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  • What’s Up With Crime Being Down in Camden?

    What’s Up With Crime Being Down in Camden?

    Let me start by saying I don’t know much about Camden, New Jersey. So if you know more, help me figure things out.

    The city of Camden is just across the river from Philadelphia. It’s part of Camden County. The city has a declining population of about 75,000. Camden is about half black and half hispanic. It is, by any quantifiable measure, a “struggling” place. I wrote a post about violence in Camden back in 2015.

    In 2011 the city and police department were in crisis and announced plans to abolish the police department and start fresh, with a new police department. In May 2013, the city police department was abolished (in part to break the police union, which has since re-formed). Anybody that wanted to stay on had to re-apply for the job. Since then, the new Camden County Police Department covers Camden City (and only Camden City) while in Camden County, I guess some other agencies (I presume local agencies and/or the sheriff) do the work.

    This all makes data gathering a bit confusing. But I (painstakingly) went through the UCR’s arrest numbers for Camden City from 2009 to 2016 (the last available year).

    Nice chart, if I do say so myself.

    If history is a guide, and they say it is, when people blame an institution for human problems and tear it down and start new, after a few years you end up with pretty much the same situation and problems. Police are as much a product of their environment as anybody else. There are still occasional problems of corruption and brutality in Camden. Cops still get attacked. And Camden is still mired in poverty (a 37% poverty rate). But poverty is declining and money is being invested.”

    Meanwhile, across the river in Philadelphia, murders are up 25 percent (2016-2018). I do presume “underlying social conditions” haven’t gone that drastically in opposite directions in these neighboring cities just since 2016. So what if — crazy idea — police (and prosecution) actually matter. Maybe a lot. And even more than the so-called “root causes.”

    I mention this because the new Camden County Police, policing Camden City, have become the progressive reformers’ dream team (despite being founded, in part, in a fit of Republican union busting). Since 2013 there have been a lot of positive press, but here is one example that presses all the feel-good buttons like “strategic shift toward community policing” and “rebuilding trust between the community and their officers” and “being mentors in the community” and “a showroom for community policing techniques” and “nothing stops a bullet like a job.” OK, but all that sets off my BS alarm.

    In terms of crime, the proof is in the pudding. Give credit where credit is due. And here’s the thing: violence really is down. A lot!

    Last year there 22 murders and the year before 23, down from 67(!) in 2012. Shootings also been cut in half. Maybe police culture really did change for the better. Or training. Or technology. Or strategies. Or maybe police are now simply funded at the proper level they had not been. Or maybe we’re getting more for less. I don’t know.

    But I do know, despite what is often reported, it hasn’t been just kumbaya with carnivals and free ice cream. Those gimmicks can be part of building trust, but they’re not crime prevention strategies. Non-criminals need more positive casual interactions with police. Criminals need more interactions, too Perhaps not all so positive, but still professional and respectful. (The person you arrest today can be your source or even save your ass tomorrow.) As Chief Thomson says), “Nothing builds trust like human contact.”

    And speaking of human contact, reported use-of-force — usually something reformers want to reduce — increased dramatically with the new police department. That could mean cops are now more brutal, but more likely cops are policing more, and some of that leads to justified use of force. Camden is being lauded by reformers for bringing down crime with exactly the form of pro-active policing loathed by the same reformers!

    http://force.nj.com/database/pd-dept/camden-camden

    Force went up. Arrests went up. Crime went down. But what about the idea, very popular among reformers who don’t live in high-crime neighborhoods, that arrests are bad, and people in dangerous neighborhoods hate police because police are arresting (or shooting) people of color for no good reason.

    If you decriminalize minor offenses, goes the hope, police “legitimacy” will increase, which along with leading to less incarceration means more solved crimes and many other wonderful things. It sounds good, especially if you think police are the problem and your neighbors aren’t.

    Based on UCR arrest numbers, arrests went up with the new police department. Camden cops are arresting more people, and crime is down. There may have also been better policing, but there was also just more policing. And the kind of arrests that increased — low-level discretionary arrests — would indicate that police focused on quality-of-life issues and Broken Windows. This is not the reformers’ party line.

