Winston-Salem, NC
~ Thursday, August 17, 2017
Remarks as prepared for delivery
Thank you Mark for that kind introduction, for your
leadership as President of the North Carolina Gang Investigators Association,
and especially for your decades of service in law enforcement.
I also want to thank acting U.S. Attorney Sandra Hairston
and Special Agent in Charge C.J. Hyman of the ATF for being here. The
Department of Justice is proud of your work.
And to all of you—to the state, federal, and local law
enforcement officers from all across North Carolina who are here today—thank
you for your service to your communities and this country. I want you to know
that President Trump understands the importance of law and order in America,
and strongly affirms and supports your work.
Whether you’re from the Piedmont, from the coast, or whether
you’re from Wilcox County, Alabama—no matter what your jurisdiction is—we are
all united in our mission of reducing crime and bringing criminals to justice.
We are all in this together.
And we all face the threat of violent gangs. This is not
just a big city problem. I heard recently about Hamlet, North Carolina, where
this year’s annual Independence Day celebration was canceled suddenly because
of threats of gang violence. This is in a town of about 7,000 people. I
certainly respect the decision of the city leaders, but it is infuriating and
wrong to me that they had to make it. This is America. We will not be held
hostage in our homes by gangsters.
I want to thank you for holding these annual meetings for 16
years now. You and I both know that so much of law enforcement is
collaboration, relationships, and trust. These gatherings foster that critical
trifecta.
I firmly believe that all of you are the best resource that
we have. More than 85 percent of law enforcement officers in this country are
at the state or local level. Some of you are on patrol in the neighborhoods
where you grew up. And by getting together to share intelligence and best
practices, you’re better equipped to deal with the threat of criminal gangs.
Gangs seek to profit off of the victimization of others
through drug trafficking, extortion, murdering rivals, robbing innocent
bystanders, and trafficking vulnerable juveniles for sex. They are outlaws.
Officers in this room have lived this reality. You know
about Josie Lindsay, a 73-year old grandmother from High Point, North Carolina,
who was gunned down in her own house, an innocent bystander who is now the
latest tragic victim of gang cross fire. Because of some despicable gang
member, her 18 grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren will never get to feel
her embrace or hear her voice again.
I am obviously preaching to the choir, You’ve been to the
crime scenes. You’ve seen the terrible aftermath of gang warfare and drug
crimes. You know what is at stake.
And you also know that this threat has only been growing.
According to the FBI’s most recent National Gang Report,
approximately half of the gang investigators they surveyed said that gang
membership and gang activity were increasing. Approximately one third of
jurisdictions reported an increase in threats to law enforcement.
In recent years, North Carolina has been one of the many
parts of this country that has experienced increasing violent crime and
homicide. Nationally, the murder rate surged by nearly 11 percent just in one
year—the biggest increase since 1968. The homicide rate is up in 27 out of the
35 biggest cities in the United States.
And as the homicide rate has gone up, the fatal overdose
rate has gone up even faster. More Americans are dying of drug overdoses today
than ever before. Based on preliminary data, nearly 60,000 Americans lost their
lives to drug overdoses last year. That’s about the population of Chapel Hill.
That will be the highest drug death toll and the fastest increase in that death
toll in American history. In North Carolina, annual drug overdose deaths have
tripled since 1999.
Most of the heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine in this
country that is killing our fellow Americans was brought across our porous
Southern border by powerful Mexican drug cartels—by transnational criminal
organizations.
But as the gang threat has grown, so have our efforts to
fight back. The Department of Justice is using every lawful resource that we
have. But our best resource in this fight is you.
And we need you. Gangs are more effective than other
criminals because they work together. We’re a lot more effective when we work
together, too.
And we are working together. I’m proud of the work that our
law enforcement officers do all over this country, and I’m especially proud of
the results that some of you have accomplished recently.
In April, two Bloods gang members in Charlotte were
sentenced for executing two witnesses in a robbery case. Thanks to the FBI,
Charlotte police, the York County sheriff’s office and our assistant U.S.
Attorneys, these dangerous murderers now will spend the rest of their lives
behind bars—where they can no longer inflict carnage in our communities.
