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“85,000 Cops Assaulted Last Year — And Police Chiefs Are Selling Them Out” | Lt. Randy Sutton · Unshaken & Unafraid with Joe Pags

0:00
Speaker 1: What he is doing is he's putting his own police
0:03
Speaker 1: officers in jeopardy.
0:04
Speaker 2: Some of the men and women in blue are being
0:06
Speaker 2: sold out by so called leadership. You've seen these radical
0:09
Speaker 2: police chiefs on television, well, twenty five year plus police
0:12
Speaker 2: veteran lieutenant Randy Sutton from Las Vegas. You probably saw
0:15
Speaker 2: him on Cops as well. He's calling them out. He
0:18
Speaker 2: says that these chiefs refuse to work with ice and
0:21
Speaker 2: they're playing politics while cops get hurt and killed. He
0:25
Speaker 2: says it's finally starting to change under Trump. You need
0:27
Speaker 2: to see this. You were a cop, yes, and for
0:29
Speaker 2: how long?
0:31
Speaker 1: I was a cop for thirty four years. I started
0:33
Speaker 1: my career in Princeton, New Jersey, did ten years there,
0:36
Speaker 1: and then I did twenty four with the Las Vegas
0:39
Speaker 1: Metropolitan Police Department, retiring as a lieutenant.
0:42
Speaker 2: So I mean, that's a whole long that's a good
0:44
Speaker 2: long time. I'm guessing that there are people injured in
0:48
Speaker 2: the service as police officers all the time. But the
0:50
Speaker 2: problem we have in this day and age is that
0:52
Speaker 2: for some reason, the left thought they would vilify police
0:55
Speaker 2: officers and act like you guys are out there, you know,
0:57
Speaker 2: looking to harm people for no reason, and you know,
1:01
Speaker 2: throw your authority around. By and large, police officers are
1:04
Speaker 2: some of the finest people on the planet. You guys
1:05
Speaker 2: put on a uniform and you're willing to die as
1:08
Speaker 2: you go to work that day. Any any comments on
1:11
Speaker 2: on with with the left of this country. I don't
1:13
Speaker 2: want to make it left versus right, but that's what
1:15
Speaker 2: it is those in this country that are pushing this
1:17
Speaker 2: anti cop rhetoric. Any comments on how that's going. Is
1:20
Speaker 2: it getting better under Trump, who is a guy who
1:22
Speaker 2: loves law enforcement.
1:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's been a there's been a change, but the
1:27
Speaker 1: change has been because of the president. Uh the Under
1:31
Speaker 1: the previous administration, under Biden and beginning with Obama, the
1:35
Speaker 1: Department of Justice was weaponized against law enforcement. The media
1:40
Speaker 1: of course carried on and vilified the American law enforcement officer,
1:45
Speaker 1: you know, with the with the great lie of hands up,
1:48
Speaker 1: don't shoot, and then you know other other lies that
1:52
Speaker 1: were told about law enforcement, and it really created a
1:56
Speaker 1: very toxic atmosphere for the men and women work in
1:59
Speaker 1: the streets, and that has led to not just not
2:03
Speaker 1: just emotional psychological injuries leading to post traumatic stress, but
2:08
Speaker 1: also a much more dangerous place for cops because last year,
2:14
Speaker 1: I don't know if you're aware of this, but more
2:16
Speaker 1: than eighty five thousand American law enforcement officers were physically
2:20
Speaker 1: assaulted in the line of duty. Five thousand. Yeah, it's
2:28
Speaker 1: in astounding number. And it's up. It was fifty thousand
2:32
Speaker 1: just you know, six years ago. So you can see
2:36
Speaker 1: that the change has been dramatic and why there And
2:41
Speaker 1: there's so many reasons that I get into, but in
2:44
Speaker 1: my book Rescuing nine to one one, but much of
2:47
Speaker 1: it began with I traced it back to the Obama
2:51
Speaker 1: administration when the President of the United States came out
2:54
Speaker 1: and said that the police acted stupidly when they arrested
2:59
Speaker 1: a buddy of his. Who is really the one who
3:01
Speaker 1: acted stupidly, Yes, but that showed that showed a deep
3:05
Speaker 1: disrespect for law enforcement, and Obama despised police officers, and
3:12
Speaker 1: he showed it in every fiber of his being, including
3:15
Speaker 1: not even showing up for National Police Week on several
3:19
Speaker 1: occasions where we honored those who gave their lives in
3:23
Speaker 1: the line of duty. So under President Trump, there has
3:27
Speaker 1: been a change good, but we're still we're still a
3:31
Speaker 1: long way from normalcy.
3:33
Speaker 2: Rescuing nine one one, The Fight for America's Safety's name
3:36
Speaker 2: of the book, as Lieutenant Randy Sutton. I gotta tell
3:38
Speaker 2: you something, man, I watched Cops for a very long time,
3:40
Speaker 2: and I, just as you were speaking, look through the
3:41
Speaker 2: notes and I went, why don't I know this guy?
3:44
Speaker 2: And I absolutely watched you a lot on Cops. You
3:46
Speaker 2: were featured for a while. Was that in Las Vegas?
3:49
Speaker 1: Yes? In fact, I was the most featured officer on
3:52
Speaker 1: the television show Cops. And that led to other things.
3:56
Speaker 1: Did you ever see the movie Casino? Of course, then
3:59
Speaker 1: you saw me. You're there too, Okay, yeah they saw
4:03
Speaker 1: So what happened was that the a casting director saw
4:07
Speaker 1: me on Cops, and then when they were filming Casino
4:10
Speaker 1: in Las Vegas, they reached out and said, hey, the
4:13
Speaker 1: director is looking for realism in the part of a
4:16
Speaker 1: police officer. Would you come down do an audition. I
4:18
Speaker 1: had no idea what I was auditioning for. And I
4:21
Speaker 1: walk into the room and who's standing there but Robert
4:23
Speaker 1: de Niro and Martin Scurees eight Wow, and they said.
