Perhaps Stan Sniff’s endorsements of left-wing liberal democrats are no fluke. He blames other people for his problems, has stymied CCW Permits, fights with law enforcement officers incessantly and of course has presided over the staggering numbers of releases of hardened criminals.
But he loves him some ACLU.
I’d lay odds the ACLU loved it when he started melting ICE and giving illegal aliens a head start on avoiding deportation. The ACLU and the Sheriff even had a love fest over it before the Sheriff thought better of it and pulled the press release off of the website. You know, the Sheriff Sniff definition of transparency.
The ACLU loved it when he hung a gigantic target on cops. The ACLU must have been asleep as the Sheriff has been scapegoating the cops for years, the hallmark of bad management. Since the ACLU’s definition of societal order is coddling criminals and heavy-handed anti-law enforcement legal activity – they should have had a poster of the Sheriff in their lobby.
What was at issue was not the body cameras. Everyone in Law Enforcement agrees that using them is a good thing. 80% of voters agree.
However having Body Cameras is just not enough for the ACLU. The ACLU tries to assert in their letter to the Sheriff that the camera does not always tell the full story, if you can believe that (it is the ACLU, after all), as an entree to explaining why the cops need to be treated with scorn and suspicion. The rest of us know that the camera does not lie. Time and gain the ACLU’s fellow society-destroying social justice warriors have started anti-police riots in the name of justice only to be exposed as liars when the camera vindicated the law enforcement officer.
However, the ACLU believes that the cops should not see the tape before writing their incident reports. Their argument is that cops are dishonest and might change their report to match the camera. Apparently, the Sheriff agrees with the ACLU.
ACLU – Police Body-Worn Cameras – Policy Points 
The ACLU references Oakland and Los Angeles in their letter and of course the good Sheriff agreed and decided he’d throw defense attorneys and criminal advocates a bone. Maybe the Sheriff was looking at this as a way to backdoor relieve prison overcrowding by giving defense attorneys more ways to create arguments to let guilty perpetrators go free.
I am 46. Anyone around my age can completely relate to not being able to remember stuff in detail very well. It is made even worse by the blur that sometimes occurs when you are making a string of split-second decisions. What the Sheriff did is create a situation where an honest mistake or omission can allow a guilty criminal to go free due to a technicality because the written report may not perfectly match the video.
Worse, an otherwise innocent, honest cop is also subjected to their integrity being challenged in this situation. This is similar to the gotcha game that prosecutors try to play in order to catch someone on obstruction of justice or perjury with unintentional comments. (see also the fantasy of obstruction against President Trump)
You can see the embedded screenshots of the since-removed ACLU’s letter to the sheriff congratulating his decision to hang a target on the cops.
You can see if you look close that this was shared on facebook.
It appears that posting stuff on the Sheriff’s website and then removing it amidst the backlash is a consistent pattern for the Sheriff as well.
When you are in law enforcement and the ACLU agrees with the decisions of your boss, you should be upset. If you are a voter and the ACLU is agreeing with the Sheriff, go get a gun (but in Riverside, you’ll have to wait 2 years before you can carry it with you) to protect yourself because criminals are having a field day with their ACLU-issued get out of jail free cards.
As we continue on our Tour-de-Sniff it will be a helpful exercise to take a trip down memory lane to tell the story about his priorities that have led to the furloughs, staffing cuts and empty jail beds because there is no staff for them? The repeatedly broken campaign promises mean the only winners have been the guilty, not the taxpayers.
Sign up to receive RightOnDaily updates sent to your inbox.