    Caveat: I really hate using arrests as a metric for anything, much less good policing. But arrest data is available. And huge changes in arrest numbers tell you something is going on. Arrests can be a proxy for pro-active policing: cops stopping suspicious people, chasing and catching the bad guys, cops less afraid of making an honest mistake. My inquiry into Camden was inspired by thisarticle from March 2017 (that I just read) saying drug arrests were way down. Except that seems not to be true.

    In 2011, Camden cops may have lost a little of whatever go-getter spirit they still had. This was Camden’s Ferguson Effect (pre-Ferguson). Cops were told they were no good and their job was on the line. Arrested dropped 50 percent, from 11,000 in 2009 to 5,348 in 2011. Along with Camden, Baltimore and Chicago also saw similarly quick and drastic decreases in quantifiable policing. And in all three violence shot way up. Yes, correlation that is also causation [thunder clap]. At the start of 2012 Camden laid off 45 percent of the police force. Murders went up to 67 (which is a shocking number for a city of 75,000).

    Let’s compare 2012 and 2014 Camden, when murders went down from 67 to 33:

    • Drug arrests up 79% to 3,052.
    • Marijuana possession arrests in particular up 467% to 488.
    • Curfew and loitering violations up 34% to 1,128.
    • “All other offenses (not traffic)” up 50% to 3,352 (This most minor category is probably something catch-all like disorderly conduct, trespassing, loitering).
    • DUI arrests up 483% to 175 (an indicator of more policing).
    • Non-felony (ie: discretionary) assaults up 57% (to 754).
    • And murder arrests — because there were fewer or them — down 23% (to 20).

    Policing get “better,” but what does that mean? Maybe police officers have better manners. That matters. But what brings down crime is focusing on repeated violent offenders, usually young men, who commit the vast majority of violence crime.

    There’s irony here in that this little department so loved by progressives, has achieved success, in part, by arresting more minorities. And you know what kind of arrests increased the most? All the little ones that reformers want to stop in the name of social justice But those progressive reformers don’t live in Camden. If you do live in Camden, you probably support anything that works.

    For a small city, 9,000 arrests is a very large number. Scaled up to the population of New York City, for instance, this would be over one  million arrests a year (compared with the 240,000 arrests in NYC last year). One arrest for every 8 people is similar to the arrest rate that Baltimore had in the early 2000s (when I was there and violence was going down). This is the same arrest rate people (stupid people, mind you) blamed for Baltimore’s riots a decade later (arrests and crime in Baltimore dropped drastically from 2003 up until the riot of 2015).

    Now keep in mind arrests are not good on their own. It’s very important what the data do not reveal. How many times did cops change behavior without resorting to arrest? My guess is a lot. More good policing does often lead to more arrests, but it’s really important to put the horse before the cart. Policing is the goal. Not arrests. “More arrests” is never a good strategy.

    I’d like to know how many people were arrested in Camden in 2017 and 2018 when murder really dropped. In the ideal world, violence and arrests (and incarceration) all go down in sync. That’s the win-win(-win). But residents will always choose more arrests and less violence rather than the standard police reform package of less policing and more violence.

    One moral, and you see it time and again, is you don’t have to fix society’s problems to fix violence. Violence is not inevitable. But equally important is the corollary that you can’t fix society when violence is out of control. Most residents want more police. They want visible police who maintain order and treat people with respect. It’s not too much to ask for.

    Maybe what is going on in Camden is just slapping lipstick on a pig. But hey, it’s hard to argue with success. Don’t underestimate good PR and a progressive-sounding chief who both controls the narrative and won’t give in to anti-policing naysayers. And it’s likely that what the arrest numbers do not show — better hiring, training, culture, attitude, accountability, and leadership — is what makes effective aggressive policing possible, or at least palatable.

    Camden homicide numbers

    2018: 22

    2017: 23

    2016: 44

    2015: 32

    2014: 33

    2013: 57

    2012: 67

    2011: 52

    2010: 39

    2009: 35

    2008: 53

    2007: 45

    2006: 33

    2005: 35

    2004: 49

    2003: 41

    Non-fatal shootings

    2017: 95

    2016: 92

    2015: 109

    2014: 90

    2013: 143

    2012: 172

    Arrests

    2009: 11,280

    2010: 9,414

    2011: 5,348

    2012: 6,903

    2013: 6,613

    2014: 10,582

    2015: 12,049

    2016: 9,052

    Notes: In the data (for 2016, ISPSR 37056 and 37057) variable “offense” the value 18 is the total for drugs. Subtotals follow. Values 180 and 185 are again subtotals of what follow. This makes drug arrest numbers very easy to triple count, as I did at first.