4:27
Speaker 2: You're the guy.
4:29
Speaker 1: Well. I wound up telling them stories about being a
4:31
Speaker 1: Vegas cop and they said, yeah, you're the guy, and
4:33
Speaker 1: that's how I got the Screen Actors Guild, and I've
4:35
Speaker 1: been doing movies and TV ever since.
4:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm actually as you're speaking, I'm looking that you've
4:39
Speaker 2: actually got somebody's listed casino fools rush in Miss Congeniality Too.
4:44
Speaker 2: What the hell do you do in Miss Congeniality Too?
4:46
Speaker 1: What was you were in most of them? But I
4:51
Speaker 1: was actually a casino boss in that particular one. But
4:55
Speaker 1: one time I got to play a bad guy. I
4:58
Speaker 1: was in the I was in the premiere episode of
5:01
Speaker 1: the TV show Las Vegas with James Cohn. Oh yeah,
5:04
Speaker 1: and for the first time I got to play a
5:06
Speaker 1: bad guy and it was really fun.
5:08
Speaker 2: Oh, that's got to be awesome. It is Lieutenant dot
5:09
Speaker 2: Randy Sutton. Go and follow Where do we just go
5:12
Speaker 2: to the Wounded Blue dot Org. Are you on Socialist
5:14
Speaker 2: too or not?
5:15
Speaker 1: Yeah? The Wounded Blue dot Org. We're all over Facebook.
5:18
Speaker 1: We're under Lieutenant Randy Sutton on Instagram and yeah, we're
5:25
Speaker 1: all over We're all over social media.
5:27
Speaker 2: I got to check you out on Instagram. I got
5:28
Speaker 2: a pretty good following on Instagram. We'll go to check
5:30
Speaker 2: you out over there. Let me go back to something
5:32
Speaker 2: you mentioned Obama that the whole situation was and you
5:34
Speaker 2: mentioned it, and just by memory, I believe it was Cambridge, Massachusetts.
5:38
Speaker 2: He was a Cambridge professor. Name was Skip Gates. He
5:40
Speaker 2: was a friend of Obama. The police officer or the
5:42
Speaker 2: neighbors see this guy breaking into a house going through
5:46
Speaker 2: the window, and they called the police. Police officer shows
5:50
Speaker 2: up and knocks on the door, says, hey, somebody saw
5:53
Speaker 2: somebody going in the window. Can you can you show
5:55
Speaker 2: me that you belong here? And suddenly it was about race,
5:58
Speaker 2: and suddenly it was about white cop. You know, black professor.
6:02
Speaker 2: How dare you profile?
6:03
Speaker 1: No?
6:04
Speaker 2: If I jump through, you know, with my big Italian ass,
6:07
Speaker 2: I mean, they'd call on me too. So that whole
6:09
Speaker 2: thing really did set the stage for what Obama would
6:12
Speaker 2: end up doing. And this is not a law enforcement thing,
6:14
Speaker 2: although people made it like that. The whole George Zimmerman
6:17
Speaker 2: and Trayvon Martin thing, the same thing. You had Barack
6:20
Speaker 2: Obama say if I had a son, he'd looked like Trayvon.
6:23
Speaker 2: He never said if I had a neighbor, he'd look
6:24
Speaker 2: like George. So and they called him a white Hispanic.
6:27
Speaker 2: The guy's his mother's from Lima Peru, George Zimmerman. So
6:31
Speaker 2: they made him a white guy against a black kid.
6:33
Speaker 2: How do you work through that? You and I see
6:35
Speaker 2: the videos on TikTok and Instagram and everywhere else, and
6:38
Speaker 2: police will pull somebody over for a valid, reasonable suspicion reason.
6:43
Speaker 2: They'll they'll tell them to get out of the car.
6:45
Speaker 2: I'm not getting out of the car. You don't go
6:46
Speaker 2: out of the Car'm gonna pull you out of the car.
6:47
Speaker 2: Don't touch me, You're not allowed to touch me. I mean,
6:49
Speaker 2: people really have it backward. Who law enforcement is. I mean,
6:52
Speaker 2: we've raised our five daughters to understand law enforcement is
6:56
Speaker 2: there to protect, serve, and to be our neighbors. That's it,
6:59
Speaker 2: nothing more, nothing less. And they will save your life
7:02
Speaker 2: if they're able, if you're in trouble. What about this
7:04
Speaker 2: whole generation that we're seeing on social media that treat
7:07
Speaker 2: your guys like garbage?
7:08
Speaker 1: Is that from That's what's that well? That began that began.
7:13
Speaker 1: You see people began becoming empowered because there began to
7:17
Speaker 1: be no consequences for what they have, what they were
7:21
Speaker 1: doing criminally. This is now, this is what This is
7:23
Speaker 1: a big This is a bigger picture, right we're talking
7:25
Speaker 1: about about the lack of consequences for a lack of
7:31
Speaker 1: accountability for committing crimes. This is what we have seen
7:35
Speaker 1: taking place literally over the last you know, most especially
7:40
Speaker 1: since George Floyd, where people burn the cities and never
7:46
Speaker 1: and never faced any consequences for it. So you can
7:49
Speaker 1: you can now remember there's eighty five thousand cops who
7:53
Speaker 1: were assaulted last year because the Left has reduced or
7:59
Speaker 1: eliminated consequences for attacking the police. Meaning what they're saying
8:03
Speaker 1: to the police is, listen, your lives really don't matter
8:07
Speaker 1: because we don't even we won't even hold those who
8:10
Speaker 1: attack you responsible for it. And so we've seen, we've
8:16
Speaker 1: seen a direct correlation between the lack of consequences in
8:21
Speaker 1: in all aspects of criminality. That's why the crime stats
8:25
Speaker 1: have been, you know, so insane with with with violent crime,
8:29
Speaker 1: because they have eliminated or reduced the consequences low bail,
8:34
Speaker 1: no bail, perfect example. Yes, and we've seen we've seen
8:39
Speaker 1: laws actually being being created to tell the police you
8:45
Speaker 1: can't you you're not allowed to enforce the law.
