The city of Red Wing, Minnesota, has become the first in the state and just the second city in the nation to pass a resolution stating that any person who attacks or hurts a police officer will be charged with a hate crime.
The city says the resolution is designed to keep police officers safe, and they hope more cities across the US adopt a similar stance.
“Currently 30 officers in 2015 have been killed by gunfire, that’s a little over three a month,” Red Wing Police Chief Roger Pohlman. “They are targeting not the person but the position and the authority. I think it’s a very trying time for law enforcement.”
In addition to the new hate crime law, representatives from the National Fraternal Order of Police pushed Red Wing officers to consider adding a daily remembrance for those officers who lost their lives in the line of duty. The Red Wing city council passed that resolution as well. For the next month, all officers in Red Wing who are not engaged with a civilian will turn on their red and blue lights each day at 11 am for one minute. Officers will pull into a parking lot or a side street and flash their lights for one minute for the next 30 days to honor the 30 officers who have been killed in the line of duty in 2015.
The same organization that pushed for the daily remembrance is hoping to take Red Wing’s hate crime resolution to the national level.
“The national Fraternal Order of Police is looking at federal legislation that would make it a hate crime to attack law enforcement,” Pohlman said.
Local Push
The push to make it a hate crime to attack a police officer starts at the local level, and Council Vice President Peggy Rehder said she hopes state legislators follow suit.
“I’d like to see the state legislators do the same thing and make this statewide statement and mean it.”
That might be easier said than done. The current law states that it’s a hate crime to attack someone because of their race, color, religion, national origin or sexual orientation, not their line of work. However, the Fraternal Order of Police say officers are being attacked because of their color – blue.
“We feel it’s inappropriate to target people because of the color their skin and it’s inappropriate to target people because of the color of their uniform,” said James Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of the Police.
Related source: MPR, CBS Minnesota