    For 2009-2012, I’m assuming Camden City is the agency with the listed population of 77,665. I ignore the other Camden, which presumably is the rest of the county. After 2013 (unless I’m wrong) Camden City is the agency “Camden County Police Dpt” with a listed population of about 75,000.

    As always comments and corrections are welcome. Replications welcome; data available on request.

    Some sources: https://www.nj.com/camden/index.ssf/2018/01/camdens_2017_murder_rate_was_the_lowest_in_decades.html

    http://www.camconnect.org/resources/CrimeMaps.html

    https://camdencountypros.org/unit-list/homicide/#tabpanel22

    https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/ICPSR/series/57

  • “Imma start a riot like it’s Baltimore”

    Turns out the cop who once rapped “Imma start a riot like it’s Baltimore” turns out to be prophetic!

    But all joking aside, this cop who shot and killed an armed and dangerous man was from the community.

    More than 1,000 people have circulated a 2014 image, shared by the Milwaukee Police Department, identifying and lauding Officer Dominique Heaggan-Brown as the rookie cop who helped a homeless woman find a warm meal during frigid weather.

    …

    “I was aware that he was an officer like most people,” he added. “When we did have a chance to hang out it was pure kicking it, or he would pop up at some of my shows in support sometimes.”

    …

    Smith’s sister, Sherelle Smith, said the officer and her dead brother knew each other from their high school days.

    And then some people started listed his home address. There were death threats. Officer Heaggan-Brown — from the community he policed, doing his job, involved in a justified shooting — is now in hiding.

  • Real community policing

    The National Police Week 5K Run is coming up and hell no I won’t be running.

    But a friend of mine is and looking for a running partner. She posted this on facebook. I think it’s sweet and serves as a good reminder as to how good police can be when they’re not sitting alone in a car, in an empty parking lot, waiting for the next idiot citizen to call 911. She’s not police:

    This race is to honor law enforcement officers killed in line of duty. Last year they struggled to reach the donation goal. It was sad. Why do I care? In my hometown, police officers assigned to a ‘police box’ were vital members of the community. I can still call the police box in my neighborhood to ask officers to check on my mom. OK, it’s in Japan, but my respect and trust for law enforcement officers are universal.

  • The State of Community Policing

    Over at The Badge Guys, there’s a nice series of posts about the current state and evolution of what is called “community policing.”

  • Fewer Cops in San Fran

    The usual. State and federal tax cuts. Local budget cuts. Union workers get screwed. The full story is here.

    Because of the city’s ongoing budget woes, no police academy classes are scheduled for next year, which means that instead of the 1,861 sworn officers who were working for the department in July 2010, retirements and resignations will drop that number to 1,745 by June 2012
    …
    “I can’t say that the crime rate will rise because we lose officers … but all creative ideas will be on the table,” [Interim Chief Jeff Godown] said.
    …
    The department could even be forced to eliminate its popular community policing foot beats and “put the officers back in cars to answer radio calls.”

    Well that’s not very creative. Why is foot patrol (and mounted) always the first thing to go? Partly because most cops don’t take foot patrol seriously. It’s just “hug a thug.” And horses area bit for show (but what a show!).

    Foot patrol officers can answer calls, too. And they should. I’d even be for mounted units on radio patrol. Why not? I thought we needed to be creative. Are two-person units on the table (does S.F. uses two-officers per car? I don’t know)? Have one officer per car. If I policed solo in the Eastern District, you can do it, too. And if you need to cut units, why not less car patrol? That’s always the last to go. I wonder why.

    I think I know:

    The public don’t notice if you cut a few patrol cars. So it’s a pretty useless threat to make. But if you threaten to sell the horses to the glue factory… then everybody is up in arms. So when times are tough, the P.D. can’t say, “We’re going to cut cars, response time will go up slightly. It won’t affect crime.” Instead, the police department threatens: “You’re gonna cut police funding? Then you won’t see officers walking the beat. Cut us more? We’ll go back to reactive policing and nothing else. Still not enough? We close your police station.” It actually is a real threat. But it’s not real leadership.

