[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 82 (Thursday, May 16, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2899-S2900]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          National Police Week

  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I have come to the floor to be joined soon 
by my colleague and cochair of the Senate Law Enforcement Caucus, 
Senator Coons, to honor the men and women who work for us every day to 
help protect us every day during Police Week. This is an annual event. 
It brings law enforcement officers to Washington from around the 
country and of course including my State of Missouri.
  As it turns out, Police Week is really a bad week to rob a store in 
Washington with a town full of policemen. Just last week, several 
would-be robbers came out of a robbery and almost ran into a group of 
St. Louis area policemen and a New Jersey policeman. They immediately 
chased down and arrested the perpetrators of that crime.
  Criminals are often not very smart, but you have to be particularly 
not smart to decide you are going to rob a store in Washington during 
Police Week. Thank goodness for those who wear blue and work to serve 
us and protect us every day and even do that when they are off duty and 
hundreds of miles away from home. So congratulations to those officers 
for what they did while they are here, and nobody is very surprised by 
that.
  When Senator Coons and I came to the Senate a little over 8 years 
ago, we started trying to find a law enforcement caucus to join, and 
found out there wasn't one, so Senator Coons said to me: Let's just 
start one, and we did. This is the week.
  We get a chance every year to talk about, specifically, what happens 
this week. We look for opportunities through the year to, No. 1, honor 
the people who work here protecting us every day, and, No. 2, to talk 
about things happening in the country that affect the people who 
protect us and protect police and sheriff's departments. This is the 
time of year, frankly, when the tragic loss of family is so evident as 
we add people to the police memorial.
  Four Missourians were added to that list this year. Deputy Sheriff 
Aaron Paul Roberts of the Greene County Sheriff's Office--the county I 
live in--died when his patrol car was swept into the Pomme de Terre 
River after he responded to a 911 call. Deputy Roberts had served with 
the Sheriff's Office for about 1 year, but he had previously served 
with the Willard Police Department for 4 years. He is survived by his 
wife, daughter, and by his parents.
  In April of 2018, Miller County Deputy Sheriff Casey Shoemate was 
killed when his vehicle collided with an oncoming vehicle while 
responding to a structure fire. He had served with that department for 
about 1 year as well, but he previously worked in two other Missouri 
police departments. He is survived by his two children, his fiancee, 
his parents, and his siblings.
  In March of 2018, Clinton Police Department Officer Christopher 
Morton was shot and killed when he and two other officers responded to 
a 911 call. As Officer Morton and his colleagues arrived at the scene, 
a man began shooting at them. The officers returned fire. They entered 
the building. The subject continued to fire. He fatally wounded Officer 
Morton and injured two of Officer Morton's colleagues whom I had a 
chance to visit with at that department not long after this incident.
  Officer Morton had been with the Clinton Police Department for 3 
years. Prior to that, he served in the U.S. military through the 
Missouri Army National Guard. He had been deployed to Kosovo. He had 
been deployed to Afghanistan. His parents and siblings, I know, worried 
about him there but wouldn't have, in their wildest imagination, 
thought he would be killed at home near his hometown when reacting to a 
911 call from a house.
  In March of last year, FBI Special Agent Melissa Morrow, of Kansas 
City, died from a brain cancer she developed following the 9/11 
terrorist attack on the Pentagon. She had been assigned to the Evidence 
Response Team of the FBI Washington Field Office. She spent 10 weeks 
after that event recovering and processing evidence from the site in 
hazardous conditions. Melissa is survived by her parents, her sister, a 
niece, and a nephew.
  The names of these fallen men and women were added to the National 
Law Enforcement Officers Memorial here in Washington and to the Wall of 
Honor at the Missouri Law Enforcement Memorial over the last month. 
They will be remembered by people who benefited from and remember their 
bravery, their dedication, and their sacrifice.
  This is a time when we honor those who serve us, particularly for 
lives which have been lost, but it is also the time to think about what 
we can do to serve them in a better way, to be sure they have the 
equipment they need, the resources they need, and the training they 
need.
  I mentioned at an event earlier today that for the last 50 years, law 
enforcement and emergency rooms have also been, unfortunately for 
everybody involved, the de facto mental health delivery system in the 
country. Officers now take crisis intervention training to be sure they 
are really prepared when they are dealing with someone whose intent is 
not criminal, but their activities are impacted by their mental health 
issues and what to do in that situation so everybody is better served.
  We have worked hard to see that the Regional Information Sharing 
System in our State, headquartered in Springfield, is properly funded. 
The High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas Program has the center for 
our region in Kansas City. Those are things that Senator Coons and I 
have worked together on to do our best to fund.
  Two different times now, we have worked together to extend the 
Victims of Child Abuse Program. Last year, we again introduced the 
bill. I think the previous extension had been a 5-year extension, and 
we came to the end of that. This is the program where, at 23 centers in 
Missouri, people understand how to get the forensic information, the 
testimony they need from kids who have either been the victims of crime 
or witnesses of crimes.
  Every law enforcement person I have talked to, Senator Coons, every 
prosecutor I have talked to believes that what happens at these victims 
of child abuse centers can't be replaced anywhere else.
  Now we are working together on the National Law Enforcement Museum 
Commemorative Coin Act, a bill that the Senate passed last year, and 
the House didn't get to it. We want to do that again. The Law 
Enforcement Museum in Washington would be the beneficiary of the 
proceeds from that coin after the cost of the coin is paid. We are 
going to be working together on that.
  We have worked with other colleagues. I have worked with Senator Pat 
Roberts of Kansas on the Kelsey

[[Page S2900]]

Smith Act. It is named after 18-year-old Kelsey Smith, who was abducted 
and murdered in 2007. This bill strengthens the ability of law 
enforcement to get the information they need, quick access to someone's 
cell phone to get the information of where they might still be or where 
they last were when they separated from that phone, if that is what 
happened.
  Senator Stabenow and I are continuing to work on the Mental Health 
and Addiction Treatment Act, something that every time we have support 
testimony on that act, it always involves law enforcement, which wants 
more focus on mental health courts and more focus on drug courts but 
particularly more focus on the ability of officers to deal with the 
situation in the best possible way when they come upon it. Remembering 
those who have fallen and continuing to work for those who stand up for 
us and run to the side of danger as they shield us from danger is 
important.

