PropertyValue
?:author
?:datePublished
  • 2017-09-06 (xsd:date)
?:headline
  • Florida Sheriff’s Office Will Not Escort Miami Dolphins Until They Stand For National Anthem? (en)
?:inLanguage
?:itemReviewed
?:mentions
?:reviewBody
  • On 3 September 2017, the web site Freedom Daily rehashed an old (and largely untrue) rumor holding that a police union in Florida had announced that they would not protect Miami Dolphins players in retaliation for players kneeling during the National Anthem: In the example above, the article begins by claiming that the Florida sheriffs office will not put up with this crap, and then ta This article is based on a grain of truth — a local police union urged officers and the Broward County Sheriff's Office in September 2016 not to participate in Miami Dolphins events — but it is outdated and contains several factual errors. In response to the growing number of NFL players who started to kneel during the National Anthem in protest of racial and social injustices, Jeffery Bell, the president of the Broward Sheriff's Office Deputies Association, Local 6020, (which is affiliated with the International Union of Police Associations) posted a message to the union's Facebook page on 15 September 2016 urging officers not to work any detail associated with the Miami Dolphins: The Freedom Daily writers failed to grasp two important concepts: A police union is not the same as a sheriff's office, and a request is not the same as a policy. These mistakes were even more obvious when the Freedom Daily first reported on this Facebook post in September 2016 in a story published under the factually inaccurate title Florida Sheriff’s Office Will Not Escort Miami Dolphins Until They Stand For National Anthem. The Florida Sheriff's office, of course, made no such statement. For one thing, there is no Florida Sheriff's office -- sheriffs provide law enforcement at the county level. Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said at the time that his officers would continue to provide security for the Dolphins, despite the union's request: The Washington Post also noted that the Broward County officers who worked security for the Miami Dolphins did so in an off-duty capacity. While an individual officer could have chosen to turn down the detail, that would hardly constitute a department-wide boycott. Furthermore, a spokeswoman for the Broward County Sheriff's office said at the time that she didn't expect any sort of widespread protest: Other police forces, such as the Miami-Dade Police, have a contract to provide security at a venue. A spokesperson for the Miami-Dade Police, who also provide game day security for the Miami Dolphins, told the Miami Herald: In addition to misrepresenting the police union's statement, failing to report the police department's response, and spreading a false rumor concerning the Miami Dolphins' relationship with police officers, Freedom Daily also shared this article with a misleading photograph. The article's featured image does not show a Broward County official making this alleged announcement. This photograph actually shows Pasco County Sheriff Chris Nocco speaking to the media after a retired officer shot and killed a man at a movie theater in January 2014. (en)
?:reviewRating
rdf:type
?:url