[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 78 (Tuesday, May 13, 2008)]
[House]
[Pages H3759-H3762]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
NATIONAL POLICE WEEK
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Reichert) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. REICHERT. Madam Speaker, it's an honor and a privilege for me to
be a servant of the people in the House of Representatives.
I came to this office through a rather unusual route. My first career
was in law enforcement. And we are here tonight to recognize National
Police Week, and especially National Police Memorial Day on Thursday.
My 33-year career in law enforcement started in 1972. I was a 21-
year-old police officer, a sheriff's deputy with the King County
Sheriff's Office. I worked patrol for 5 years. I worked as a property
crimes detective. I worked as a homicide detective. And I've worked as
a lead detective on a serial murder case. I've worked as a patrol
sergeant, SWAT commander, a hostage negotiator--just about every aspect
of law enforcement that you can think of I've been fortunate enough to
experience--and finally, my last 8 years as first elected Sheriff in
King County in almost 30 years. And here I stand today, in my second
term in the House of Representatives, to talk about law enforcement.
I feel I have, as you might guess, some knowledge about what police
officers do and what dangers they might face. And this week especially
is an important week to stop and think about what police officers
across this Nation do. I think that sometimes we take them for granted,
the brave men and women who serve all across this Nation to protect us
each and every day.
If you think about your life, think about my life and what we do each
day by getting up in the morning, preparing breakfast, going to work,
going to school, feeling safe, coming home from work, picking up your
children from school, we sort of take those police cars for granted
that we see patrolling our neighborhood. And Sunday, this past Sunday
we celebrated Mother's Day, an opportunity for families to get together
with their children and grandchildren, as I did on Sunday with my
three--actually, two of my children showed up, and some of my
grandchildren were there, but an opportunity for us to come together
and celebrate the contribution that mothers make to this Nation. And we
did it safely in our home.
But at the same time, I remember, as I was sitting there this Sunday,
and most holidays, really, reflect back on my career and think about
those days I was in a police car, as I drove around the neighborhoods
that I was patrolling and recognizing that all of these families were
together on this special day, Thanksgiving, New Year's, Christmas,
Mother's Day, Father's Day, all those days that bring families together
that I was driving around in my patrol car in those communities, all
the cars parked at these homes, it was my job, and my partner's job on
either side of me in the districts that they patrolled, to keep them
safe while they enjoyed that day. We take that for granted. I think we
take our freedom for granted.
I once spoke at the University of Washington not too long after
taking this office and I was talking to a group of students, 400, 500
students or so, and really was emphasizing the importance of freedom
and how much that we need to embrace our freedom and recognize that
freedom isn't free, not just the men and women who are serving here as
police officers in our country, protecting us each day here at home,
but those men and women who are protecting our freedom all around the
world in our armed services.
And as I was a little bit passionate about freedom and about how
important it is for us to recognize that if we don't guard freedom it
will slip through our fingertips, a young lady in the class raised her
hand and said--and they still call me Sheriff, by the way--Sheriff, I
don't understand why you're talking about freedom so much. We have been
a free country for years, and we're going to continue to be free. That
really struck me, that one comment by that young college student,
because she really pointed out what I had believed for a long time,
that people in this country are taking our freedom for granted.
Success in our world today, success in our communities today, it
really depends upon what our police officers do. Remember your police
officers out there who are balancing, protecting your neighborhoods
every day. I was the sheriff during WTO. We had 40 to 50 thousand
people who were rioting in the streets of Seattle in 1999.
Now, there is a great balance that had to take place there as we
tried to bring peace to the city of Seattle during those riots. Before
the riots began, people were saying, let's go to Seattle and listen to
people speak and express their freedom of speech. And then as people
arrived and some decided to create havoc, people were a little bit
nervous because crimes were being committed, the rights of other people
were being trampled upon by those who felt that their freedom of speech
was more important than others who were trying to express their freedom
by going to work, coming home, leaving and going and moving and
shopping and doing the things that we do every day.
So at one point what we had to do in WTO during those days was to
shut the city down. Certain segments of the city of Seattle were
cordoned off. There was a curfew placed on the city of Seattle on the
citizens. So freedom was lost. If you think about freedom on a
continuum, you have the ``freedom to'' and the ``freedom from.''
``Freedom to'' is the police officers that raise their right hand and
say, I swear that I will uphold the Constitution of the United States,
that I will protect your rights provided to each and every citizen of
the United States of America. And on the other end of the continuum you
have the
[[Page H3760]]
``freedom from.'' We promise that we will do our best to keep you from
becoming victims of crime. Well, in WTO you saw that balance sway.