  I am glad to be joined today by my good friend Senator Coons from 
Delaware.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. COONS. Mr. President, it is an honor and a joy for me to come to 
the floor today not just as the Senator representing Delaware but as 
the cochair of the Senate Law Enforcement Caucus, which I am very proud 
to have a chance to lead with my friend and colleague Senator Blunt 
from Missouri.
  As you just heard, he recited some of the many ways in which we have 
been able to work together. Senator Blunt, as a seasoned senior 
appropriator, someone who has experience in the House of 
Representatives and in the private sector at home, leading an 
educational institution, and has worked in State and local government, 
along with my experience in local government and the private sector--I 
think that has allowed us to do really good and positive things for the 
men and women of law enforcement.
  This is National Police Week. It is an opportunity for us--not just 
here in the Senate but all over the country--to thank the hundreds of 
thousands of men and women in State and local law enforcement, as well 
as in Federal law enforcement agencies, who make possible the 
opportunity we have to enjoy our freedoms. Our basic safety, our 
ability to travel far and wide, to speak and live, and to praise and 
believe as we hope--all of this is made possible because of the ways in 
which our law enforcement officers guarantee those freedoms by 
literally putting their lives on the line for us each and every day. 
For that, we are eternally grateful.
  The Law Enforcement Caucus, which Senator Blunt and I founded, has 
held a number of engaging and important bipartisan sessions. You heard 
the Senator reference things like the High Intensity Drug Trafficking 
Areas Program and RISS, the Regional Intelligence Sharing System that 
helps to connect resources between Federal and State and local law 
enforcement. We also recently had a session on sharing relationship-
building models where we had folks in from Delaware and Missouri to 
talk about how law enforcement serves as positive role models and 
mentors in the community through terrific programs.
  I look forward to continuing to work with my friend and colleague 
Senator Blunt on these issues in the year ahead in the Law Enforcement 
Caucus and to talking briefly here on the floor today about how we 
should not just give great speeches but actually take important actions 
to demonstrate to the families and to the men and women of law 
enforcement that we care deeply about their service and about whether 
they come home at the end of their shift.
  I serve on the Senate Judiciary Committee. On a unanimous basis, we 
recently advanced a series of bills that will help advance officer 
safety, not the least of which is making permanent the Federal 
Bulletproof Vest Partnership Program that has literally saved lives 
across the country. The capitol police--the police who protect 
Delaware's capitol and our courthouse--had a dramatic and personal 
experience with that when two law enforcement officers' lives were 
saved when they were shot in the line of duty, and it was only because 
they were wearing vests made possible by this Federal-State partnership 
that they survived.
  I will also continue to work to support the COPS Program, which 
ensures that we have officers on the ground in communities large and 
small in Delaware, such as Cheswold, Delmar, Laurel, Ocean View, 
Smyrna, and my home city of Wilmington. They all have been able to hire 
new officers in recent years because of the COPS Program.
  We are also working together on reforms to the Public Safety 
Officers' Benefits Program to ensure that families of officers who are 
permanently disabled or lose their lives in the line of duty receive 
the benefits they richly deserve.
  Let me conclude by thanking and honoring a few specific officers from 
Delaware's law enforcement community for their service this past year. 
We have not had any Delawareans' names added to the Wall of Honor 
referenced by the Senator from Missouri, but all of us who have 
affection for and support the law enforcement community in Delaware 
know that we are simply blessed this year to have not joined that 
terrible roll of great honor of those who have given their lives in the 
line of duty.
  Let me briefly thank Sergeant Paul Doherty of the Delaware State 
Police, who was awarded the Robert J. Seinsoth Memorial Award as the 
2018 Delaware Crime Stoppers Law Enforcement Officer of the Year. His 
investigatory work following up on a robbery led to the apprehension of 
a serial, dangerous criminal who harmed other Delawareans.
  Let me honor Detective Jonathan Moyer, who led the investigation of 
fraud and theft at Beebee Hospital in Lewes, DE.
  Let me honor Detective Ryan Schmid from the Dover Police Department. 
He is a 6-year veteran of that department and maintained an amazing 
clearance rate of 84 percent in investigated burglaries, robberies, and 
attempted murder and solved homicide.
  Lastly, let me recognize Detective Brad Cordrey, who is Delaware's 
Child Welfare Professional of the Year and has served under Georgetown 
chief of police R.L. Hughes, who said that ``Brad's dedication, 
compassion, and tenacity to solve serious cases are unmatched.''
  There is so much more I could say, but given the number of my 
colleagues who have also come to the floor to speak, let me conclude by 
simply saying how grateful all of us are to the men and women of law 
enforcement.
  During this National Police Week, let me say what a great blessing it 
is to be able to continue to work with my colleague Senator Blunt of 
Missouri in cochairing the Law Enforcement Caucus in this Congress and 
hopefully for many years to come.
  Thank you.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.