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“The thin blue line is a symbol of solidarity and professional pride within a dangerous, difficult profession and a solemn tribute to fallen police officers and their families who have been killed in the line of duty,” Dominguez said. However, Dominguez said she considered the original meaning of the flag as harking back to the 1854 battle during the Crimean war, where the British infantry regiment in red uniforms stood against the Russian cavalry charge - a symbolic “Thin Red Line.” Dominguez said that police modified and adopted the symbol based on their blue uniforms and that it has come to symbolize courage. “These officers need additional training to understand the gravity and the threat inherent in the public display of such a symbol.”ĭominguez wrote back in an email that the Thin Blue Line now possesses a negative connotation in the community because of how it the symbol was invoked to support “Blue Lives Matter.” “The Blue Lives Matter signals to me that this officer (and perhaps both officers) will choose to stand alongside fellow police officers in defiance of a community member’s negative police encounter, especially a Black person’s mistreatment, false arrest injury, or death,” the resident wrote in their email. The sight of the flag alarmed the resident, and they wrote that they were disappointed by the idleness of the other officer at the scene. In the emails, the resident narrated an encounter where they saw two police officers at Lighthouse Road who had masks with the “Thin Blue Line” flag - a flag that has come to be associated with the pro-police “Blue Lives Matter” movement - hanging out of their pockets. In January, an email exchange occurred between an anonymous resident, New Haven Police Department Chief Renee Dominguez and Mayor Justin Elicker, according to the New Haven Independent, which published the exchange this week.
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In the past week, a debate of whether officers on duty should be allowed to wear a “Thin Blue Line” mask has erupted across the Elm City.