Category: Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement
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Imprisoned by the Past
by James A. Bacon As a parting gift to Virginia, outgoing Attorney General Mark Herring has overturned 58 opinions issued by attorneys general between 1904 and 1967 that supported racially discriminatory laws from poll taxes to the prohibition of interracial marriage. “While these discriminatory and racist laws are no longer on the books in Virginia,…
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Morrissey Proposes Extending Parole to Most Violent Offenders
by Hans Bader State Senator Joe Morrissey, D-Richmond, has proposed legislation to make parole available to even the most violent offenders, including those who were given shorter sentences due to the lack of existence of parole at the time they were sentenced. The proposal includes a bill to make parole available to all types of…
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One More Race Baiting for the Road
by James A. Bacon Days before leaving office, Attorney General Mark Herring has filed a complaint against the Town of Windsor in Isle of Wight County, charging the police department with a pattern of unlawful racial discrimination. The lawsuit cites data showing that between July 1, 2020, and Sept. 30, 2021, 42% of the traffic…
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Uh, Oh. Charlottesville Strengthens Its Police Review Board
by James A. Bacon Earlier this year Charlottesville police officer Joseph Wood stopped a vehicle driven by a local musician, LaQuinn Gilmore. Gilmore proved uncooperative and, according to local media reports, the encounter ended with Wood throwing Gilmore to the ground. A subsequent internal affairs investigation found that Wood had unlawfully detained Gilmore, but rejected…
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Things Fall Apart: Menchville High School Edition
by James A. Bacon Last week 17-year-old Justice Dunham was shot to death during an altercation in the parking lot outside Menchville High School in Newport News. The incident took place after a basketball game. In the version of the story given by 18-year-old Demari Batten, who was charged with the shooting, he saw a…
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A Naval Officer Prepares to Repel Boarders
by James C. Sherlock Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced he has put $8 million in his new budget to transport illegal immigrants to other states and D.C. He listed Delaware and Martha’s Vineyard as potential destinations. This of course will be Florida’s response to the Biden administration flying 70 planeloads of illegals into the state…
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It’s Silly Season
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The Richmond Times Dispatch reports that Governor Northam will include $27.4 million in his budget bill for a new Center for Firearm Violence Intervention and Prevention in the Department of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS). What a dumb proposal! Setting aside the obvious politics surrounding the subject matter, as a budget analyst, I…
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Law Enforcement Shortages Come to Small-Town Virginia
by James C. Sherlock The Town of Leesburg had a population of 49,157 as of July 1, 2021. Its police force has an authorized strength of 90 sworn officers. Twenty-one of those positions are vacant. The Loudoun Times posted an article that headlined the town’s vaccine mandate as a potential contributor, but a close reading…
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Budget Maneuvering
by Dick Hall-Sizemore One of the quirks about Virginia’s governing system is that an outgoing governor gets to submit a budget proposal for the upcoming biennium, when he will not be around to execute it. It would be difficult for any new governor trying to deal with a budget that he had no part in…
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Let Teachers Teach
by Joe Fitzgerald Remember when SRO was standing room only? It’s not now. That’s not truly a loss, nor is it unexpected in a language whose alphabet only offers 17,576 three-letter combinations for abbreviations. The number goes up to almost half a million, specifically 456,976, if you go to four letters, and still there are…
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More Bacon Bits
Mia Love to Speak at UVa. Mia Love, the first Black Republican woman elected to Congress, will deliver a speech at the University of Virginia tomorrow, addressing the topic, “Preserving the American Tradition.” Love’s address is the second in a series of events bringing outside conservative voices to UVa sponsored by The Jefferson Council. For…
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Cop Who Shot Donovan Lynch Acted in Self Defense
by Kerry Dougherty On a balmy spring Friday night last March — the 26th to be exact — the Virginia Beach resort strip was packed with young people as an orgy of violence exploded. By the time the gunfire stopped and the crowds were dispersed, 10 people had been shot. Two were dead. And scores…
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To Get Respect, Show Respect
by Dick Hall-Sizemore There are frequent posts on this blog citing the low morale of police officers and officers quitting or retiring as a result. (For one example, see the post from earlier today.) However, for some reason, those posts often fail to report on the continued bad behavior of police. Early last month, a…
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Bacon Bits: Crime and Delusion Edition
Another drive-by, two more dead. Family, friends and community leaders gathered a week ago to remember 14-year-old Rah’quan Logan, who was murdered at a Richmond community store, in a drive-by shooting. Nine-year-old Abduel Bani-Ahmad, whose family owned the store, died in the same incident, in which occupants of an SUV drove past the store and…
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White Supremacists Are Pathetic Broke Losers
by James A. Bacon The mainstream media portrays white supremacists as an ever-present danger to the republic, and heavy hitters from the New York Times to the Washington Post gave the trial of White nationalist leaders in Charlottesville daily coverage. At last an article has been published that portrays the racists as the broke, pathetic…