Polk County, Florida

Polk County’s 2023 crime rate of 1.06—one per 100 residents—is less than half the state’s rate and lowest since the metric was created in 1971, Grady Judd is the ideal of what it means to be an incredible Sheriff, the policies detailed in this article should be implemented nationwide. 

He deserves the title of America’s greatest lawman. 

He is launching a program to help keep the mentally ill out of jail, a chronic national urgency that defies easy solutions, while training a unit to combat the next great global crime challenge: artificial intelligence (AI). 

After seeing what was happening to those whose mental illness has often landed them in jail, he has made it his mission to offer resources to protect them from being incarcerated because we no longer have adequate mental institutions. 

So he has a plan—and $1 million in seed money from Polk County commissioners to provide court-mandated medications for itinerant offenders. This program is in its infancy stages but he has high hopes for his success. 

His blunt press conferences and no nonsense approach to criminals has catapulted him into social media stardom. He has 100 million views on nos Tik Tok videos. 

He is a shining example of what it means to be tough on crime while still caring about people and trying to help them in a just way. 

I wish more Sheriffs in America were like Grady Judd. What a hero.

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