Freedom was being expressed, people were expressing their freedom more
vocally than they should have. It got out of control. Chaos ensued.
Police came in. Freedom was taken away. The balance in the continuum of
freedom was unbalanced.
But in America and in Seattle, as peace was restored to the city, the
curfew was removed and certain areas of the city that were closed off
were now open once again for people to move about the city. This is
America, where we recognize that we can't keep people from moving where
they want to move and go where they want to go. It's a free country.
So the police have a tough job. Imagine being a police officer,
50,000 people rioting in the streets and you're one of the police
officers standing in line trying to protect America, protect the
citizens of Seattle. And I saw this happen. One of the police officers,
the sheriff's deputies standing his post shoulder to shoulder with the
rest, as I was standing behind him, was standing stoically in the face
of thousands of people screaming and yelling and protesting. And one
had a stick in his hand and reached over and hit the police officer,
the sheriff's deputy over the head with that stick. And the sheriff's
deputy didn't move, just stood there. And they moved the crowd along.
It's a tough job to balance freedom and protection of America, but our
police officers do it every day.
Let's take a moment to talk about and think about National Police
Week. This is a week where we celebrate and appreciate and remember the
efforts that all of our police officers put forth each and every day.
And boy, I could tell you some stories, I would be here all night,
about my experiences on patrol and some of the things that police
officers see and the dangers that they face.
More than 56,000 police officers are assaulted every year. Every 53
hours a police officer is killed in the line of duty here in the United
States. I've lost some friends over my 33-year career. I want to share
their stories briefly. And as you can tell, it's emotional, memories
that come bubbling up as I remember those days.
My best friend by the name of Sam Hicks, he and I were working
homicide together. We were tracking down a killer. He went out one
night with another friend of mine because they got a tip on where this
killer was. And as they went out in search of this killer, they found
him. They began to follow him. And the killer and his brother ambushed
my partner and shot him in the chest with a .308 Winchester rifle and
took his life. He left behind a wife and five children. That was June
1982.
Two years later, a good friend of mine who was a classmate in the
academy--in fact, we rode together every day to the police academy in
1973--Mike Rayburn, a great public servant, excellent police officer,
dedicated, committed to his job and his family and his community, was
working a special unit in Seattle. He knocked on a door, the door
opened, the man opened the door and thrust a World War II sword through
the crack of the door and into Detective Rayburn's body. He fell and
died.
These are only two stories of two special friends. There are many
people who are touched by the loss of a police officer, mothers and
fathers, sisters, brothers, spouses, sons and daughters, grandparents,
neighbors and friends. It's a job we should respect, we should thank
them for, praise them for, not take for granted, and always remember
them.
I'd like to pause in my presentation for a moment and yield some time
to my good friend who is a judge from Texas, Congressman Ted Poe.
{time} 2030
Mr. POE. I want to thank the gentleman for yielding.
I appreciate your service in the House but also in your other career
as a sheriff. I'm sure, based upon the information we know about you,
Sheriff, when you left the State of Washington and came to the House of
Representatives, the criminals were probably cheering that you had left
town and you were coming to Washington, DC. But I want to thank you and
the other several individuals in the House of Representatives who
served in law enforcement prior to coming to the House of
Representatives.
This week is Police Week, May 11 through the 17th. I am proud to be
the author of House Resolution 1132 to designate May 15 of this year as
Peace Officers Memorial Day so that we can honor all Federal, State,
and local peace officers killed in the line of duty or disabled in the
line of duty.
As you have mentioned, Sheriff, thousands of local, State, and
Federal law enforcement officers across the country are injured every
year. Almost 60,000 a year are injured in the line of duty. Many others
are also killed in the line of duty.
Peace officers selflessly protect our communities and our property
regardless of the dangers they face. Every day when they get up, they
pin that badge or star on, and they go on patrol throughout this
country, they always put their life on the line for the rest of us.
There are almost 1 million sworn peace officers in the United States
today.
When I came to Congress, I was the author and founder of the Victims'
Rights Caucus. This bipartisan group advocates not only on behalf of
crime victims but peace officers as well, to give bipartisan support
for the work that peace officers do because many of them also become
victims of crime.
