Roy Exum
It is a rite of spring for “the sap to rise” in high school students and, back in the day, I heard tell of a guy who used to abscond with a pretty girl and go to the lake to watch submarine races in the late-morning sun. Not anymore, today it's major league stuff. At Nashville’s Overton High School on Friday two ninth graders were stabbed, one critically. The week before a white police officer at Knoxville’s Austin East High School shot and killed a black student who was reaching for his 9mm pistol. The fully-loaded automatic was in the front pocket of his sweat shirt.
The Knox County District Attorney said Thursday that the officer fired in self-defense and, within two hours, protesters gathered at the school and in front of the police department.
Meanwhile, in Memphis the violent crime task force arrested a 14-year-old who leapt from a second-story window in an attempt to run but was quickly caught. It is strongly alleged he shot and killed an 18-year-old 10 days ago.
And in Chattanooga, at the School for the Creative Arts on Dallas Road, some child defaced the American Flag by placing a “Black Lives Matter” flag on it. This was after the very liberal principal told the school’s SRO to remove the “police flag” in his office because she had received complaints about it, and she then wrote “an official letter-of-complaint” to the unrelenting officer a day or two later.
“I will not stand for any of my officers – or any of our police serving the Chattanooga community, to be treated with disrespect. I have a thin blue line flag in my house,” said a disappointed County Sheriff, Jim Hammond, “and so do other police officers all over this city. If the School for Creative Arts so desires, I have other uses for a very, very fine sheriff’s deputy and, if he is harassed by the principal or students, I would be happy to reassign this officer and let Chattanooga School for the Creative Arts handle the messes they create. Chattanooga School for the Creative Arts is a ‘city’ school so maybe the City Council can advise the principal.”
Sheriff Hammond continued, “I talked to the school superintendent (Bryan Johnson) about the Black Lives Matter flag and he seems not to be real concerned about public school students defacing the flag, like it is some sort of prank, but I will tell you every veteran who has fought under that flag feels differently. I believe our nation’s flag is sacred and every morning when I leave the house I see my ‘thin blue line’ flag and I am reminded every day that those represented by that blue line are the safeguards we have in the United States between good and evil. Every officer in our county, be it Signal Mountain, East Ridge, or Collegedale, should feel the same way."
“We are here to protect and serve. I will not tolerate disrespect for a law enforcement officer … or for that matter … disrespect of anyone in Hamilton County. I am convinced the vast majority of our citizens want what is good and right,” the sheriff said. “I gave my oath I would do all in my power to protect all people. That includes those who were offended when our flag was desecrated. I’ll not have it.”
Art Acevedo, who left Houston recently to become the Police Chief of Miami, is hardly surprised at what is happening across the country. “An idle mind is the devil’s workshop … many school districts have been closed for a year and a half. The parent still has to go to work so these kids are left alone, unsupervised. They seek out their friends and the next thing you know we have big problems.”
Do we ever. In Philadelphia, carjacking is now the rage, with a 450 percent increase over last year. “Chicago had an 80 percent increase this March over last year’s March. “It’s just a game,” Chicago detective Brendan Deenihan said. “These children are still extremely young, terrorizing people, and a lot of them shrug, 'It’s just a car.' ”
Big Democratic-run cities, pounded by the “defund police” lunacy, are the worst being hit. In Philadelphia six juveniles have been arrested and charged with murder where there were none last year. Carjackings in Washington D.C., jumped to 345 from last year’s 142 incidents, yet the biggest statistic in that for the first three months last year, there were 95 at the end of March versus 33 last year – a 352 percent increase.
Minneapolis, where Derek Chauvin was just found guilty of second-degree murder, took $1.1 million of its police budget to fund a “violence interrupters” program through the health department. But now there is a noticeable uptake in ‘broad daylight’ carjackings, robberies, assaults, shootings, and street racing. Over 100 officers have left the MPD or have taken extended leave. “All of my people want to know, is ‘Where are the police?” said Councilman Jamal Osman, who was one of nine who voted unanimously for heavy defunding.
In 2019 Minneapolis had 101 carjackings, but in 2020 it had 404. There was another triple increase last year and – get this -- what is most disturbing is that over 80 percent of the carjackings in the fabled Twin Cities are committed by minors. That’s right. People who shrug off Black Lives Matter flags at liberal-led high schools in liberal-led cities will soon be retested at a greater standard. Smart money is betting on carjacking in Chattanooga.
In Washington D.C. a couple of weeks ago, two girls, ages 13 and 16, killed an unsuspecting Uber driver. Two days later a pair of boys, 14 and 13, were arrested for grand larceny juvenile car theft and both were armed. What they face is far distant from the principal’s office. Miami’s Acevedo: “A big part of the (crime) increase has been the fact they haven’t been going to school. There is no tool in terms of truancy to keep them in school. And, so, guess what they’ve been up to?” the police chief floated the question before answering, “They’ve been up to no good.”
Selah.
royexum@aol.com
The flag outside Chattanooga School for the Creative Arts on Dallas Road