Politics

Bowens: Detroit's New Police Chief Is Hardly a Profile in Courage

October 22, 2013, 4:14 PM


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Detroit Police Chief James Craig

Freelance writer Greg Bowens served as press secretary to former Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer. He is also a local political consultant and public relations professional. 

By Greg Bowens

The chief of police for the City of Detroit came face-to-face with a carjacker and ran.

Say what?

That’s right.

He ran. He put the pedal to the metal and sped off.

He did what?

He ran, man. Adios, baby! Burned rubber! Outta there!

That's what The Detroit News reported he told a crowd at an anti-carjacking program in the city Monday. You can read all about it here.

This isn't the kind of news that inspires confidence in the police department’s crime-fighting ability. Nor does it do much to encourage the street cops he is leading to go out and do their job – namely take down carjackers.

“One suspect jumped out and began running toward the passenger side of my vehicle,” said Detroit Police Chief James Craig in The News story. “As soon as I saw the suspect running to my car, I accelerated out of harm’s way. And then, candidly, I got angry. . . . I said, ‘I can’t believe this just almost happened.’”

We can’t believe that the guy running the Detroit police department did not end his story with “we caught the dirt bag trying to carjack me – the chief of police! And now you are all a little bit safer.”

Instead we are all a little bit more unsafe because you, Chief Craig, let a carjacker get away.

Now there’s a chump running around the streets looking for his next victim.

One that can’t speed away in an unmarked Detroit Police Department car equipped with flashing lights, a police radio and presumably a police-issued weapon like shotgun, taser gun, pistol, pepper spray or the old-fashioned fists cops use to catch would-be carjackers in the act!

Talk about profiles in courage.

The  chief lets one get away and has the nerve to tell a group of people – some of whom have been victims of the same crime. One has to wonder: Did the crowd applaud or cry?

If Detroit's police chief won’t stand up to carjackers, what the heck are the rest of us supposed to do?

God help us all.



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