Alone in debts

Many observers (including me) have been surprised by the fact that crime has remained relatively subdued in the wake of the financial crisis. Among other things, it’s apparent that a lot of people are in desperate straits, which might naturally lead many of them to consider alternative — read: illegal — ways of getting their hands on cold, hard cash and acquiring the things they need to survive.

Some might say times have changed, and people are, in certain respects at least, much more civilized than in the past. Others might point to the large number of Americans receiving emergency unemployment benefits, food stamps, and other forms of safety-net assistance, which has taken some of the sting out of the downturn. A few might note the large number of criminals who are behind bars, which has reduced the population of potential trouble-makers roaming the streets.

Then again, if the following New York Times report, „A Rise in Violent Crime Evokes City’s Unruly Past,” is anything to go by, maybe it was only just a matter of time before the fallout from the Great Unraveling triggered an upsurge in criminal activity.

Teenagers flashing knives in a spate of high school stabbings. Two men murdered in a brawl aboard a downtown No. 2 subway train. Four people shot and 33 others arrested in late-night melees in Times Square that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg described with a loaded term from the past: “wilding.”

It is impossible to know if the recent increase in violent crime in the city is legitimate cause for concern that the “bad old days” of crime may return, or if it simply represents a blip in a trend line continuing a descent of nearly two decades.

Homicides are up nearly 22 percent in 2010, compared with the same period last year. Shootings are up in the city, to 293 from 257, a 14 percent increase. And there are more victims of gunfire: 351 through April 4, up from 318 in the same period a year ago.

But it is not statistics, but rather the tenor and pace of 2010’s spasm of disorder that are suggestive of a bygone era, and have again raised questions about whether New York City is finally at the end of crime declines.

Add to this a depleted police headcount — and city and state budgets that remain stubbornly unsolved — and crime is suddenly a political hammer: The mayor is lobbying for money from Albany, and state lawmakers are pleading poverty even as they try to close a $9.2 billion budget gap and serve the needs of constituencies from Buffalo to Bridgehampton.

Last week, after hordes of young people swarmed Times Square in what has evolved in recent years into a violent Easter night ritual, the mayor used a term popularized in 1989 when a Central Park jogger was brutally attacked, emblematic of an era when crime in the city was at its apex. That followed comments he made in March when he called the uptick in homicides “worrisome,” and decried, “We have fewer police officers on the streets than we did before.”

His choice of words was significant for a mayor who typically gives little credence to minor fluctuations in data. But the posturing is laced with a degree of caution, as city officials strive to sound the alarms of budget cuts while at the same time assuring the public that the streets remain as safe as they have ever been.

Addressing a radio audience on Sunday, Mr. Bloomberg said that since 2001, overall crime was down 40 percent, murder was down 35 percent and subway crime was down nearly by half.

Under the governor’s and the Senate’s budget proposals, the city would lose roughly $1.3 billion, and a little more than half of that under the Assembly’s plan. The mayor warned in January that the governor’s proposal would force the Police Department to lay off 3,150 officers, bringing the force down to same level it was in 1985. He backed off that statement last week, saying on his weekly radio program that the city was “not going to lay off cops.”

Nonetheless, the police force has been shrinking steadily, from a  high of 40,285 officers in 2000, to about 35,600 last year.

Even if the cuts in the governor’s proposal were fully restored, the department’s uniformed count is still on course to drop below 33,000 through attrition by July 2011, its lowest level since 1990, when it had 32,441 officers, including housing and transit police before the departments were merged.

That was the year murders in the city peaked at 2,245, making it one of the nation’s top murder capitals. Not only is the force smaller, but it is also being pulled in more directions, with roughly 1,000 officers on counterterrorism duty. The department devotes cars and resources to a  critical response team and to provide a presence near potential terrorist targets, though those resources can be redeployed to areas with elevated crime.

Some officials worry the city is already slipping toward its lawless past.

“What is the tipping point?” said Scott M. Stringer, the Manhattan borough president. “How low can you go, in actual police numbers? And I think what these statistics say, and these other incidents say, especially those who have been around the city all our lives, is we may have tipped a little.”

In fact, now that more and more municipalities are being forced to abandon pretensions that conditions will soon return to „normal,” they are left with no choice but to slash spending in key areas, including public safety. Based on the following Los Angeles Times report, „Investigations Sit Idle as LAPD Detectives Hit Overtime Caps,” that means a  growing number of criminals are likely to go unpunished — with some literally getting away with murder.

With its overtime budget decimated, the department is forcing officers to put cases on hold and take days or even weeks off. Despite an uptick in killings, the homicide unit is among the hardest hit.

In January, Los Angeles Police Det. Nate Kouri was ordered to stop working.

One of the LAPD’s most productive homicide investigators sat idle for six weeks, unable to follow any leads on old cases or pick up new ones. Kouri was not being punished for misconduct or for botching an investigation. He was benched for working too hard — and he is not the only one.

