January 24, 2011 Today's Stories -- Four Detroit Police Officers Shot At Precinct Station -- Cleveland Cops Cleared Rapes With No Suspect: Newspaper -- Company To Stop Making Anesthetic Used In Executions -- VA Seized More High-Capacity Magazines Since Ban Expired -- U.S. Park Police Chief Returning Almost 7 Years After Firing -- Opinions Divided On Chicago Ex-Commander's Prison Term -- Don't Base Death Reports On Secondary Sources: NPR's Simon -- Could Unmanned Drones Become Law Enforcement Tool? -- Camden Cop Cut May Be "Catastrophic"--Police Expert -- Police Misconduct Lawsuit Settlements Up In Pittsburgh -- Cincinnati Seeks Community-Oriented Police Chief -- Brownback Abolishes KS Parole Panel, Names Corrections Chief You may go to TheCrimeReport.org to search all archived CJN stories. Please e-mail Ted Gest at CJJ with concerns about the editorial content of our news items, to suggest news stories, or with general comments. |
Four Detroit Police Officers Shot At Precinct Station ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In a violence-weary city where every run can put police in danger, even this news was stunning: A gunman walked into a Detroit police precinct Sunday afternoon and opened fire with a shotgun, wounding four officers before return gunfire took his life, the Detroit News reports. After earlier coming into the 6th Precinct on the city's northwest side, a 38-year-old man returned about 4:30 p.m. and shot the commander in charge and three officers. All are expected to recover. "Incidents like this are very sobering and remind us how vulnerable we all are," said Police Chief Ralph Godbee. "We have a lot of people that are shaken up." That four were shot at once in Detroit wasn't shocking; that they were all uniformed and armed was. It capped another felonious weekend during which three bodies were found in a home on Friday and five people were shot outside a strip club early Sunday. "We have a serious problem with crime when someone has the audacity to walk into the police center and starts firing on police officers," City Councilman Andre Spivey said. "We have to wrap our arms around the public safety issue." |
Cleveland Cops Cleared Rapes With No Suspect: Newspaper ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cleveland police broke departmental rules and sidestepped national law enforcement standards when they prematurely cleared rape cases without sex-crimes detectives ever identifying the suspects, reports the Cleveland Plain Dealer. A Plain Dealer analysis found that police improperly cleared at least 52 rape cases in 2006 and 2007, giving the impression they had solved more crimes than they had. In reality, unknown assailants who abducted victims from city streets or bus stops and held them hostage while they raped them are not being pursued. That leaves them free to attack other victims. The FBI crime-reporting standards, which are similar to Cleveland's own police procedures, call for detectives to keep sexual-assault cases open until a suspect is identified. The federal rules say that to close a case without an arrest -- a classification known as "exceptional clearance," meeting several criteria. Acceptable reasons for exceptionally clearing a case range from a suspect's death to a victim who chooses not to pursue prosecution. In Cleveland, police are using those justifications without first identifying a suspect. And the city is counting the improperly cleared cases toward the police department's overall clearance rate, a widely recognized barometer of a law enforcement agency's performance. Most commonly in Cleveland, cases die when detectives declare victims "uncooperative," when they don't answer phone calls or show up to the department's downtown offices for interviews. According to the newspaper's analysis of data provided by the city, about 56 percent of all rape investigations during the two years in question have been cleared -- meaning there was an arrest, the crime was proven unfounded, the case was turned over to another agency or it was labeled an exceptional clearance. The analysis showed that in the two years, sex-crimes detectives cleared nearly 2 1/2 times as many cases by exception as they did by arrest. At least 16 percent of exceptionally cleared cases examined by the Plain Dealer were classified as such in violation of the department's own policy. |
Company To Stop Making Anesthetic Used In Executions ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The U.S. company that makes a drug most states use in lethal injection announced Friday that it would no longer produce the powerful anesthetic, a decision that throws the nation's capital punishment apparatus into disarray, the Washington Post reports. The decision by Hospira of Lake Forest., Il., was prompted by demands from Italy, which does not authorize capital punishment, that no sodium thiopental - which the company had planned to make at its plant outside Milan - be used for executions. Hospira's move will force states and the federal government to look for alternatives to the drug, which could require lengthy approval processes and result in costly, long-running legal challenges. "This is clearly going to cause a problem for a lot of states," said Richard Dieter of the Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes the death penalty. The development will "anger a lot of people," said Michael Rushford of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a Sacramento group that supports the death penalty. "It would certainly bother someone whose daughter was killed by a convicted sex offender." Thirty-five states permit executions. |