One month later, more than 600 law enforcement officers came
together to arrest more than 70 alleged members of the Bloods. Together, these
defendants have been charged with a whole host of crimes including murder and
attempted murder, narcotics trafficking, weapons charges, bank fraud, and wire
fraud. These charges are the next step in neutralizing the threat posed by the
Bloods to North Carolina. And this is an outstanding example of cooperation
between law enforcement at the federal, state, and local levels.
Whether it is MS-13, the Bloods, or Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs,
gangs are targeting our youth and law-abiding citizens. But I have news them:
WE ARE TARGETING YOU.
President Trump is serious about supporting our state and
local law enforcement. That is why he sent my Department three executive orders
when I took office. One directs us to be supportive of law enforcement. A
second declared that our mission is to reduce crime. And the third requires us
to dismantle transnational criminal organizations. These are our goals and we
are getting after them.
Carrying out the President’s first executive order—to
support law enforcement—helps us carry out the second—reducing crime. The
Department is working at your side to crack down on gun crimes and drugs. In
March, I ordered our prosecutors to prioritize violent crime and firearms
offenses, and in that short time we’ve seen a 23 percent increase in the number
of federal gun prosecutions.
Further, since the beginning of this year, the Department of
Justice has secured more than 1,200 convictions against gang members.
Our fight against MS-13 has been emblematic of this greater
effort.
With more than 40,000 members worldwide—including 10,000 in
the United States—MS-13 threatens the lives and wellbeing of every American.
MS-13 members brutally rape, rob, extort, and murder. MS-13
has executed and permanently disfigured innocent bystanders to their crimes.
They have attacked innocent people with chains, bats, and machetes. They
destroy the lives of the innocent middle schoolers they recruit for membership,
the young girls they entrap, gang rape, and sell for sex, and the drug addicts
they exploit for profit.
Guided by their motto: “Kill, Rape, and Control,” they leave
misery, devastation, and death in their wake. But at the U.S. Department of
Justice, we have motto too: justice for victims and consequences for criminals.
This is our motto and that is our mission.
Even though MS-13 is based in El Salvador, its tentacles
reach across Central America, Europe, and through 40 U.S. States, to within
yards of the U.S. Capitol. I wish I could say that North Carolina has not been
affected by MS-13. But they’re here and the threat is serious.
Some of you may remember that back in November, two MS-13
members in Charlotte were sentenced to life in prison for murder. They murdered
someone because he wore red, the color of a rival gang. This is how easy it is
to be killed by a gang: wear the wrong clothing or the wrong haircut or walk in
the wrong neighborhood.
A third MS-13 member was sentenced to 70 months in prison
for attempted murder and 29 other MS-13 gang members were previously sentenced
in connection with this case.
Several weeks ago I visited El Salvador to meet with their
Attorney General, Douglas Melendez. We discussed our efforts to cut off MS-13
at its roots, and we put our plans into action. Within a span of just 48 hours,
approximately 700 gang members were charged in El Salvador. Hopefully that is
700 gang members that will never reach America and replenish the cliques that
we are dismantling and whose members we are incarcerating.
We will not let up, you will not let up. We will combat this
threat, take the fight to them, and devastate these criminal enterprises. We
will refuse to cede one block, one street corner, one inch to these gangs. They
must never assert their sovereignty over American soil. It will not be easy,
but I have complete faith in our prosecutors and our law enforcement at every
level.
This is the work waiting for us when we leave this
conference. As you go back to your patrols or back to your desks, I want you to
remember this: every day at the Department of Justice, we recognize the vital
work that you do. We honor your mission and we will always have your back.
It has been clear to me that no matter what happens, it is a
privilege like no other to serve in law enforcement and to wake up each morning
to fight for the rule of law.
That is what you do. It is hard work and I know that it is
often thankless. But the right to be safe in your community is the right on
which all the others are based—and it is a right that the American people would
not have without law enforcement.
I want to thank you all for making a commitment to this
difficult, but noble work. God bless you all. I look forward to working with
each of you to make our country safer. Thank you.
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