8:49
Speaker 2: Well in Chicago and Raandy, you know this. In Chicago,
8:52
Speaker 2: they literally told cops you cannot pursue somebody, a bad
8:56
Speaker 2: guy in a suspect by running. You can pursue them,
9:00
Speaker 2: but you have to walk. I'm not even getting you
9:02
Speaker 2: can't run after a suspect. Are we on crack? What
9:05
Speaker 2: are we doing here?
9:06
Speaker 1: So?
9:06
Speaker 2: How do we fix that? Because you've got you've got
9:09
Speaker 2: cities and states being run by idiots in some in
9:11
Speaker 2: some instances, other states like where I am in Texas
9:13
Speaker 2: not so bad, uh, Florida not so bad? But how
9:16
Speaker 2: do you fix that? Because the residents of that of
9:19
Speaker 2: those cities and those states don't feel safe because they
9:22
Speaker 2: know the police are are handcuffed.
9:25
Speaker 1: Yeah. But but here's the here's the the dichotomy here
9:28
Speaker 1: is that they keep on voting people into office that
9:31
Speaker 1: continue that tradition. When I mean, look at look at
9:34
Speaker 1: Johnson in uh in Chicagogo. That guy, that guy from
9:39
Speaker 1: the from the very beginning, declared war on common sense
9:43
Speaker 1: criminal justice. He did, and he has continued that. And
9:45
Speaker 1: yet they took they I mean, after LORI Lightfoot, I
9:49
Speaker 1: thought nothing could get worse. It got worse, and then
9:53
Speaker 1: and then they elect and then they elected this guy. Yeah,
9:55
Speaker 1: I mean, and now look at New York City Mondamie
9:58
Speaker 1: getting elected.
10:00
Speaker 2: You want to what's the open Riker's island? Everybody out.
10:05
Speaker 1: Exactly because if the people, if the people are going
10:08
Speaker 1: to elect these these leftist politicians who care nothing about
10:14
Speaker 1: the safety of the people that they have just been
10:18
Speaker 1: voted in to govern, then then then you're fighting a
10:24
Speaker 1: losing battle. That's why I wrote the book Rescuing nine
10:28
Speaker 1: one one. It's a call to action for people to
10:30
Speaker 1: get involved. Look at the look at the dismal number
10:34
Speaker 1: of people who actually even voted in the election. Right,
10:38
Speaker 1: So if if you if you want to be if
10:41
Speaker 1: you want your family to be safe, it's so counterintuitive
10:45
Speaker 1: that it makes no sense. It's like watching lemmings jumping
10:49
Speaker 1: off the cliff by voting people in that that have
10:53
Speaker 1: an ideology that is that is counterproductive to safety, and
10:59
Speaker 1: it's it's absurd to see. But it's also highly dangerous
11:05
Speaker 1: because it's not only dangerous for the citizens, it's dangerous
11:08
Speaker 1: for the police. I literally every single day I'm dealing
11:13
Speaker 1: with a police officer who's been severely injured. And many
11:16
Speaker 1: times those injuries I know would never have occurred had
11:20
Speaker 1: we been in a different state. In policing in this country, it.
11:24
Speaker 2: Is Lieutenan Randy Sutton. Go and get his book. It's
11:26
Speaker 2: called Rescue in nine to one one, The Fight for
11:28
Speaker 2: America's Safety. Rescuing nine to one one, The Fight for
11:30
Speaker 2: America's Safety. Let me just add a little bit of
11:34
Speaker 2: context on this as well. I'm in the news and
11:36
Speaker 2: information business. I had never heard that eighty five thousand
11:38
Speaker 2: police officers were assaulted last year. We should be reporting that.
11:43
Speaker 2: I just didn't know it. But I do know that
11:45
Speaker 2: one ICE agent somewhere put his knee on somebody's back
11:48
Speaker 2: and the people were yelling and screaming about your kidnapping
11:51
Speaker 2: kids off the street. I do know that the police
11:53
Speaker 2: chief in Minneapolis, Minnesota, looked at the camera and said
11:55
Speaker 2: to residents, if you see people showing up who are
11:58
Speaker 2: addressed in what looks to be enforcement outfits with masks on,
12:01
Speaker 2: they might be kidnapping people, call nine one one.
12:04
Speaker 1: What about that?
12:05
Speaker 2: When you've got a police chief who's clearly a politico,
12:07
Speaker 2: who is using his position to tell people to abuse
12:11
Speaker 2: the nine one one system to have cops show up
12:14
Speaker 2: to confront ICE agents, what do you do about that?
12:17
Speaker 1: Is it is he's an embarrassment to law enforcement, you know,
12:21
Speaker 1: And I listen. I was a police leader in one
12:26
Speaker 1: of the ninth largest police department in this nation. I
12:29
Speaker 1: have seen incredible police leadership at the highest levels, but
12:34
Speaker 1: I've also seen dismal failures. And seeing that police chief
12:39
Speaker 1: and watching him in his public addresses, it's an embarrassment
12:46
Speaker 1: to me. But it's also what he is doing is
12:49
Speaker 1: he's putting his own police officers in jeopardy. Now the
12:53
Speaker 1: Minneapolis Police Department is a shadow of its former self.
12:58
Speaker 1: I have very very good connect actions with police officers
13:02
Speaker 1: at Minneapolis PD, and I not just a week ago,
13:06
Speaker 1: was given information that they are so they have so
13:10
Speaker 1: few cops they can't even answer their nine to one
13:13
Speaker 1: one calls.
13:14
Speaker 2: Wow.
13:14
Speaker 1: Because they are because nobody wants to work for them.
