Cop in the Hood

**Shek** · 07 Apr 08,, 02:05

I came across this excerpt from the book Amazon.com: Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District: Peter Moskos: Books from one of the blogs I frequent. While I don't know how well fleshed out the critique from Sherman is, it certainly rings familiar with a lot of our early COIN experience in OIF and got my wheels turning thinking about the similiarities between policing and COIN.

Car patrol eliminated the neighborhood police officer. Police were pulled off neighborhood beats to fill cars. But motorized patrol -- the cornerstone of urban policing -- has no effect on crime rates, victimization, or public satisfaction. Lawrence Sherman was an early critic of telephone dispatch and motorized patrol, noted, "The rise of telephone dispatch transformed both the method and purpose of patrol. Instead of watching to prevent crime, motorized police patrol became a process of merely waiting to respond to crime."

Given some of the lukewarm/negative feelings towards cops in some other threads, I think that it is a fascinating parallel. Even if there is a bias because the only time you may interface with a cop is when getting a ticket while potentially ignoring the fact that your street may be safe, how do you overcome it. I think the car patrol vs. foot patrol is a great dichotomy, since with the former there is little to no interaction and the relationship is impersonal, while with the latter, there is interaction and it is on a personal level.

Here's the author's blog: Cop in the Hood

**Ironduke** · 07 Apr 08,, 09:04

According to a sociology course I took, doctrines concerning police forces from the 50s purposefully wanted to separate cops from the general population because of corruption. The new doctrine sought to transform police into a paramilitary force. I can't remember much else.

Anyway, it seems the private sector has somewhat filled the demand, with security guards, which are basically a private police force who when and where employed, fulfill many of the roles of the cop on the neighborhood beat.

**sourkraut115** · 03 Jul 08,, 18:37

I have only read the beginning of the book, but as a Baltimore City officer, I found what I read fascinating. The author made a number of remarks in his opening comments that were absolutely true. Imagine my surprise to find a reference to The City that Bleeds here on this board, however.

**dave lukins** · 04 Jul 08,, 09:32

Originally Posted by sourkraut115

I have only read the beginning of the book, but as a Baltimore City officer, I found what I read fascinating. The author made a number of remarks in his opening comments that were absolutely true. Imagine my surprise to find a reference to The City that Bleeds here on this board, however.

And Sir, what is your comment on this then? do you think there is a gap between the public and the police due to the fact that there is more police in vehicles than on foot? We in the UK certainly feel that there is not enough police on the beat. I might see one policeman walking the beat in my town, once or twice a month. Unless there is trouble, never, at night. I see and hear plenty of police vehicles, but by then the incident has already happened. We have been told that the reason we don't see a lot of police is because of all the paperwork they have to do. IE, if they question someone on his/her round s/he spends 90 minutes writing a report:( Faith in the Police in the UK is, I'm afraid, not very high.

**Cactus** · 04 Jul 08,, 20:50

Originally Posted by Ironduke

According to a sociology course I took, doctrines concerning police forces from the 50s purposefully wanted to separate cops from the general population because of corruption. The new doctrine sought to transform police into a paramilitary force. I can't remember much else.

The emphasis changed again in late-70s and early-80s to what is known as community-based policing. The earlier doctrine did not want to "transform police into a paramilitary force", but rather to professionalize it (as mirrored in media like Dirty Harry). There was a period in the history of American law enforcement when an attempt was made to turn them into paramilitary forces, Colombia-style, but it was it was a century earlier and mostly in rural and frontier areas.

Rifleman, I think, once posted the exact terminology and time-lines for each stage...

**Blue** · 04 Jul 08,, 21:03

In my area at least, the number of police have not kept up with the population, and niehborhood policing is out the window for a long time now. Rural cops need thier vehicles and when I was a deputy in a rural area, our sheriff would encourage us to stop and talk to the people if we saw them outside doing something. Sometimes a chat would net some intel that on several occassions brought me back to that area after dark and I busted cattle rustlers and dopers. And btw, my county wasn't all that remote, but sometimes response times would be 30 minutes and just as much for back-up.

When I was an MP at Bragg we would often park our car and walk the housing areas, mostly for PR. I have to say though, you go sneakin around in the dark and there ain't no tellin what your gonna find. Thats pro-active instead of re-active.

**sourkraut115** · 04 Jul 08,, 22:43

There is a disconnect. However, it is not quite as simple as motorized over foot patrols. My post in Baltimore had over 30,000 residents for whom, on my shift, I was the sole patrol officer; my sector, of five posts and a supervisor, was the largest in the district. I could not have covered the area on foot; possibly five officers could have, but responding to in-progress calls and providing back up (which had to come from another post in the sector, or from another of the district's three sectors if the sector was "down") would have been practically impossible. However, by maintaining motorized patrols and targeting certain areas for foot patrols, an effective medium can be fond. There were a few spots on my post, mainly on my boundary with another post in my sector, that I could effectively walk foot, but because of our call volume, frequently if I would walk more than a block fom the car (checking bars and back alleys and keeping tabs on "my" juveniles), something urgent would come out on the other side of my post (I had two large, distinct neighborhoods divided by a major road, a hospital and two high schools) or elsewhere in the sector, which required a sprint back to the car.

