Conservative Republican Women of North Atlanta

OPEN LETTER TO SHERIFF BUTCH CONWAY:

Please see the letter below.

We, the Executive Board of Conservative Republican Women of North Atlanta, wanting to show our support and appreciation for Sheriff Butch Conway and the Gwinnett County Sheriff's Department, wrote the following letter in order to balance and counter the recent unfounded attacks against him. We tried to do so in a way that did not escalate the rhetoric, but simply demonstrated our gratitude for the conduct and service of our law enforcement here in Gwinnett and across the nation.

Sheriff Butch Conway October 13, 2015

Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Department

2900 University Parkway NE

Lawrenceville Ga. 30043

Dear Sheriff Conway,

We, the executive board of Conservative Republican Women of North Atlanta, are writing to affirm our support for you and for the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Department. You, your deputies, and your staff have the support and confidence of our membership and our families in the wonderful job you do to keep us safe in Gwinnett County. Without your commitment to duty, courage and leadership, life in our community would be much less secure.

As you know, we actively supported your wise move in 2007 to begin use of the federal 287 (g) program that has allowed you to expand your authority to identify criminal illegal immigrants (who have been charged with murder, kidnapping, rape, child molestation, drug dealing and a wide assortment of other crimes) in our county jail and report them to federal authorities. As a result, the general population of the Gwinnett jail has been reduced overall with a corresponding savings to the taxpaying people of Gwinnett, and our community is a safer place to live and raise our families.

We offer our formal “thank you” for your dedication to ALL Gwinnett citizens, and to make it clear that we affirm your recent public official reminder that “All Lives Matter.” Our club’s mission statement affirms our belief in this sacred value of all human life, created by God in His image. All lives, regardless of color or status -- police lives, protestor lives, unborn lives -- yes, ALL lives do indeed matter. We need to protect and defend all life, and we thank those of you in Gwinnett County and across our nation who take up this mantle of protecting life every day, even as you often risk your own lives to do so.

We are not dismissing that there have no doubt been instances of real abuse of power in every walk of life, including law enforcement, where an individual officer has stepped over the line and caused harm to innocent life. We deplore any such abuse, and when it happens, we support vigorous, rigorous investigation and prosecution for the guilty. Criminal activity should be punished wherever it exists, and we believe that you, Sheriff Conway, have conducted a sheriff’s department that confirms this objective.

We also deplore the looting, burning, violence and destruction that we’ve seen happening in our great cities across the nation. This also is an abuse of power; indeed, many who protest peacefully, using their treasured American freedoms to do so, certainly do not want or deserve to share the guilt of those who commit these crimes. We also deplore the abuse of power that the media exert if/when they perpetrate lies regarding the facts and details of an incident, or when they jump to conclusions before an investigation even takes place regarding these facts.

We value the truth, and applaud rigorous investigation to uncover the truth regarding each and every incident. When that truth is discovered, we support prosecution of criminal activity, no matter who perpetrates it. This is how a nation that is governed by the rule of law behaves. It is right and just. And this is why we believe it is important to affirm and support our law-enforcement institutions here in Gwinnett and across the nation.

Movements that are attacking our law enforcement with sweeping generalizations and promoting violence against them are both disheartening and destructive to our nation and to our own community. Some attempt to build distrust in those of you who serve and protect us, to marginalize you and your service to our communities, and to dismiss the danger you face every day to safeguard us. They are not about the serious task of unifying us, but rather about controversy and division. Often fueled by emotion with a disregard of the facts, and funded by those who would profit from the resulting chaos, these movements are certainly no way to go about producing unity.

We believe it’s time to get back to working together to keep Gwinnett safe and strong, alongside our public servants who have committed their lives to this very task.