13:18
Speaker 1: And the reason they don't want to work for them
13:20
Speaker 1: is because the mayor is a I don't even have
13:25
Speaker 1: words for him.
13:26
Speaker 2: But he's the guy that said He's the guy that
13:28
Speaker 2: said let them burn down the third Precinct. He's the
13:31
Speaker 2: guy that right this Jacob Fry, guy who took a
13:33
Speaker 2: knee in front of Black Lives Matter and immediately said
13:37
Speaker 2: that the cop was guilty. And the George Floyd thing.
13:39
Speaker 2: When we know that the medical examiner says, there something
13:42
Speaker 2: else going on there.
13:43
Speaker 1: So I'm with you.
13:44
Speaker 2: So so why would you want to work at at
13:46
Speaker 2: a police department like that? You wouldn't know. It's got
13:48
Speaker 2: your back exactly.
13:50
Speaker 1: And so they have fled, and so you have you
13:54
Speaker 1: have a leftist mayor who cares nothing about law enforcement.
13:59
Speaker 1: They're doing everything they can. The only reason that there
14:02
Speaker 1: are cops there because they have to have them for
14:04
Speaker 1: show right and and to and to because they they're
14:08
Speaker 1: not prosecuting anybody anyway. You have you have the you know,
14:11
Speaker 1: the the disc attorney there is just as bad as
14:15
Speaker 1: the chief of police. You have everything the higher I
14:18
Speaker 1: call I call them trojan horse prosecutors, Yes, because they're
14:22
Speaker 1: elected into office and then what they do is they
14:25
Speaker 1: turn on the people that elected them and they and
14:29
Speaker 1: they care nothing about their safety.
14:30
Speaker 2: Well, you've got the attorney general. Keith Fellowson is the
14:32
Speaker 2: attorney general. He's a guy literally said in a zoom
14:36
Speaker 2: call with Karen Bass from from Los Angeles and somebody else.
14:39
Speaker 2: He said, if you've been a victim of rape and
14:42
Speaker 2: the rapist has already left the scene, why call a cop,
14:46
Speaker 2: call a therapist. And he's the guy also who's pictured
14:49
Speaker 2: holding the Antiqua playbook. So how do you defeat that?
14:52
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a cop you're gonna go to a
14:54
Speaker 2: place like in Florida or Texas or somewhere else where
14:56
Speaker 2: you know that somebody's going to have your back. It's
14:58
Speaker 2: like the border patrol. It's not different. The border patrol
15:00
Speaker 2: under under Biden and under Obama, they weren't getting any
15:03
Speaker 2: support at all. In fact, they were being called the
15:04
Speaker 2: KKK half the time by the left in this country.
15:07
Speaker 2: But now that it's that it's Trump again, people are
15:09
Speaker 2: flooding the border patrol. They want to be border patrol
15:11
Speaker 2: agents again because they feel like somebody's gonna have their back.
15:14
Speaker 1: Can you fix that? Shows them? That shows you leadership.
15:17
Speaker 1: That shows what leadership does and can have both. He
15:21
Speaker 1: goes from one end of the spectrum to the other.
15:24
Speaker 1: You have a you have a President Trump who really
15:27
Speaker 1: really does truly respect the American law enforcement officer at
15:30
Speaker 1: all levels and has shown that for as long as
15:34
Speaker 1: as he's been even before he entered politics. Yes he was.
15:38
Speaker 1: He was legendary for treating police officers right in the
15:44
Speaker 1: right way, even when he was just in business. Then
15:46
Speaker 1: you have the Bidens, and the and the Obamas who
15:51
Speaker 1: despise law enforcement officers, who make no bones about it,
15:55
Speaker 1: and as a result, you have a criminal justice crisis
15:58
Speaker 1: that is now is now generational. We there's no way
16:03
Speaker 1: in the world that President Trump, as much as he
16:07
Speaker 1: would like to to, can right the ship as in
16:11
Speaker 1: any in any timely fashion, because the damage has been done.
16:14
Speaker 1: We've lost incredible amounts of very very good police officers,
16:21
Speaker 1: people who are very competent, who have institutional knowledge, who
16:25
Speaker 1: who have incredible knowledge and investigative work. They have fled,
16:31
Speaker 1: they said when they when the eligible for retirement, they left.
16:35
Speaker 1: And of course we're talking the major cities in this country,
16:40
Speaker 1: especially those run by democratic politicians, have lost the majority
16:45
Speaker 1: of the the retirement eligible police officers. Now here's the
16:50
Speaker 1: other side of that coin. So you lose, you lose
16:54
Speaker 1: all that experience. Then you can't recruit people because they
16:59
Speaker 1: have made the job so dangerous both physically, emotionally psychologically,
17:04
Speaker 1: and so now you're not getting enough people. When I
17:07
Speaker 1: took the police test in Las Vegas in nineteen eighty six,
17:11
Speaker 1: because I'm dating myself here, they stopped it at five
17:16
Speaker 1: thousand applicants for one hundred jobs. They wouldn't allow anymore.
17:20
Speaker 1: Now we're lucky to see eight or nine hundred applicants,
17:24
Speaker 1: and we're in a city that doesn't have the woke insanity.
17:28
Speaker 1: So you go. They gave a police test in Saint
17:31
Speaker 1: Louis not long agoing about like twelve people showed up
17:35
Speaker 1: because nobody wants to work there. And so you look
17:39
Speaker 1: at the just the numbers themselves. You have everybody fleeing
17:43
Speaker 1: from the experience level. Then you can't hire enough people.
17:47
Speaker 1: So what do they do. They lower the standards, of course,
17:51
Speaker 1: and so and has that has just the opposite effect.
17:56
Speaker 1: But it needs to happen because if you hire people
18:00
Speaker 1: that really shouldn't be police officers to begin with, then
18:03
Speaker 1: they commit acts of misconduct or corruption. Then the left says,
18:07
Speaker 1: you see all police, Yeah, exactly right. And so it's
18:11
Speaker 1: like it's like the self fulfilling prophecy.
