How do police reduce petty crime?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I’m glad that I cleaned up any miscommunication. That wasn’t anything like what I meant.

42

Yeah, “snitches get stitches” as used by everyday non criminals has done a lot to encourage crime.

A Podcast debunks nothing. Well written footnoted articles do. So, until I see some, I am gonna go with Freakonmics.

43

Hadn’t realized the link I posted didn’t have links to the references embedded.
Here’s a better link, with actual links inside.

Sources:

44

Freakonomics had some good points, mostly about ways of using non-intuitive data to attack problems, but oversimplified issues and relied unquestioningly on too many single studies. Now that I write that sentence I realize it sounds like posts on the Dope. From that above list, the article in American Scientist, Freakonomics: What Went Wrong?, gives a good summary of their weaknesses in accessible prose.

I came to prefer Tim Harford, the Underground Economist writer. He approaches many everyday questions in the same data driven way, but isn’t nearly as cocksure as they are.

45

I love Tim Harford. His More or Less podcast on deconstructing (or often, debunking) statistics from the news is a favorite.

46

I’ve been reading. I appreciate all the responses, I’ve just not felt a need to reply.

I did not actually mean “What SHOULD police/society do”. I meant “What do you, personally, EXPECT police(specifically) to do?” Which winds up getting a similar response, but is a subtly different question.

I asked because I have my own opinions about policing and society (relatively liberally aligned). In short, I don’t see how police can be very effective about reducing petty crime. (Not saying they aren’t an important component in a cohesive strategy. I just don’t think they should be societies’ first or primary response to general ills).

However, I keep hearing arguments (like in the original thread I mentioned initially) that we need more police to reduce petty crime, and I just don’t understand how people expect more poorly trained guns arriving 30 minutes late to a scene to be effective on a large scale.

47

Maybe you should read my post. Goetz was mugged on the subway. He had to go to the police station, along with the perps who mugged him. The process of his statements and paperwork took a lot longer than it did to process and release the muggers (bail or recognisance). It’s right there in your linked article:

According to Goetz, in early 1981, he was the victim of a robbery at the Canal Street subway station.[18][30] Goetz reported that three Black teenagers had smashed him into a plate-glass door and threw him to the ground, injuring his chest and knee.[31][13] Goetz was involved in a struggle with one of the teenagers until police arrived; that individual accused Goetz of assaulting him.[31] To his frustration, Goetz was detained for six hours, while the person he accused was released in two and a half hours.

After that he began carrying a weapon. When a group of young men surrounded him on the subway later on, suggested(?) he give them $5, he felt menaced and shot them. It’s a matter of debate whether he was really threatened and if he used excessive force.

Goetz was acquitted of the attempted-murder and first-degree-assault charges and convicted of criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree–for carrying a loaded, unlicensed weapon in a public place.

I don’t want to debate Goetz. Just pointing out that the result of police not doing enough to control petty crime was vigilante action. Petty bureaucracy aggravated the situation.

48

The timeline doesn’t really line up, though. Blood titers have shown that the children with the highest levels of lead in their blood are those of us born between the mid-70s and early 80s, and the 90s are exactly when we became prime criminal age. It’s not until births in the mid-80s that you see a sharp decline in lead levels in children, and those kids were too young to be responsible for crime through most of the 90s.

49

I live in Chicago and I cannot remember the last time I saw a beat cop just walking neighborhoods. That and traffic cops. I think having their presence near and seen helps as well as (hopefully) learning their communities. But no cop wants that job. Tiring, weather can suck from hot to freezing to raining and so on.

When I was a kid living in Chicago I remember those police though and I got to know them since I’d pass the same one walking to school everyday.

50

The OP is flawed as it’s examples of burglary and armed robbery are not petty crimes but instead are serious offenses. Shoplifting, minor drug offenses, disorderly conduct, trespassing, public intoxication, vandalism, etc are petty crimes.