ST. LOUIS (AP) — Attorney General Jeff Sessions says Ferguson, Missouri, has become “an emblem of the tense relationship” between law enforcement and those it serves, especially minority communities.

Sessions was in St. Louis Friday for a speech to law enforcement leaders. He told them the Justice Department will work with them to battle the rising tide of violent crime in America.

Sessions says police misconduct must be addressed. But he says police work has become increasingly difficult in what he called “an age of viral videos and targeted killings of police.” He says law enforcement has been “unfairly maligned and blamed for the unacceptable deeds of a few bad actors.”

Ferguson, a St. Louis suburb, became a flashpoint for racial tension after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in 2014.