18:13
Speaker 2: Lieutenant Randy Sutton going and check out the Wounded Blue
18:16
Speaker 2: Dot org. Get his book called Rescuing nine one one,
18:19
Speaker 2: The Fight for America's Safety. I want to beat up
18:21
Speaker 2: on Brandon Johnson just for another minute or so if
18:23
Speaker 2: we can, because he was my pledgure, my pleasure exactly.
18:26
Speaker 2: He was asked by CNN or MSNBC here some stupid network,
18:30
Speaker 2: this very simple question, would five thousand more police officers
18:33
Speaker 2: in Chicago help to solve the shooting and murder problem?
18:37
Speaker 2: And he wouldn't answer, and wouldn't answer, and no, no, no,
18:39
Speaker 2: just I think it was Joe Scarborough, for God's sake,
18:41
Speaker 2: so it's certainly not a righty. He said, no, no,
18:43
Speaker 2: but I just want to know if you got five
18:45
Speaker 2: thousand more, well, there's no way to get fired. But
18:47
Speaker 2: if you had five thousand more, would that solve the problem.
18:51
Speaker 2: And his answer was, you can't incarcerate your way out
18:55
Speaker 2: or something. Crime is is we're calling things crimes that
18:59
Speaker 2: aren't randy. He would not say that five thousand more
19:03
Speaker 2: men and women in blue in the city of Chicago
19:05
Speaker 2: would help cut down crime when you and I both though,
19:08
Speaker 2: of course it would.
19:09
Speaker 1: That's it.
19:09
Speaker 2: That's an easy answer, isn't it.
19:12
Speaker 1: Of Course it's an easy answer, but it's not his
19:14
Speaker 1: political ideology. When you put ideology ahead of safety, then
19:19
Speaker 1: you get exactly what's happening in Chicago. You have incredible
19:24
Speaker 1: amounts of violent crime, you have a leadership that even
19:30
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm still I'm still very, very angry. I'm
19:35
Speaker 1: curbing my words. Thank you for you after what happened
19:41
Speaker 1: with the ice raids and the and the chief of
19:43
Speaker 1: Police coming out on the radio telling officers not your response,
19:48
Speaker 1: I mean you talk about about the he shouldn't even
19:52
Speaker 1: be the chief of police.
19:53
Speaker 2: Well, anybody know this. I got to stop you for
19:55
Speaker 2: a second because those watching listening might not know this.
19:58
Speaker 2: You know this. The Ice agents were literally surrounded by
20:01
Speaker 2: angry people, and angry mob was surrounding them, and they
20:04
Speaker 2: simply said, we need backup. And you heard it wasn't
20:07
Speaker 2: the chief of police. It was the Knight supervisor in
20:11
Speaker 2: charge who said we're not going there. And and the
20:14
Speaker 2: chief of police did not say that guy's in trouble
20:16
Speaker 2: or he's gonna get fired. They basically said, well, we
20:18
Speaker 2: should really support law enforcement, but they didn't that night.
20:21
Speaker 2: So I wanted to make sure we put it in context.
20:24
Speaker 2: These Ice agents who were there to enforce the law
20:27
Speaker 2: and get bad guys out of Chicago were surrounded by
20:29
Speaker 2: an angry mob and cop said no, go ahead.
20:33
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly. And that's and that's not the only place
20:35
Speaker 1: that's happening. You have you have state legislators, legislators who
20:40
Speaker 1: are passing laws telling the police they can't they can't
20:44
Speaker 1: respond to help ice. I mean, it's it is, it is.
20:49
Speaker 1: It goes beyond politics. It's it's entered some weird stage
20:53
Speaker 1: where common sense doesn't even play a role anymore. Well,
20:58
Speaker 1: they should be arrested.
20:59
Speaker 2: It's hitting, the betting, is harboring, it's aiding a betting, harboring,
21:02
Speaker 2: putting officers in danger. It's obstruction of an investigation. Whatever
21:05
Speaker 2: you want to call it. It's something. It's illegal, isn't it?
21:10
Speaker 1: Yes? It is. If I would love to see prosecutions,
21:13
Speaker 1: I'm happy to see that the judge that that aided
21:17
Speaker 1: the the illegal alien and escaping was just convicted. And
21:22
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, maybe there would be jury nullification
21:26
Speaker 1: and they would go along with some of the ideology there.
21:29
Speaker 1: But I was happy to see that after after six
21:32
Speaker 1: hours of deliberation, they in fact did did find her guilty, which,
21:37
Speaker 1: which is a good is a good sign. But can
21:40
Speaker 1: can we pivot this to just for a moment, anywhere
21:43
Speaker 1: you want to go? Let's go all right, I want
21:45
Speaker 1: to talk about how this affects the mental, the mental
21:48
Speaker 1: and emotional health of our of ours do.
21:52
Speaker 2: Yes, I definitely want I want to know about that.
21:55
Speaker 2: And by the way, I'm in San Antonio, which is
21:56
Speaker 2: military city, USA. I am familiar with with veterans, you
22:00
Speaker 2: with PTSD. You mentioned PTSD earlier about police officers, which
22:03
Speaker 2: I've never even considered. Tell me what that's all about. Yeah,
22:08
Speaker 2: this is so.
22:09
Speaker 1: The Wounded Blue is a national charity and we help
22:13
Speaker 1: injured and disabled officers across this country. And we recognize
22:16
Speaker 1: injuries as either being physical or emotional and psychological because
22:20
Speaker 1: post traumatic stress can be as real as a bullet.
22:24
Speaker 1: And what is rarely talked about is the suicide rate
22:27
Speaker 1: of law enforcement. It is abysmal. It is startling how
22:32
Speaker 1: many police officers end their own lives. Roughly, the estimate
22:36
Speaker 1: is three to five times the number of officers who
22:39
Speaker 1: die in the line of duty will take their own lives.