VA Seized More High-Capacity Magazines Since Ban Expired ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The number of guns with high-capacity magazines seized by Virginia police dropped during a decade-long federal prohibition on assault weapons, but the rate has rebounded sharply since the ban was lifted in 2004, the Washington Post reports. More than 15,000 guns equipped with high-capacity magazines - holding 11 or more bullets - have been seized by Virginia police since 1993. The role of high-capacity magazines was thrust into the national spotlight when Jared Loughner allegedly opened fire with a semiautomatic handgun outside a Tucson grocery store, killing six and wounding 13, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ.). Authorities say Loughner used a legally purchased 9mm Glock 19 handgun with a 31-round clip and was tackled while changing magazines. Last year in Virginia, guns with high-capacity magazines amounted to 22 percent of the weapons recovered and reported by police. In 2004, when the ban expired, the rate had reached a low of 10 percent. In each year since then, the rate has gone up. "Maybe the federal ban was finally starting to make a dent in the market by the time it ended," said Christopher Koper of the Police Executive Research Forum, who studied the assault weapons ban for the National Institute of Justice. Congress could reinstitute the prohibition on high-capacity magazines, a measure opposed by gun-rights advocates. |
U.S. Park Police Chief Returning Almost 7 Years After Firing ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Teresa Chambers, who was ousted as U.S. Park Police chief almost seven years ago, will resume her duties Jan. 31, the Washington Post reports. Chambers, 53, is returning after the Bush administration fired her for warning that staff shortages could lead to safety hazards at national parks and monuments in the Washington, D.C., area. In a 2003 interview with the Post, Chambers warned that her police force was underfunded and overstretched. National Park Service officials charged that she provided an "open invitation to lawbreakers" by discussing the agency's potential vulnerabilities, and the Interior Department fired her in 2004. Citing weak evidence against her, the Merit Systems Protection Board this month ordered her reinstatement and ruled that she is entitled to about $2 million in retroactive pay and reimbursement for legal fees. |
Opinions Divided On Chicago Ex-Commander's Prison Term ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ After former Chicago police commander Jon Burge was sentenced Friday to 4 1/2 years in prison for lying about his role in torturing criminal suspects, Mark Clements, an alleged victim of Burge's "midnight crew" of detectives who was freed after 28 years in prison, said, "This is ridiculous. This is a smack in the face once again to the African-American community. [] This is a complete injustice," the Chicago Tribune reports. Clements, an alleged victim of Burge's "Midnight Crew" of detectives who was released after 28 years in prison, wasn't the only one in the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse who felt Burge got a light sentence. "What a shame that black folks get had again," a man said as he left the courtroom after the sentencing. The disappointment of some of Burge's alleged victims stood in stark contrast to the reaction of their lawyers and prosecutors. They agreed that U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow's sentence delivered an unmistakable message that Burge - who has faced allegations of abuse from dozens of criminal suspects for decades - had finally been brought to justice. |
Don't Base Death Reports On Secondary Sources: NPR's Simon ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Scott Simon, host of NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday, and a close friend of Rep. Gabrelle Giffords (D-AZ), has criticized his own network for wrongly reporting that Giffords had died in the shooting on Jan. 8, reports NPR ombudsman Alicia Shepherd. On the day it happened, Simon phoned the NPR news desk and was told the information was based on "confirmation" from the Pima County Sheriff's department and a congressional source. "I couldn't fathom how cops or pols would know more than the hospital," said Simon. "Two sources who are not in a position to know something are not reliable sources." Adds Simon: "There should be no room for doubt when a news organization declares someone dead. They should wait until the medical authorities directly involved declare death, or close family members announce it. There is simply no way that anyone else-not local police, not witnesses, not 'two governmental sources'-would be in a position to know for certain especially when there are now, between respiration and brain activity, at least a couple of medical gauges of death." |
Could Unmanned Drones Become Law Enforcement Tool? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Before a SWAT team raid on a drug suspect, Texas agents launched a drone. A bird-size device called a Wasp floated hundreds of feet into the sky and instantly beamed live video to agents on the ground. The SWAT team stormed the house and arrested the suspect, says the Washington Post. "The nice thing is it's covert," said Bill Nabors Jr., chief pilot of the Texas Department of Public Safety, who described the 2009 operation for the first time publicly. "You don't hear it, and unless you know what you're looking for, you can't see it." The drone technology that has revolutionized warfare abroad is entering the U.S. airspace: Unmanned aircraft are patrolling the border with Mexico, searching for missing persons over difficult terrain, flying into hurricanes to collect weather data, photographing traffic accident scenes and tracking the spread of forest fires. The Texas operation presaged what could be one of the most far-reaching and potentially controversial uses of drones: as a new and relatively cheap surveillance tool in domestic law enforcement. The Federal Aviation Administration requires the few police departments with drones to seek emergency authorization if they want to deploy one in an actual operation. Because of concerns about safety, it grants permission only occasionally. By 2013, the FAA expects to have formulated new rules that would allow police routinely to fly lightweight, unarmed drones up to 400 feet above the ground - high enough for them to be largely invisible eyes in the sky. |
