the 60’s and 70’s are gonna reap what they’ve sewn. This is what we have in Washington DC. Look them up and you will see they were all hippies. Every single one of them were dopers.
Ya’ get whatcha vote for.
This should serve as a warning to voters nation-wide. Do not elect crazy leftists unless you want to turn your area into a cesspool of crime and violence.
And leftists desperately need to heed the warning “be careful what you wish for – you just might get it.”
I used to love Western WA, but the californication ruined it. I live in Western WI now
Y’all got what you voted for? Nobody with a half a brain should have seen the problem and lies theses incompetent liberal democratic politicians are shoveling. Y’all will only wake up when you become a victim or a crime and you call 911 and the put you on hold. Voting theses democratic morons out of office?
They pass a law prohibiting pursuit of people that IGNORE police seeking to conduct a traffic stop, and drivers IGNORE police attempting to conduct a traffic stop. Who could have possibly predicted that?