22:42
Speaker 2: I've never even heard that reported.
22:44
Speaker 1: That is a statistic that should frighten everyone in America.
22:49
Speaker 1: That should bring attention to what the challenges are emotionally
22:53
Speaker 1: and psychologically. Now, I don't use the word PTSD I
22:58
Speaker 1: because post traumatic stress disorder. I use the word post
23:02
Speaker 1: traumatic stress injury because it is an injury and it
23:06
Speaker 1: can be fixed, don't. It doesn't have to become a disorder.
23:11
Speaker 1: But it's hugely challenging because there are many police agencies
23:17
Speaker 1: who who don't even recognize post traumatic stress injury as
23:22
Speaker 1: a legitimate injury and these and that leads to officers
23:27
Speaker 1: not asking for help when the help is available for them.
23:32
Speaker 1: We've helped more than sixteen thousand American law enforcement officers
23:36
Speaker 1: in the six and a half years that we have
23:38
Speaker 1: been in service, and many of those have been injured
23:42
Speaker 1: emotionally and psychologically. And there's so many reasons for that.
23:46
Speaker 1: First of all, it's just the job itself, right, The
23:50
Speaker 1: job itself can be emotionally damaging because you are seeing
23:54
Speaker 1: literally the worst that humanity has to offer. I mean,
23:58
Speaker 1: I can tell you from from thirty four years of
24:01
Speaker 1: law enforcement that there were very very dark times in
24:05
Speaker 1: my personal history and I was not ashamed to ask
24:09
Speaker 1: for help when when it when when the darkness really
24:13
Speaker 1: really fell? But you know, I mean I remember, I remember,
24:20
Speaker 1: you know, a baby that dyed in my arms, that
24:23
Speaker 1: I whose life I tried to save after she drowned.
24:26
Speaker 1: And I still see your face.
24:30
Speaker 2: So I was gonna I was gonna ask you what
24:32
Speaker 2: trigger is something like that. I mean, so it's a
24:34
Speaker 2: specific I mean, that's I can't even imagine. I just
24:36
Speaker 2: have a brand new granddaughter was just born. I can't
24:38
Speaker 2: even imagine having to go through that. And then you're
24:41
Speaker 2: expected just to put the uniform on again, just keep
24:43
Speaker 2: on going.
24:44
Speaker 1: You're supposed to not only clear the call and then
24:47
Speaker 1: go right to the next call. And so and every cop,
24:52
Speaker 1: every cop will go through trauma. Every police officer will
24:56
Speaker 1: see things that will that will challenge them and that
24:59
Speaker 1: will change them internally externally the way that they view
25:04
Speaker 1: things and the way they affect their family. And so
25:07
Speaker 1: everybody feels alone. Our motto at the Wound of Blue
25:10
Speaker 1: is never forgotten, never alone, And that is because when
25:14
Speaker 1: you get injured, either physically or psychologically, you feel alone.
25:18
Speaker 1: And when you are, when you get that sensation, it's
25:22
Speaker 1: a very very dark place to be. Now, let me
25:25
Speaker 1: tell you some other things that they're going to shock you, Joe,
25:28
Speaker 1: and why I created the organization to begin with. If
25:32
Speaker 1: you had asked me twenty years ago, Randy, what's your
25:34
Speaker 1: future going to be? I would never have said it'll
25:37
Speaker 1: be running a national wide charity that helps injured and
25:39
Speaker 1: disabled cops, that was not that it was not on
25:43
Speaker 1: my to do list, But what happened to me was
25:47
Speaker 1: I had a stroke in my police car. That is
25:50
Speaker 1: what ended my police career, right on Las Vegas Boulevard
25:53
Speaker 1: at two thirty in the morning, and I was the
25:55
Speaker 1: watch commander. I was the highest ranking officer on duty
25:59
Speaker 1: that night, and luckily I had a patrol officer with me.
26:04
Speaker 1: And at two thirty in the morning, we're driving down
26:06
Speaker 1: Las Vegas Boulevard having a conversation like I'm talking with
26:10
Speaker 1: you right now, and suddenly I found myself talking slower
26:13
Speaker 1: and I literally felt my brain slowing down, and I
26:16
Speaker 1: knew I was having a stroke. So I stopped the
26:18
Speaker 1: car right in the middle of the street and I said,
26:21
Speaker 1: get me medical, I'm having a stroke, and I got
26:24
Speaker 1: out of the car to go round to the passenger
26:25
Speaker 1: side in case he needed to get me the hospital.
26:28
Speaker 1: And then I started speaking gibberish and I knew I
26:31
Speaker 1: was speaking gibberish, but I couldn't control it, and it
26:34
Speaker 1: was the most frightening moment of my life. And then
26:37
Speaker 1: I lost the ability to speak and move all together,
26:39
Speaker 1: and I crumpled to the pavement and that's where my
26:42
Speaker 1: police career ended laying there helpless, watching people walk by
26:47
Speaker 1: me taking my picture as I'm laying there, absolutely helpless
26:52
Speaker 1: in the dirty gutter of Las Vegas Boulevard.
26:55
Speaker 2: Wow.
26:56
Speaker 1: And it was, I tell you, quite honestly. I wasn't
27:01
Speaker 1: afraid to die. In fact, I was wishing to die
27:05
Speaker 1: because I didn't want to live like that. Right, But
27:08
Speaker 1: once again, that angel has been on my shoulder. My
27:10
Speaker 1: entire career was with me again that night, and the
27:13
Speaker 1: blood clotting through my brain did its damage, but it
27:16
Speaker 1: certainly could have done substantially more. But it ended my
27:21
Speaker 1: police career. And what happened next is what is going
27:25
Speaker 1: to shock you as it shocked me, And that's my
27:28
Speaker 1: own agency turned its back on me. I said, we're
27:30
Speaker 1: not paying your medical bills, We're not giving you your benefits.
