Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee said he is abandoning an idea he had to stop and possibly search young black men in high crime neighborhoods after complaints from the NAACP.

WWL-TV

Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee.

“It’s history,” said Lee in an interview with WWL radio Friday morning. “I’m not thinking about it any more.”

In an interview on WWL-TV Thursday night, Lee said the main reason behind the escalating murder rate in Jefferson Parish is black on black crime involving drugs.

He said that the overwhelming majority of victims of the murders in Jefferson Parish this year have been black, as have the majority of the suspects.

 “The white community is not the problem. The black community is the problem,” said Lee. “I think in the last few months now, the black community is recognizing it, and they’re willing to say, the sheriff is right. The problem is in the black community and we have to start doing things differently than we did in the past.”

Lee said that he wanted to confront groups of young black males congregating in the high crime areas, search them and possibly do background checks.

Local NAACP chief Dannatus King, whose organization accompanied Lee on a recent trip to Boston to look at their crime fighting techniques, called the comments "saddening." King said the comments threatened the goodwill that Lee and the NAACP have exchanged.

Lee said that after viewing Mr. Kings’ comments on WWL-TV, that he will call him and say, “you win.”

In Friday morning’s radio interview, Lee said he understood that some people might have problems with his plans to target young black men and that he has no problem stepping back from the idea, one he said he hadn’t even discussed with his staff, much less implemented.

“If they say that they don’t want to do that and that they’ll accept the consequences, that’s okay with me,” he said. “I did not think that stopping blacks from killing blacks would be objectionable to blacks.”

Lee was also told that a couple of web site polls showed high support for his plan, but Lee said that support was likely coming from people who wouldn’t be affected.

He said it is easy for someone whose child is not likely to be stopped to be okay with having other people checked.

Lee added that he harbors no ill will nor has any problem with the NAACP for its criticisms of his idea.

“All I’m trying to do is to save some black kid’s life.”