uptown Charlotte on Sept. 30 (Photo credit: Jeff Siner/Charlotte Observer/TNS)
by Dr. Ron Martinelli, Ph.D., B.C.F.T., C.F.A., C.L.S.
The law enforcement community is currently experiencing the most intense scrutiny and community dissention since the Vietnam war of the late 1960’s – early 1970s. Law enforcement and city administrators increasingly find themselves up against the wall as citizen protests mount; occasionally transitioning into violence, riots and the destruction of city property and privately owned businesses. Worse yet, as the police officer assassinations in Dallas (TX) and Baton Rouge (LA) demonstrate; police officers who are defenders of the Rule of Law and the Thin Blue Line of safety between the criminal elements and innocent civilians have become human targets for disturbed, lone-wolf, ticking time bombs influenced by the emotional rhetoric born from false narratives of officer-involved death cases.