27:35
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I said, I mean hold on, not only
27:38
Speaker 2: I mean if it happened at home, they still should
27:40
Speaker 2: pay for everything. But you were driving down Las Vegas Boulevard.
27:43
Speaker 2: What't happened in uniform? And they're not paying for anything.
27:45
Speaker 2: What are you talking about? That's what I said. I said,
27:50
Speaker 2: what do you mean you can't do that? It's the law.
27:53
Speaker 2: And they said, yeah, well make us. And I got
27:57
Speaker 2: to tell you, I've never felt so abandoned. So after
28:01
Speaker 2: twenty four years of service, and I believe me, I
28:03
Speaker 2: almost gave my life more than on more than one
28:07
Speaker 2: occasion as a police officer in Las Vegas, I survived
28:12
Speaker 2: five shootings. So I feeling this devastating feeling of abandonment
28:21
Speaker 2: was very difficult to deal with.
28:23
Speaker 1: I even went to go see the sheriff who I
28:25
Speaker 1: served with for twenty four years, and I said, how
28:27
Speaker 1: do you treat me like this? And he looked at
28:29
Speaker 1: me and I'll never forget this. Look me right in
28:31
Speaker 1: the eyes, Randy. This isn't personal, man, It's just business.
28:36
Speaker 1: And here's the harsh reality. He was telling me the truth.
28:40
Speaker 1: You see, I was no longer I was no longer
28:42
Speaker 1: an asset to my agency. I'm now a financial liability. Wow.
28:46
Speaker 1: And I didn't realize this. It's very difficult to fathom.
28:50
Speaker 1: And then and they fought me every step of the way.
28:54
Speaker 1: They lost every single hearing and still continue to fight me.
28:58
Speaker 1: And it lasted a year and a half before the
29:00
Speaker 1: judge finally said, you got to pay his medical bills.
29:03
Speaker 1: It's the law. You got to give them his benefits.
29:06
Speaker 1: And here's the here's what's going to be very difficult
29:09
Speaker 1: for most people that are listening to this to believe,
29:12
Speaker 1: but it is the harsh reality. They were hoping that
29:16
Speaker 1: I would die in the meantime. Oh wow. And and
29:20
Speaker 1: I thought that this was just me, Joe. I just
29:23
Speaker 1: thought this was Randy. Well. Then from being on the
29:27
Speaker 1: show Cops and writing books and being in the movies
29:30
Speaker 1: and being so visible in the law enforcement community, cop
29:33
Speaker 1: started reaching out to me. Randy, I know you don't
29:36
Speaker 1: know me, but I was shot in the line of duty.
29:38
Speaker 1: They're not paying my medical bills. They've thrown me away. Randy,
29:42
Speaker 1: I was paralyzed when my police car was hit by
29:44
Speaker 1: a drunk They they've thrown me. They thrown me to
29:48
Speaker 1: the to the to the wolves. And I realized that
29:52
Speaker 1: this wasn't Randy. This is a national issue, and there
29:57
Speaker 1: was no national resource for these men and women. All
29:59
Speaker 1: of the all of these terrible, heartbreaking stories that came
30:04
Speaker 1: to me ended with the same words. At the end,
30:09
Speaker 1: I feel abandoned, I feel alone. And then the worst,
30:14
Speaker 1: I wish I'd never survived that night. At least I
30:16
Speaker 1: wouldn't be a burden of my family and it's heartbreaking, heartbreaking,
30:21
Speaker 1: and that's why I created The Wounded Blue. And they
30:25
Speaker 1: we sure as hell are doing something now. We are
30:28
Speaker 1: saving lives, we are saving careers, we are saving marriages.
30:32
Speaker 1: But I live with heartbreak every single day. Heartbreaking stories
30:36
Speaker 1: that that that are that would just curdle your We
30:39
Speaker 1: actually have a documentary film. If you go to Amazon
30:42
Speaker 1: dot com, I put in the Wounded Blue, you'll see
30:46
Speaker 1: a documentary and you better bring your tissues because you're
30:48
Speaker 1: gonna see stories that you will find unbelievable. Police officer
30:53
Speaker 1: was shot in it on Amazon dot com, right, and
30:56
Speaker 1: that's that's that's where you'll you'll find our our documentary
30:59
Speaker 1: film Can you Imagine Being? And this is all captured
31:03
Speaker 1: on video. Police officer in pursuit of He does know it,
31:08
Speaker 1: but they're three hired killers from the cartel in the
31:12
Speaker 1: vehicle that he's pursuing. And this is all captured on
31:15
Speaker 1: video during the pursuit. This is in Oklahoma. They're doing
31:18
Speaker 1: one hundred miles an hour. Suddenly you see the back
31:21
Speaker 1: windshield break out of the of the dark out suv
31:24
Speaker 1: either end and they open fire on him with a
31:27
Speaker 1: high powered rifle. One of the Rounds, goes through the windshield,
31:30
Speaker 1: hits him right smack in the forehead. He goes unconscious,
31:35
Speaker 1: and you see his police car drift off the road
31:38
Speaker 1: and smash into a tree after tumbling. They get him
31:43
Speaker 1: to the hospital. They get him to the hospital, and
31:47
Speaker 1: they refuse to give him a neurologist, saying it's medically unnecessary.
31:51
Speaker 1: They don't pay his medical bills for over a year.
31:54
Speaker 1: He loses his house, he loses his car, He's got
31:57
Speaker 1: three children. And it's not until a news station did
32:03
Speaker 1: an expose on it that suddenly they paid his medical bills.
32:07
Speaker 2: Wow.
