A lot of people would think maybe–just maybe —the system worked in the case of Greensboro Police Officer Travis Cole’s use of force of a citizen as portrayed in the video released to public earlier this week. Not only is Cole no longer a police officer, but neither is his female partner, who also ‘resigned’ earlier this week. Mind you Officer C.N. Jackson was portrayed sympathetically in earlier news reports because she apparently did not behave inappropriately in the arrest of DeJuan Yourse. But–like the teenage two boys in Hang ‘Em High–who didn’t help Bruce Dern as he attacked Clint Eastwood in the desert, but didn’t do anything to stop him, either—-Officer Jackson got the (proverbial) gallows.
The question of course is whether or not Officer Jackson would have been forced to resign had local activists–led by the Rev. Nelson Johnson–not called for her discipline. And here we have the problem—Johnson and his ilk have the ear of certain City Council members—notably District 1 rep Sharon Hightower and Mayor Nancy Vaughan, who let protesters have their way during the Monday’s special meeting to release the video. As John Hammer writes in this week’s Rhino, “it sounded like Hightower wanted the City Council to run the police department.”
Not to mention the fact that City Manager Jim Westmoreland excluded four officers involved in the Cole investigation from a promotion ceremony because—according to the Rhino—he was concerned the ceremony would be subject to protests. So now Greensboro is going fast down the road to a politicized police force, and that’s never good. and it appears as though Chief Wayne Scott is buckling to the council’s wishes, so much so that he even (briefly) received praise from uber-liberal N&R columnist Susan Ladd. But as we know with leftist political groups, enough is never enough.
Somebody correct me if I’m wrong, but the most stable GPD has been period in recent memory was when they brought in Ken Miller from –of all places–Charlotte to head the force. This tells me it’s once again time for an outsider to bring a new vision–which of course would mean that Chief Scott should take an early retirement.