You mentioned that you spent 33 years in law enforcement. I saw it
probably from the other position. You used to catch them and I used to
prosecute them, so to speak. I spent 8 years prosecuting criminals in
Houston, Texas, and left the District Attorney's office and became a
judge in Houston for 22 more years, hearing only criminal cases,
hearing some 25,000 cases during that period of time. And I saw
firsthand how police officers became victims of crime. During my years
as a prosecutor, I knew several peace officers that were injured or
killed in the line of duty. And since the first recorded police death
in 1792, there have been almost 20,000 officers killed in the line of
duty in the United States. Of course, the deadliest day in law
enforcement history was September 11, 2001, when 72 officers were
killed responding to international criminal attacks against the United
States. Last year 181 officers were killed. That's 30 more than in
2006.
Law enforcement officers are also frequently the victims of assault.
They continue to be assaulted day in and day out. And it's not part of
their duty and job to be victims of assault. But as you mentioned, many
times they take it because that's what they do.
Here in Washington, DC., we have the National Law Enforcement
Officers Memorial. This memorial lists the names of brave men and women
who have died in the line of duty, and every year more names are added
to that memorial, and every year more families suffer the rest of their
lives for being a victim of crime and the loss of their loved one.
This year, in 2008, Texas has the highest number of law enforcement
officers that have been killed, with Georgia being second. Ranking in
the States, California has lost the most, Texas the second most, and
New York the third most since we have been recording the number of
officers killed. This week allows us an opportunity to pay tribute to
these brave men and women who are no longer with us because they
protected our communities.
Texas has a high number of officers who have been killed because of
the unique problem we have with illegal trespassers and that epidemic
that is occurring on our southern border. You can open a newspaper
almost every week in Texas and read about some illegal trespasser
committing a crime, and too often that crime is against a peace
officer. Right now, as we are here tonight, down in Houston, Texas, an
illegal trespasser by the name of Juan Leonardo Quintero-Perez, who had
already been deported from this country once for child molesting, came
back into the United States and was arrested by Houston Police Officer
Rodney Johnson for a routine traffic stop. But Officer Johnson was the
victim of a crime because this illegal criminal shot Officer Johnson
four times in the back of the head. His wife was also a Houston police
officer. Now they mourn his loss while the killer is on trial for
capital murder, too often a
[[Page H3761]]
scenario that occurs here in the United States.
This week also there is another group that is meeting, and the name
of this organization is Concerns of Police Survivors, or COPS, as it's
called. They have their National Police Survivors' Conference this
week, and it's an organization of 15,000 families of law enforcement
officers that were killed in the line of duty, and they are meeting
this week to honor the loss of their loved ones and peace officers
throughout the United States.
It is important that we in Congress recognize the work that peace
officers throughout the United States do on a daily basis. They don't
get much recognition, and it's our responsibility to make sure that we
are their advocate and we're their voice.
When I was growing up in Texas, before we moved to Houston, we lived
in a small town called Heidenheimer. You've never heard of it, Sheriff.
But occasionally we would go to the biggest town in our area, Temple,
Texas. And once I was there with my dad watching a parade, and I
noticed that there was an individual standing on the side at the curb
not involved in the parade, just watching the parade. And, of course,
that was a local Temple police officer. And back in those days, they
didn't wear uniforms. They just wore a cowboy hat and a white shirt and
a star, as some of them still do. And I was 5 or 6 years of age. And I
remember my father told me, because he noticed I was watching this
individual, he said, ``If you are ever in trouble, if you ever need
help, go to the person who wears the badge because they are a cut above
the rest of us.''
Now, those words were true many, many years ago when I was a kid, but
they are true today as well. People still, when they're in trouble,
when they need someone to help them, they go to peace officers, those
individuals who wear the badge, because they are the last strand of
wire between the law and the lawless, and they protect us from those
who wish to commit crimes against our community. They are all that
separate us from the barbarians, if you will. And we honor them for
wearing the badge of an American peace officer.
When September 11, 2001, occurred, all Americans remember what they
were doing that morning. I was driving my jeep to the courthouse, and I
was listening to the radio, and it was interrupted, and we heard about
an airplane that crashed into the World Trade Center. And as I
continued driving to the courthouse, we heard about a second plane that
crashed into the World Trade Center, the second tower. And then another
plane crashing in Pennsylvania because of some heroes on that plane,
and the fourth plane crashing not far from here, into the Pentagon.
And later that evening, as most Americans were watching television,
as I was, while peace officers like yourself, Sheriff, were out doing
your duty on patrol, I noticed that there were thousands and thousands
of people. When those planes hit the World Trade Center, thousands of
people were running as hard as they could to get away from that crime
in the skies.
