The state's largest law enforcement association is planning a campaign to refute what it says is a 'false narrative' which is being furthered by kneeling NFL players, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
Mitch Slaymaker, assistant executive director of the Texas Municipal Police Association, says the false narrative started with the 'hands up, don't shoot' claim that Michael Brown was in the process of surrendering when he was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson Missouri in 2014, the event that led to the start of the 'Black Lives Matter' movement.
The Obama Administration's Justice Department concluded that those words were made up by BLM organizers, and Brown was actually advancing on the officer.
"If you follow an officer's orders during an encounter, I guarantee you you will not be hurt," Slaymaker said.
He says the TMPA will write op eds, talk to groups, and hold media events to try to get out one simple message: police officers, whether in Texas or nationwide, are not on the streets shooting and harming innocent people.
Slaymaker says the people who are suffering the most by the promulgation is the 'false narrative' are the very people who live in the minority neighborhoods where the claim of wanton police abuse is taken the most seriously.
"I believe it does effect how some officers are policing, in a way of non enforcement," he said. "They are looking the other way.
"He says it also does place police officers at risk, and makes it more difficult for crimes to be solved and violence to be prevented.
Slaymaker says the TMPA recognizes that the kneeling NFL players are simply furthering a false and dangerous narrative, and he says they could be using their influence for good.
"They have an incredible amount of assets, and they could put them toward a solution, instead of portraying this false narrative and continuing it."