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As first noted by capper over at whallah!, Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke is playing the blame game once again, and this time he’s blaming everyone but himself (conveniently enough) for the recent spate of shootings in Milwaukee. In an email to Chuck Sykes, Clarke blames Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, Common Council President Willie Hines, Governor Jim Doyle, the Milwaukee County Circuit Court judges, and District Attorney John Chisholm in quick succession for the recent rash of violence in Milwaukee, but as I read Clarke’s missive, I noticed one glaring absence among those named as being responsible: Sheriff David Clarke. As Milwaukee County’s top law enforcement official, shouldn’t Sheriff Clarke share in some of the blame for the problems that plague Milwaukee? After all, as Milwaukee County’s “top cop,” Clarke should be at the forefront of any efforts to make Milwaukee a safer place to live, work, and raise a family.

Then again, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that Clarke’s casting blame at everyone but himself, because in doing so he’s shifting attention away from his own failed policies as Milwaukee County Sheriff - policies which include pulling deputies from patrolling Milwaukee County parks, eliminating the drug unit, and stopping support for the DARE program, among other things. Maybe Clarke’s bitter because knows he probably will never advance further than his current position, or maybe he’s just too arrogant to admit to his own shortcomings, but if he’s serious about helping find a solution to violent crime in Milwaukee, I’d like to see a lot less talking and a lot more action.

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As reported a couple of weeks ago by Michael Mathias at Pundit Nation, Americans For Prosperity are holding their Defending the American Dream summit on February 9th in Pewaukee. Among those slated to speak at the summit are Congressman Paul Ryan, Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, and Sheriff David Clarke of Milwaukee. As I perused the website for the summit, I couldn’t help but notice this:

Earlier this year, we held the largest taxpayer rally in Wisconsin’s history on the steps of the state capitol in Madison to send a message to the Governor and Legislature to hold the line on taxes.

While AFP might technically be correct in saying they held the largest taxpayer rally in Wisconsin’s history earlier this year, that’s not exactly saying too much, considering they were outnumbered almost two to one by folks opposed to AFP’s anti-tax kookery.

Is kookery even a word? I’m not sure it is, but it should be.

Heck, I might even attend the summit - maybe Michael Mathias will give me his free tix.

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Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker has talked a lot about his desire to close the Community Correctional Center - Milwaukee’s Huber work release facility - and replace it with GPS monitoring for offenders who would have otherwise been housed at CCC. Walker’s touted his plan as being one that will save the County - and taxpayers - millions of dollars, but Sheriff David Clarke isn’t buying it. “If you are not going to do GPS right, I’m going to stand in the way of it,” Clarke said to the MJS. What I found most interesting was this passage from the article:

Clarke said in an interview that serious unanswered questions about the GPS system remain. To be done properly, inmates considered for GPS monitoring should be carefully pre-screened, he said. All violent and drug offenders should be excluded, Clarke said.

A successful monitoring program also should have frequent drug testing, he said. And the program needs extra law enforcement help to round up inmates who set off alarms for straying from approved travel routes to school or jobs.

All those things cost money that hasn’t been found yet, Clarke said.

That’s exactly the problem I’ve always had with Scott Walker’s plan to close CCC - the fact that it may not actually save much more money than keeping CCC open and fully staffed. Another concern of mine was also raised by Sheriff Clarke - that being the fact that offenders on GPS could still be committing new crimes while they’re being monitored, because a GPS bracelet won’t prevent someone from committing murder or dealing drugs.

Ultimately, any solution to the problems that have plagued CCC will come only after Scott Walker and Ron Malone, the Superintendent of the House of Corrections and CCC, finally admit that the problems at those two facilities aren’t simply a matter of lazy staff who don’t want to do their jobs properly. If I were running things at the HOC and CCC, my first course of action would be to change the entire culture and improve working conditions for staff, because staff who don’t like coming to work aren’t going to do their best while they’re at their jobs. There’s no denying there’s a lot of problems at the HOC and CCC, but those problems can most certainly be fixed - but only if management is willing to work collaboratively with the rank and file corrections staff to enact real changes that not only improve working conditions, but that also keep our communities safer.

GPS monitoring isn’t going to be a magic fix for what’s wrong with CCC, and if Scott Walker thinks it is, he’s fooling himself.

capper over at folkbum’s is talking about this too.

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I know I’m biased, but I honestly believe David Clarke has been a miserable failure as Sheriff of Milwaukee County. This is a man who, during his tenure in office, has done more to alienate the rank and file members of the Sheriff’s Department than any of his predecessors, a fact that isn’t surprising given his penchant for calling his subordinates “losers” and “dumb,” and putting aside his lack of any kind of leadership qualities, he hasn’t really done much to fix that which is wrong with the Sheriff’s Department. This is also the same man who time and time again blames his subordinates whenever there’s a problem at the jail, leading me to conclude Sheriff Clarke’s obviously not a believer in Harry Truman’s philosophy that “The Buck Stops Here.” As Sheriff, he should take some responsibility for how the jail is operated, because that is one of his mandates as Sheriff, yet time and time again he deflects any blame off himself and on to the deputies and corrections officers that work under him, ostensibly because he’s more concerned about his own political future than he is about doing what’s right for the Sheriff’s Department - and not just David Clarke.

After all, how can anyone forget the absolute failure that was the GRIP program, Sheriff Clarke’s vaunted - but ultimately ineffective - program for taking guns off Milwaukee’s streets. I sure haven’t forgotten GRIP, because it was largely due to the GRIP program that deputies in the field were sent on a fool’s errand instead that yielded little in the way of actual results, while creating holes in coverage throughout the county.

As I’ve said, I’m not fan of David Clarke, but that’s because I don’t consider him much of a lawman. After all, how can anyone respect a Sheriff whose “plan” for reducing crime in Milwaukee consists of:

• Send folks to church
• Get them more money
• School uniforms for kids

Noticeably absent from that list? Any mention of specific law enforcement strategies to deal with crime in Milwaukee. There’s no mention of putting more deputies onto our streets and highways, and there’s no mention of partnering with other law enforcement agencies in Milwaukee County to work collaboratively to combat crime. If this is what passes for Sheriff David Clarke’s “plan” for making Milwaukee safer, then perhaps I should run for Sheriff, because I’m sure I can come up with a comparably detailed and comprehensive “plan” in about five minutes.

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I wish I was surprised, but knowing what I know of how the Milwaukee County Jail is run from the top down, it’s not shocking that another inmate has escaped from the County Jail. Jaron X. Jennings, in custody on a probation hold for an outstanding auto theft warrant, switched wristbands with an inmate in custody on a misdemeanor marijuana charge, enabling Jennings to bail out. It’s important to note that a probation/parole hold is a hold with no bail or bond, so the individual under a VOP (Violation of Probation/Parole) hold can’t be released by anyone except their Probation & Parole Agent.

Of course, when asked for a comment on the situation regarding the escape, Sheriff David Clarke blamed everyone but himself for the failure, saying,

“Wristband switching is one of the oldest tricks in the books, yet we have people working here that are still dumb enough to fall for it; however, they won’t be here after I finish my investigation.”

Now I know that as Sheriff, David Clarke can’t know everything that goes on in the Milwaukee County Jail on a day to day basis, but this escape is just another example of how ineffective and farcical the leadership of the Milwaukee County Jail/HOC/CCC really has become. This is just another in a long line of blunders and mistakes that have given these facilities and their staff the reputation of being an absolute joke, sometimes undeservedly so, sometimes not. Heck, at this point, I’m starting to believe I could do a better job of running the county’s criminal justice facilities than the current crop of leaders.

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