But there was another group, not near as many, but they were there
anyway, a small group, that when those planes hit the World Trade
Center, they were running as hard as they could to get to that crime
scene. Who were they? Emergency medical technicians, firefighters, and
peace officers. And 72 of those peace officers gave their lives that
day.
And while it's important that we remember the 3,000 that were killed
on 9/11, it's equally important we remember those that lived because
peace officers and other first responders gave their lives so they
could live and are living today.
So it's important that we honor our peace officers because they are,
as my dad said many, many years ago, ``a cut above the rest of us.''
And that's just the way it is.
Mr. REICHERT. I thank my good friend from Texas, and it's good to
have others in Congress who understand the role that law enforcement
officers across this country play and the important work that they do
to keep us all safe. And the judges were a great partner for us in
keeping our communities and neighborhoods safe.
I want to thank you for your years of service in law enforcement and
thank you for being here tonight to share some of your thoughts with us
on National Police Week.
Some of the things that you mentioned I want to touch on.
We, as Americans, cannot really talk about success and freedom in
America and being free in America until we know our children are safe
and we know our children and family are secure. One of the things that
I think is important is to have people in Congress who understand law
enforcement. And for those police officers out there listening, I
assure you that there are people here who understand and appreciate so
much what you do. Some of us have been there.
The judge touched on a number of police officers injured in the line
of duty. I was one of those in a domestic violence call in the mid-
1970s, back when I was much younger and had dark brown hair. But in the
middle of trying to save the wife of a deranged person, her husband, I
was in the battle for my life. This man had a butcher knife and was
trying to slit the throat of his wife, and I was able to grab her and
push her out a bedroom window but suffered butcher knife wounds to the
side of my neck.
I also understand the need for support, for the community to come
around us and support us and be there for us when we need them to stand
up and tell elected officials: We need more police officers. We need
technology. We need more help. We need you to be there for us and
support us with budget increases, not budget cuts. We need you to make
strong laws in your local communities, your cities, and your States and
your counties that help us do our job, that help us protect American
citizens from criminals, from being victims, and also to protect our
rights.
The United States has some serious problems that we need to address,
and I don't think they're being addressed the way they should be.
People know that we have a gang problem. People know that we have a
drug problem. People know that we have child predators on the Internet,
sexual predators on the Internet, preying on our children.
I want to share a few facts with you. Gangs are increasing. We used
to think about gang problems, drug problems, and those sorts of things
as inner-city problems, inner-city crimes. These crime activities now
are spread across the Nation, as you can see by this map. This is an
indication of the gang problem across our country. The white dots you
see are where gang activity exists today, and it's pretty much
maintained the same level over a number of years. The red dots indicate
increases in gang activity. The blue dots, which you don't see many of,
indicate a decrease. Now, if you can't see this fully on your TV screen
at home, please feel free to go to our Web site and check your
neighborhood, check your city, check your State to see what condition
your neighborhood is in as far as increase in gang activity and drug
activity.
Today there are 25,000 gangs operating in more than 3,000
jurisdictions in the United States. Gang membership has escalated to
850,000 members.
Even more alarming, gangs are increasingly targeting our young kids.
They're not recruiting kids from college, young men and women from
college. Yes, they are, but this isn't their target age. They're not
just recruiting kids from high school. They're not just recruiting kids
from junior high school or middle schools. But they're also targeting
our kids who are in elementary schools. The average age of a gang
recruit today is seventh grade. That's an 11- or 12-year-old child
being recruited into a gang in some city across the United States of
America now, today, tomorrow, and the day after.
{time} 2045
What are we doing? According to a 2001 Department of Justice survey,
20 percent of students age 12 through 18 reported that street gangs had
been present at their school during the previous 6 months. More than
one-quarter of the students in urban schools reported a street gang
presence. Eighteen percent of students in suburban schools and 13
percent in rural schools reported the presence of street gangs. This is
not just an inner city problem. This is a problem that is spread across
this country. It is in suburban schools. And
[[Page H3762]]
it is in the suburban neighborhood that I live in in Washington State.
Gangs threaten the freedom and security of our communities in many
ways. They are directly linked to the narcotics trade, human
trafficking, ID theft, assault, murder and a host of other crimes.
There were over 631 gang-related homicides in the United States in
2001. Gangs readily employ violence to control and expand their drug
trade.
Now I have personal experience too, of course, with that but more on
a personal level rather than a professional level as a police officer.