With the city reeling from its worst financial crisis in decades, the LAPD has stopped paying officers overtime wages, except in rare situations. In lieu of cash, officials have implemented a strict policy of forcing cops to take time off when they accrue large amounts of overtime hours. Because of demanding work schedules that routinely require them to investigate a case into the night or through the weekend, homicide detectives have been among the first officers to be sent home in significant numbers.

The drain on homicide squads has hampered investigations, several detectives and top department officials said in interviews. Detectives said their investigations are frequently put on hold while they take days off, delaying witness interviews and other potentially important leads. And, in the crucial first hours after a killing, several supervisors said they now dispatch fewer detectives to the crime scene.

A rash of homicides in recent weeks has compounded the problem, placing increased strain on detectives already running up against overtime limits and leaving homicide supervisors to worry that a  prolonged surge in killings will quickly overwhelm the stop-gap measures they are currently using to get by.

LAPD Chief Charlie Beck has used the rise in killings to underscore his frequent warnings to city lawmakers that further cuts to the department’s budget would continue to compromise its ability to fight crime.

„The hours have to come from someplace,” Beck said last week at a  meeting with the Los Angeles Police Commission, which oversees the department. „It has a serious impact on our ability to respond to some of the large, violent incidents we’ve been experiencing lately. That is especially true of homicide investigations because of the long hours they demand.”

In past years, the LAPD typically spent about $100 million in overtime. The department is planning to set aside less than $10 million for the upcoming fiscal year to cover certain work scenarios mandated under federal labor laws.

Before the city’s fiscal crisis, an agreement between the department and police union called for officers to build up a bank of about 100 hours of overtime and then be paid cash for hours worked beyond that. Late last year, the department renegotiated the agreement and now officers are not paid until they have accrued 400 hours of extra work. To make sure no officer reaches that trigger point, the department’s new policy forbids them from banking more than 250 hours.

In the Southeast Division, where Kouri works, the 11-person homicide squad was ordered to take off 700 hours in February — a month when they opened five new investigations. The same group responded to five killings last February, but worked 500 hours of overtime to solve them.

Nine of the 14 killings this year in the Southeast area remain unsolved.

„That is horrible compared to our typical rates,” said Det. Sal LaBarbera, a 24-year homicide veteran who supervises the Southeast squad. „All of those cases are solvable. None of them are mysteries. A few of them would likely already be solved, if I could just let my guys loose to work.”

Similar situations are playing out elsewhere. Late on a recent Saturday night in the Newton Division, two killings took place in quick succession. Det. Kelle Baitx, the homicide supervisor, said typically he would have sent a team of two detectives to each of the crime scenes. That night, however, he had one team take care of both crime scenes because other detectives were approaching their overtime limits. One of the cases was later reassigned to another team during regular working hours.

„It’s not ideal,” Baitx said of the overtime cap, noting that as a  general rule detectives handling a case should work the crime scene as well.

Under the circumstances, Americans might start wondering who is going protect them from society’s miscreants. According to one public official, as WKYC reports in „Ashtabula County: Judge Tells Residents to „Arm Themselves,” the answer is pretty straightforward.

JEFFERSON — In the ongoing financial crisis in Ashtabula County, the Sheriff’s Department has been cut from 112 to 49 deputies. With deputies assigned to transport prisoners, serve warrants and other duties, only one patrol car is assigned to patrol the entire county of 720 square miles.

„I did the best with what they (the county commissioners) gave me. If it wasn’t enough, don’t blame me, don’t blame this department,” said Sheriff Billy Johnson.

Johnson said he is suing the commissioners to get a determination of whether he should use his limited budget to carry out obligations defined by law or put more patrol cars on the streets.

„I just can’t do it anymore,” he said. „I have to have the court explain to the commissioners and to me what my statutory duties are.”

The Ashtabula County Jail has confined as many as 140 prisoners. It now houses only 30 because of reductions in the staff of corrections officers.

All told, 700 accused criminals are on a waiting list to serve time in the jail.

Are there dangerous people free among the 700 who cannot be locked up?

„There probably are,” Sheriff Johnson said, „but I’m telling you, any known violent criminal, we’re housing them. We’ve got murderers in there.”

Ashtabula County is the largest county in Ohio by land area.

Ashtabula County Common Pleas Judge Alfred Mackey was asked what residents should do to protect themselves and their families with the severe cutback in law enforcement.

„Arm themselves,” the judge said. „Be very careful, be vigilant, get in touch with your neighbors, because we’re going to have to look after each other.”

Ashtabula County gun dealers and firearms instructors tell WKYC their business has really picked up since the Sheriff’s Department cutbacks began some months ago.

„That’s exactly why they are coming, so that they can protect themselves,” says Tracy Williams, a certified firearms instructor in Jefferson. „They don’t feel that they are protected. They want to be able to protect themselves.”

Williams says interest in his classes has doubled recently, and many of those coming are people who he would not normally expect to have interest in obtaining a concealed carry permit.

„And as far as him (Judge Mackey) telling you to arm yourselves and protect yourselves, you don’t have any other option,” Williams told WKYC. „We don’t have the law enforcement out here to handle it right now.”