Sheriff Heath Taylor frustrated with media coverage of police shootings

We all look at life through a filter.

Our filters come from who we are and our life experiences. It is as simple as that. And just as complicated.

Russell County Sheriff Heath Taylor’s filter is tinted by 29 years as a lawman. He spent seven years as a Metro Narcotics Task Force agent working drugs on both sides of the Chattahoochee. He served as chief of investigations for his department for 14 years.

The last six years, he has been sheriff.

Right now, he is frustrated. He’s had it up to here with the mainstream media he thinks is fueling some of the crisis in law enforcement these days. He is frustrated with social media. He’s frustrated that law enforcement officers are dying trying to serve and protect. He is frustrated by the unrest that has resulted from the deaths of men in Louisiana and Minnesota at the hands of law enforcement.

And he has had it up to his eyeballs.

“More people are struck by lightning than are killed by police officers,” Taylor said.

The study Taylor points to was done by a University of Toledo criminal justice professor using homicide data from 2009-2012. The survey suggests that during that span an average of 372 people were killed each year by law enforcement use of force. The survey says 373 people are struck by lightning each year.

“Roughly 20 of those shootings are called into question,” Taylor said. “There are more than 900,000 cops. That is millions and millions of public encounters each year. Go to the media and see how many stories you get wrong over the course of a year.”

Point made.

But Taylor takes great pains to say he is not diminishing the mistakes law enforcement makes.

“They should be investigated — properly investigated — then people can react,” Taylor said. “But MSNBC, Fox News and CNN should not be showing edited clips. Show the whole thing.”

The biggest issue, as Taylor sees it through his filter, is that some people do not follow the commands of law enforcement during an encounter.

“And it is black people and white people,” he said. “When we were kids, you did what an officer asked. If they were wrong, you sorted it out later. With what is happening now, everything escalates.”

Then it gets on television because everybody today has a camera in their pocket .

“Part of the public’s discontentment with cops is being fueled by the media,” Taylor said.

He points to the Baton Rouge police shooting of Alton Sterling last week. Taylor suggests that some media outlets had video footage they did not air.

“If the media had the full footage and had shown it, the reaction from the public would not be the same,” Taylor said. “It is a tragedy a man was shot. The reality is he had a gun and tried to get to it. Color doesn’t play a part in that role.”

And his frustration level rises when he sees a social media post like the one Cleveland Browns running back and Columbus native Isaiah Crowell made last week where a jihadist is slitting the throat of a cop.

Crowell has since apologized, even promising to donate $37,500 — one game’s pay — to the Dallas Fallen Officer Foundation in memory of the five officers killed last week by a lone gunman.

“It is kind of like us,” Taylor said. “Once you fire, you can’t put the bullet back in the gun. It’s the same thing when you post a picture like that. You have told everybody exactly how you feel.”

One of the reasons Crowell gave for the post was frustration. Seems like everybody is frustrated these days.

Taylor draws an analogy to what is happening with Crowell. The Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association initially threatened to refuse to work the Browns home games because of Crowell’s post. On Wednesday, the union accepted his video apology and ended the threat to not work the games.

It would have been flawed logic to deny stadium security because of one player’s actions, Taylor said.

“Don’t cut off all security at an NFL game because one guy made a bad decision,” the sheriff said. “You can’t judge all NFL players by that post. Just as you can’t judge all cops by the actions of one. You can’t judge all black people because one black guy did something crazy; and you can’t judge all white people because one white guy did something crazy.”

Taylor offers a novel suggestion.

“Judge every case on its individual merits,” he said.

That’s the climate that exists in our country — pull the trigger and wait for the reaction.

Frustrating, huh?

This story was originally published July 13, 2016 at 8:17 PM with the headline "Sheriff Heath Taylor frustrated with media coverage of police shootings."