I want to talk about the impact of drugs on children and families. I am
the proud grandfather of six grandchildren. Two of my grandchildren are
adopted. They were foster grandchildren, foster children of my daughter
and her husband, who were drug-addicted babies. They came into my
daughter's home and her husband's home when they were about 2\1/2\
months old. Little Briar is 6 years old and doing fine. He was 2\1/2\
pounds when he was born, a little meth-addicted baby. Little Emma is 5
years old. She was a crack cocaine, heroin, meth and alcohol-addicted
baby.
Think about that for a minute. Drug-addicted babies. Gang members who
are promoting drugs and selling drugs to young teenage girls on our
streets who then become pregnant and give birth to drug-addicted
babies.
I hope that everyone watching understands the impact of what I just
said. Do you know what happens when a meth baby is born? Have you ever
thought about the pain they go through? When they are born, they have
no idea they are hungry. In fact, they don't know how to eat. They
don't know how to suck on a bottle. The poison from the meth escapes
through their bottom. So they put the babies on their belly in a fetal
position with a warming light over the top of them. The poison, as I
said, escapes through their bottom. But you can't put any ointment on
them because it holds the poison against the skin. You can't use baby
powder. It does the same thing. It creates more pain.
So what do you do with a meth-addicted baby? You let the baby suffer
for 2 or 3 weeks and let the drug escape through the bottom while the
baby feels intense burning and pain during that period of time. Briar
went through that. Emma, as a crack cocaine, heroin and meth-addicted
baby had additional issues to deal with. Today these children are in a
good home. They have a chance at a good life and to be productive
citizens in this country.
But ladies and gentlemen, those are the kids that we need to protect.
Those are the kids that our police officers are out there every day
trying to prevent them from becoming drug-addicted babies, trying to
prevent those young girls that we see out there from becoming mothers
of drug-addicted babies, trying to prevent those young men out there
from becoming fathers of drug-addicted babies and then disappearing
into the streets.
So we have to say enough is enough. We have a crisis on our hands.
Gangs, drugs, sexual predators, Internet sexual predators, gangs on the
rise, organized gangs, 850,000 gang members. Congress needs to stop
talking about these issues and needs to act. We need to act today. And
during this Congress, the majority has been silent on this issue. And
as I said, I understand as a sheriff, as a police officer in a uniform
driving a police car, and as a detective, I needed the tools then to do
my job. I know there was a fight in the battle in the budget arena at
the county council level, at the State level and at the Federal level
to find us the tools that we needed. But every day we went out and we
did our job with the tools that we had.
One of the things I wanted to point out today is that we have, as
Republicans, presented over 103 pieces of legislation to help police
officers get the job done. I have to tell you that as a cop, because I
still see myself as a cop trying to be a legislator, trying to find the
way to stop the craziness and the violence in this country, where are
the people of the United States who need to push their representative,
who need to call their representative, who need to e-mail their
representative, who need to be pounding on the front door and demanding
that we do something about gang violence in this country, that we do
something about stopping the recruitment of our grade school kids and
junior high school kids into gangs?
Of the only six bills that we have out of the 103 that the Democrats
have agreed to accept, and they have actually passed, three of those
are resolutions. While we support resolutions and the statements that
they make in support of police officers, in support of stopping crime
and protecting our citizens, we need real action.
To address the gang epidemic in our suburban communities, I have
introduced legislation, H.R. 367, the Gang Elimination Act, that would
identify and target the three international gangs that present the
greatest threat to the United States and create a gang most-wanted list
and develop a national strategy to eliminate the gang epidemic plaguing
our neighborhood. This bill has not seen the light of day. I even
testified in front of the committee. That bill has not even seen the
light of day.
Why not? Is it because it is a Republican bill? Is it because the
majority doesn't support the job that police officers are out there
trying to do every day? Why are we not providing the tools that our
cops need? I ask that question every day when I come to work in this
body.
Crime is on the increase. Violent crime is on the increase. Gang
activity is on the increase. Drug addiction is on the increase. More
drug-addicted babies are being born. The pediatric interim care center
that Briar and Emma were taken to and treated and foster cared out and
finally adopted by my family has increased their capacity to now nearly
45 babies that they can hold within that facility. And it's not enough.
They need more space.
So I would ask the majority, please consider the other 103 bills.
Let's bring the Gang Elimination Act to the floor. Let's bring these
other 103 bills to the floor. Let's act on these today. Let's help the
police officers out there in our country that need our help today.
Let's not wait another minute. I demand that we have action here in
Congress in helping our police officers.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
____________________