Camden Cop Cut May Be "Catastrophic"--Police Expert ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the first week after layoffs cut the Camden, N.J., Police Department nearly in half, predictions of doom and gloom and outlaws running wild in the streets have remained just that - predictions, says the Philadelphia Inquirer. Experts say there's no way a city like Camden can avoid feeling the impact of the massive layoffs, which also included about one-third of the city's firefighters. "You can't police the same way you did with half the police force," said Chuck Wexler of the Police Executive Research Forum, a think tank in Washington, D.C. "There is no department that I know of [facing the kind of crime in Camden] that has lost half of their police force." Said Prof. Maki Haberfeld of John Jay College of Criminal Justice: "There is always a need to have some sort of balance between reactive and proactive policing," but "when you're losing that many officers [] this balance goes out the window." So far, there has been no uptick in assaults, shootings, or the other mayhem that have branded Camden a city on the brink. "For a reasonable-sized city, this is one of the most catastrophic law enforcement stories in the country," said Eugene O'Donnell, a professor of law and police studies at John Jay College. The Camden police reduction brings the city, with a 78,000 population, closer to the national average of 2.1 police officers per 1,000 residents, said John Firman of the International Association of Chiefs of Police. Firman and others said using that ratio as a standard was simply playing a numbers game and avoiding the reality of police work. "Staffing has to be based on three things," he said. "What's your mission, and what is needed to ensure public safety and officers' safety." Those factors vary by municipality, and trying to establish a common ratio is foolhardy, he said. |
Police Misconduct Lawsuit Settlements Up In Pittsburgh ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Settlements in police misconduct cases have cost the city of Pittsburgh about $300,000 in the past 13 months, and another settlement for $150,000 is pending -- an uptick in payouts that has some officials and lawyers urging a review of police department procedures, especially those pertaining to officers' off-duty activities, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. The city settled one federal misconduct lawsuit in 2008 and one in 2009. Last year, however, the city settled four misconduct suits, two of them involving officers who were off-duty or moonlighting when the incidents occurred. So far this year, City Council has taken up two more settlements, both involving off-duty officers. Because the financially strapped city is self-insured, payouts come from the $450 million operating budget. "My hope is that the city takes more control over officers' behavior, when they are on the clock and off the clock," said lawyer Gerald O'Brien, who is seeking a $150,000 settlement for a dump-truck driver who charges that an officer in uniform but off duty and driving a personal vehicle -- passed him and cut him off on a downtown street and then assaulted him in 2008. David Rudovsky of the University of Pennsylvania Law School and author of "Police Misconduct: Law and Litigation" said an increase in suits or complaints signals the need for a policy review. "I would think any responsible public official would look at that and say maybe there's a problem," he said, noting it would make no sense for the city to shell out money in settlements and "not do anything internally." |
Cincinnati Seeks Community-Oriented Police Chief ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For the first time, Cincinnati can hire a police chief from anywhere, says the Cincinnati Enquirer. Until now, every chief in the department's 207-year history has come from within the ranks. Voters gave the city the power to hire fire and police chiefs from the outside in 2001, after riots prompted by the death of an unarmed African-American man who ran from police and was shot by an officer. The police chief job may be the most important in Cincinnati. Nothing dogs the city more than the perception that it is unsafe - even though data show that crime is falling. The new chief could be taking over from Tom Streicher a department that, for budget reasons, may shrink or lose its patrol functions to the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office. The Enquirer interviewed more than a dozen people, including crime victims, elected officials, police officers and neighborhood activists, to see what Cincinnati wants and needs in the next chief. They want someone selected through an honest and public process who makes them be safe and feel safe. Someone who fully gets what Cincinnati has endured in the past decade in terms of the department's relationship with African-Americans. For the man doing the hiring, connection with the community seems to be key. At the top of a four-page ad for the job, City Manager Milton Dohoney said he is seeking a community-oriented law enforcement leader with a legacy of integrity. |
Brownback Abolishes KS Parole Panel, Names Corrections Chief ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Gov. Sam Brownback has abolished the Kansas Parole Board to save money, the Wichita Eagle reports. He named Raymond Roberts, warden of the El Dorado Correctional Facility, to head the corrections department. In a move projected to save nearly$500,000, a three-person committee of corrections staff will take over responsibility for making parole decisions for the approximately 500 inmates who remain incarcerated with sentences allowing for the possibility of parole. The new group will take over the Parole Board's responsibility to conduct hearings and decide whether to reincarcerate ex-convicts accused of violating conditions of their parole. Board member Patricia Biggs has expressed concern that abolition of the board could lead to staff decisions to release prisoners to ease overcrowding, or, alternatively, to keep people in prison longer to justify expansion of staff or prisons. She said the plan raises issues of due process of law for alleged parole violators, because the same agency responsible for bringing the accusaion would also be responsible for deciding the defendant's guilt and punishment. Brownback said the need for parole oversight is dwindling because the state has moved to a system in which new convicts are given exact sentences that are not open to parole review. New corrections director Roberts is known for encouraging Christian evangelism as part of the corrections system. A center he established is open to inmates of all faiths. Brownback said Roberts' focus on ministry as part of the corrections process "gives men and women serving their time the opportunity to change their lives." |
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