Byram: New laws embolden bad actors
By Terry Murry on Wednesday, June 8th, 2022 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
PENDLETON – A Washington state resident was recently stopped in a pursuit through Pendleton and told police they couldn’t chase him because that was against the law. The Washington Legislature had passed a law that set limits on police pursuits, but has recently loosened those restrictions after multiple problems arose because of it.
Pendleton Police Chief Chuck Byram said that after the suspect was informed he was in Oregon and the initial amusement wore off, the certainty of the driver that he could not be chased shone a light on a big problem that sees police weakened by lawmakers.
“It goes to show you the mentality of the criminal element right now that they feel emboldened to go ahead and break the law because of legislation that has been passed and put everybody else in jeopardy,” Byram said.
Byram said that it doesn’t appear lawmakers are as interested in protecting the people as they are in protecting criminals.
“That’s not the kind of behavior that our legislature or anybody’s legislature should be emboldening,” he said. “It seems to be happening just based on the fact that he was so incredulous that we would even chase him is just mind boggling to me in this day and age.”