32:07
Speaker 1: And if it weren't for the Wounded Blue and by
32:10
Speaker 1: the way, then they fired him. Couldn't come back to
32:13
Speaker 1: work full duty, so they fired him. If weren't for
32:16
Speaker 1: the Wounded Blue being able to help him get a
32:20
Speaker 1: federal benefit of about four hundred thousand dollars, he would
32:25
Speaker 1: have lost everything. This is criminal, but it's happening all
32:30
Speaker 1: over the country.
32:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you would ask people before before the interview,
32:34
Speaker 2: had you asked me and Randy, I'm running a short
32:36
Speaker 2: on time and I want to have you on often
32:38
Speaker 2: because I love talking to you. But had you not
32:41
Speaker 2: told me this, I would not. I would not have
32:43
Speaker 2: known ever, because they're hiding it, and they're hiding it
32:46
Speaker 2: very well. My assumption is you guys not only have benefits,
32:49
Speaker 2: You've got the best benefits on the planet because you're
32:51
Speaker 2: literally willing to die to do what you do for
32:54
Speaker 2: a living. I would never ever have thought that a
32:57
Speaker 2: police agency would not stand behind everybody so quickly and
33:00
Speaker 2: only a couple of minutes. And I do want to
33:01
Speaker 2: have you back soon. A Why is your your organization necessary?
33:06
Speaker 2: I'm glad it's there, but because you won your case,
33:09
Speaker 2: because these other cops have won their cases, why wouldn't
33:11
Speaker 2: this make them fix what's wrong in the agencies? And
33:15
Speaker 2: I love that you're doing it. I want you to
33:16
Speaker 2: do charity forever. But again, your organization should not be necessary.
33:20
Speaker 2: Why haven't necessary change has been made in these agencies
33:23
Speaker 2: since your case and others?
33:26
Speaker 1: You are one hundred percent right, I wish my charity
33:30
Speaker 1: did not exist. And by the way, I want people
33:32
Speaker 1: to know this because it's very critical. We're all worried
33:35
Speaker 1: about charity money right about where it gets spent. I
33:38
Speaker 1: live on my pension. I do not take a salary
33:41
Speaker 1: from the wounded Blue. I take no money from the
33:43
Speaker 1: wounded blue. It all goes into the services that we provide.
33:47
Speaker 1: But we should not need to exist. And the reason
33:49
Speaker 1: we do is because of the age old reason and
33:53
Speaker 1: that is money.
33:54
Speaker 2: Wow.
33:55
Speaker 1: There is incredible amounts of greed that are that that
34:00
Speaker 1: play out in the in the space of insurance companies
34:03
Speaker 1: and third party administrators that get hired to uh to
34:08
Speaker 1: do the workers compensation system. Uh, it's all about money,
34:13
Speaker 1: quite honestly. Now, there are some agencies that do it right.
34:16
Speaker 1: If you get if you get hurt in New York City,
34:18
Speaker 1: they have a very strong police union and they have
34:20
Speaker 1: very strong workers' compensation laws in New York City. So
34:24
Speaker 1: you're gonna you're gonna get good medical attention, you're gonna
34:27
Speaker 1: get you're gonna get good benefits. But if you go
34:29
Speaker 1: across the I'm dealing with a police officer in New
34:31
Speaker 1: York State right now, right now that we are getting
34:36
Speaker 1: into see the finest final surgeon, one of the finest
34:41
Speaker 1: final surgeons in the United States, because his own department,
34:44
Speaker 1: after he fractured his skull fighting with the suspect, have
34:48
Speaker 1: refused to give him his surgery. I was just with
34:51
Speaker 1: him just five days ago and this week we're getting
34:54
Speaker 1: him in and we're paying for it. We shouldn't have
34:57
Speaker 1: to be paying for it. But here there's the other. Here,
35:01
Speaker 1: here's just one one that there are great Americans that
35:04
Speaker 1: that believe in the Wounded Blue And and we just
35:09
Speaker 1: paid three hundred thousand dollars to fix a cop who
35:12
Speaker 1: was told he would never walk again, and six weeks
35:15
Speaker 1: ago he danced with his daughter at her wedding. That's amazing.
35:19
Speaker 1: So and that's because there are great Americans that believe
35:23
Speaker 1: in law enforcement, that believe in my organization. So I
35:27
Speaker 1: asked that anybody that supports law enforcement go to the
35:30
Speaker 1: Wounded Blue dot org. See who we are, see what
35:33
Speaker 1: we do, give what you can. If you are a
35:35
Speaker 1: law enforcement officer and you're struggling, you don't have to
35:38
Speaker 1: walk this journey alone, reach out to us at the
35:42
Speaker 1: Wounded Blue And if you want to contact me directly,
35:46
Speaker 1: I'm Randy at the Wounded Blue dot org. That's Randy
35:49
Speaker 1: at the Wounded Blue dot org. And I am very accessible.
35:52
Speaker 2: That Wounded Blue dot org. Go to that website right now,
35:54
Speaker 2: go see how you can support what Randy's doing for
35:56
Speaker 2: these amazing people out there who are risking their lives
35:58
Speaker 2: for you and me the Wounded Blue dot Org. Get
36:01
Speaker 2: his book. It's called Rescuing nine one one, The Fight
36:03
Speaker 2: for America's Safety. It's the number one best seller. Go
36:05
Speaker 2: to Amazon and go check it out again. Rescuing nine
36:08
Speaker 2: one one The Fight for America Safety.
36:10
Speaker 1: Randy.
36:10
Speaker 2: Great to meet you in person. I've been a fan
36:12
Speaker 2: for a long time. I just realized as we started
36:13
Speaker 2: talking that's the guy, so I really I love hanging
36:16
Speaker 2: out with you. Let's do it again very soon, my friend.
36:18
Speaker 1: Thank you. Let's do that and you have a very
36:21
Speaker 1: merry Christmas.
36:22
Speaker 2: You too, Merry Christmas, my friend. That's it for Unshaken
36:24
Speaker 2: and Unafraid with Joe Paggs this time. Make sure you
36:26
Speaker 2: subscribe and we'll have another one very soon