The Eastern District, featured in this book, is on the other side of the City, and would fit into my post. It contains the same number of sectors and slightly more posts than my district, and is also policed by various special-purpose units that would rarely venture into my part of town. Those units did not respond to calls for service, but they did suppress some of the crime.

Unfortuneately, the temptation among BPD command staff to develop "strike force" type units for aggressive zero tolerance policing, and the demand for "enforcement stats" took away from the patrol officers, took away from the local knowledge of the post officers, and constantly moved some officers around the city, or forced sectors to work with 2-3 units rather than five or six. Under those conditions, things got so busy that foot patrol was impossible. Out new commissioner has rationalized some of that in the last year (thus, perhaps, our greatly reduced murder rate) but I believe that this has led in some instances to a near abandonment of the "quiet" neighborhoods experiencing a lot of property crimes.

**sourkraut115** · 04 Jul 08,, 22:48

Additionally, we do spend a lot of time completing reports; many citizens call wanting "just a report number" without realizing that generating that number actually requires a report to be written, and thus, a preliminary investigation to be started. If I make an adult arrest, I am probably out of service for an hour or so, longer for drugs or a warrant arrest, and if I arrest a juvenile, I can bank on 2-4 hours out of service. In that time period, officers from other posts would have to respond to any calls on my post. I have a number of friends on county departments who might respond to 3-5 calls on a busy night. In my district, on 3x11 shift, you can count on an average of 20 calls.

I was detailed back to patrol today, for the 4th of July (I presently act as a report auditor in my district), and handled 14 calls on daywork, slightly above average for 7x3.

**Cactus** · 08 Jul 08,, 01:13

sourkraut115, a quick question:

How much does insurance policy affect policing techniques? Basically if there has been a change in policing techniques because of rising premiums? I have heard something to that effect, but would like your first-hand input.

**Blue** · 08 Jul 08,, 03:49

Originally Posted by sourkraut115

My post in Baltimore had over 30,000 residents for whom, on my shift, I was the sole patrol officer; my sector, of five posts and a supervisor, was the largest in the district. I could not have covered the area on foot; possibly five officers could have,

How many square blocks was that?

**sourkraut115** · 08 Jul 08,, 21:33

Hard to say, because the post is somewhat irregular; maybe 50? That particular post was very spread out, but included probably about fifty "urban" blocks; other parts of the sector were either very urbanized (much tighter block structure), or, in one case, also spread out and "semi-urban", as was the second large neighborhood of my post (not to be confused with suburban).

If you've seen "The Wire", my district surrounded the Western (featured on the show), but was about 4-5 times the size; much of the area is identical to the environment on the show, some is a bit better; out on the county line, you could hardly tell you were in the City (except for the number of property crimes).

**Blue** · 08 Jul 08,, 23:54

Originally Posted by sourkraut115

Hard to say, because the post is somewhat irregular; maybe 50? That particular post was very spread out, but included probably about fifty "urban" blocks; other parts of the sector were either very urbanized (much tighter block structure), or, in one case, also spread out and "semi-urban", as was the second large neighborhood of my post (not to be confused with suburban).

If you've seen "The Wire", my district surrounded the Western (featured on the show), but was about 4-5 times the size; much of the area is identical to the environment on the show, some is a bit better; out on the county line, you could hardly tell you were in the City (except for the number of property crimes).

I can see the dilema in the city now. I thought there were lots of cops per capita in the city. I was a county deputy that covered about 320sq mi, with three "major" towns(two had at least on stoplight and one had six

)) with about 18,000 people in all. All by myself. The county was divided in two halves, north and south. One Deputy for each with a supervisor usually "on-call". Maybe thats why since about '79 each car was equipped with a shotgun and Mini-14. Of course I would have spent a little on better radios(personal experience

) We would be backlogged on calls and get to the report makers when we could. Enough to fill a 12 hour shift 5 days a week. Most of our time was spent driving just to get to the next.

I'm going to check out "the wire", sounds interesting.

**sourkraut115** · 09 Jul 08,, 00:04

Sounds like you were extremely busy, contrary to the stereotype of rural departments. While we do have a fairly good population ratio (about 3200 sworn officers to a population of 640,000; obviously a fair number of these officers are not in patrol), the call volume is fairly intense. We work one to a car (in areas pretty heavily infiltrated with Crips, Bloods, and some lesser-known social groups; there is exactly one 2-man car in my district right now, not counting trainees), have decent radios but lousy batteries, and there are usually a couple of shotguns (no rifles) in a sector. Sectors average five posts, most districts have three sectors (two have four); there are nine police districts.

It can be a great deal of fun, but it does wear at one after a time, working 6 on, 2 off, with court scheduled almost every day (including vacation, days off, and mornings when working 3x11 or 7(pm)x3, and so on.

**Blue** · 09 Jul 08,, 00:16

And all the above mentioned is why I don't do it anymore. But I do miss it.

**sourkraut115** · 09 Jul 08,, 11:19

I think - to get back to the original point of the article- that in Baltimore and other urban areas, foot patrol in selected, key areas is still viable, but it cannot be universal. Dispersion will always be an issue, and motorized units will be necessary for response to in-progress calls, back ups, and general patrol. In addition, foot officers cannot carry the necessary gear, paperwork, and so on normally required in the daily course of duty, so sub-stations or support vehicles would become necessary (unless we ruck up, but that would seem a bit silly).