  • You can’t arrest your way out of problems in a neighborhood

    “You can’t arrest your way out of problems in a neighborhood,” the sheriff said. Communication between the community and law enforcement, Bradshaw said, is crucial.

    It’s my favorite line. I’ve said it a bunch myself. You canarrest your way out of some problems, but not drug problems in a drug neighborhood.

    There’s a piece about community policing in Florida. Sounds like a great idea. Community policing is a great idea in theory. Of course the real question is will it work reducing crime. Usually community policing is just lip service. As a philosophy of a whole department, I don’t believe community policing exists. I’d love to be proven wrong.

  • Community Policing query

    Dear Prof. Moskos

    First off, let me say that I enjoyed your book. As someone who has recently moved to Baltimore and now finds themselves living on the edge of the Eastern I found it a fascinating read. Your discussion of 911 helped to explain the very big difference in reaction between the community meetings.

    Commanders (not a direct quote) “We won’t know something is happening unless you call 911 and tell us. We can’t do anything about it if you don’t tell us.”—911 operators “You’ve got transvestite hookers working in the park across the street? We can’t do anything about it unless you call when one of them is getting into a car.”

    Even without my new context, “Cop in the Hood” would have been an interesting book. I appreciate how you are able to speak with two voices; both the police and the sociologist.

    That out of the way, I have a question I would appreciate your opinion on: are citizen’s patrols actually effective? I’ve made some minor forays into the literature and searched for opinions. Although community policing generally seems to have a positive effect in some studies, I can’t find anything pointing to which aspect(s) is effective.

    At a gut level I have a cynical reaction to the overall effect of having a random group of neighbors walking around the area in green vests and waving the occasional flashlight at a dark corner. Keep in mind that I live in Greenmount West straddling the border between the Eastern and Central, so we have to communicate with 2 separate districts. This seems to reduce the level of direct contact with anyone who we have direct contact with.

    I’m very interested in your viewpoint…

    I answer:

    Living between two police districts really does make things worse. And having to deal with a different set of officers on two different blocks is a pain. There is a natural tendency for police officers to push problems (such as prostitution) “away.” I certainly pushed some people away from the Eastern and back into the Southeast. Counterproductive, when you consider I lived in the Southeast.

    Community policing, by and large, doesn’t exist and never has. It was supposed to mark a move away from reactive policing. But despite lip service to the contrary (I mean, nobody will ever come out againstcommunity policing), I don’t think any police department has every implemented a real long-term community policing program. Quite simply, you can’t have community policing if patrol officers are sitting in cars waiting for radio calls.

    About citizen patrols… I don’t know. My thought is that they can be effective (both directly and indirectly). It really is community policing. That’s good, right? But for all the effort put in, the gain is probably very very small.

    I’m a big fan of the Guardian Angels, for instance. But that’s more from the perspective of being a young guy very happy to see them on the Chicago L than from any actually academic proof that they prevent crime. Buy my guess is that they dohelp prevent crime from a Broken Windows perspective. And even if the Guardian Angels (or other citizen groups) don’t prevent crime, at least they made me feel safer. That’s worth something.

    District Commanders in Baltimore tended not to be the most enlightened bunch. (At least from my experience back in 2000. I’m sure they’re all much better now.) Getting police to move away from rapid response and toward foot patrol in not in their genetic DNA. They’re right that they won’t know until you call 911. So the question they and you should be asking them is why don’t they know and what can theydo to know better.

    And that 911 operator is an idiot. Just call for disorderly then, to get police to respond. But even better would be to talk to your post officer (on any of the three shifts, but the midnight is probably the best because we had more time) and talk to him or her about ways to solve the problem. As a police officer, I would much prefer to help a real person than just respond to another anonymous 911 call for prostitution. What the cops can do is arrest. And some arresting is probably part of the solution here. But probably just one piece of the solution.

    Interestingly, there weren’t many street-walking prostitutes in the Eastern when I was there. My guess is it was too dangerous for prostitutes and Johns alike.