Crime In Minneapolis Continues To Drop Despite The PD Losing Hundreds Of Officers
from the not-as-essential-as-imagined dept
Former officer/current prisoner Derek Chauvin decided to personify endemic police racism by pressing his knee to the neck of an unarmed black man for nearly ten minutes. This display of power continued for three minutes after another officer told Officer Chauvin he could no longer detect a pulse.
This act saw Officer Derek Chauvin join the very short list of law enforcement officers convicted of murder. Before that verdict arrived, Minneapolis exploded. Shortly thereafter, so did the rest of the country.
Minneapolis PD officers responded as cops almost always do when a “bad apple” further turns public sentiment against them: they simply refused to do their job. Officers decided that if people didn’t love the police, they weren’t going to avail themselves of the benefits (whatever they are) of an organized police force. Of course, most officers were unwilling to give up their incomes in exchange for abdicating their responsibilities. They expected to get paid for doing nothing.
Others saw the writing on the likely burning wall: casual abuse of citizens and their rights was no longer being tolerated to the extent it had been previous to Officer Chauvin’s murder of George Floyd. They decided to exit the police business altogether, rather than deal with any minimal increases in transparency and accountability.
These officers assumed the city would bend to their will in order to maintain the status quo, assuming legislators would rather retain bad cops than deal with chronic understaffing. Things went the other way, though. The PD remained under the microscope and further limits were placed on police and policing.
But following the murder of George Floyd, a unified message was sent out by police officials, police union reps, and the bootlicking contingent of the Minnesota/Minneapolis legislatures: “Fewer cops means more crime, folks. That’s just simple math.”
And, for a relatively brief moment, that simple math held. Crime did go up while the city was still dealing with 24/7 protests and an observable spike in disrespect for police officers and everything they stand for.
But that assertion has since been proven false. Reports flowing in over the last couple of years show cops aren’t all that essential to lowering crime rates. In April of this year, it was reported that crime rate decreases first noted in 2022 weren’t an anomaly.
According to MPD data, carjackings are down 46% year-to-date, robbery has dropped 34%, gunshot wound victims declined nearly 38% and assaults are down 7%.
The city’s mayor, Jacob Frey, credited this drop to a new task force and a renewed focus on subjecting repeat offenders to harsher sentences. Maybe. Maybe not. But it definitely wasn’t related to an increase in officers on patrol, contrary to the predictions of the self-interest groups listed above.
Things had only improved by early September:
The city has recorded 20 fewer homicides than at this time last year, on pace for a 33% decline.
Other metrics show similar positive trends, according to city data analyzed by the Star Tribune: 9% fewer aggravated assaults, 26% fewer robberies, 30% fewer gunfire reports, 33% fewer shootings victims and 52% fewer carjackings.
Violent crime — murder, aggravated assault, rape and robbery — is down 12% overall from last year to its lowest point of the 2020s so far, the data show. Only a record-breaking surge in auto thefts bucks the pattern.
Once again, the same law enforcement agencies that declared the city would devolve into anarchy due to officers leaving and/or simply refusing to the do the job they were (still) being paid to do were quick to take credit for something that directly contradicted the scenario they had presented two years earlier. MPD Chief Brian O’Hara claimed this decrease was the result of “data- and partnership-driven strategies” for taking guns off the street.
Again: maybe! I mean, we can hope cops are doing smarter, more meaningful work rather than just hassling minorities simply because they can. If constraints in resources have actually forced cops to be smarter (rather than just claiming they’re being smarter), I’m here for it.
There’s little that ties these crime decreases to law enforcement activity. Correlation, causation, etc. But one thing is undeniable: adding more cops isn’t the answer.
Violent crimes through the first nine months of 2023 in Minneapolis, compared to this same time a year ago, are trending downward, while the number of sworn officers available for patrols has now dipped to just 515.
Assistant MPD Chief Katie Blackwell, told a Minneapolis City Council committee the violent crime trends, including violence committed with guns, are headed the right way with homicides, robberies, and the gun violence index all down significantly from a year ago.
Blackwell goes on to say that that department is facing a “significant burden” and that “cops are getting tired.” I don’t doubt that’s true. But not a single police official — when faced with an uptick in attrition following the murder of George Floyd — ever bothered to consider the possibility that a mass exit in officers simply meant the PD was ridding itself of its most useless employees. The officers first to press the eject were most likely the same officers who routinely violated rights and/or engaged in cop busywork that did nothing to reduce violent crime, but definitely continued to deteriorate citizens’ opinion of law enforcement.
Leaner is cleaner. When resources are strained, they have to be utilized effectively. When there’s an excess of officers, people just tend to do what they want or whatever is easiest. It’s the way it works in the private sector. There’s no reason to believe the same thing doesn’t happen in the public sector.
Again, correlation is not causation. But law enforcement agencies continue to insist, despite evidence to the contrary, that the only way to effectively fight crime is to put more cops on the street. What’s happening in Minneapolis says otherwise. And it might be ok to simply let disgruntled cops walk off the job rather than subject themselves to additional accountability. The people leaving will generally be officers not worth keeping: the kind of employees who opt for easy/abusive as often as possible. Those who remain will work harder. But, more importantly, they’ll be forced to work smarter. And that’s when you’ll start seeing positive results. Flooding the streets with cops is nothing more than dilution which, as everyone knows, is a process that weakens whatever’s subjected to it.
Filed Under: crime, minneapolis, minneapolis police, police
Comments on “Crime In Minneapolis Continues To Drop Despite The PD Losing Hundreds Of Officers”
Does make one wonder how much crime was due to the officers who left?
The crime was coming from inside the station house!!
One does wonder how many of the old stats were just juiced up by them looking for someone to arrest for a crime they did or didn’t do. I mean its not like someone found out that yet another department was running a CIA style black site abusing citizens to get confessions.
So?
The avg number before was 60 per year, in a Metro area?? WOW.
NOW for the detective section? Insted of JUST arresting people, HOW about FINDING the crooks that you DIDNT catch.
These are Arrests, NOT INCIDENTS.
LETS see if they can SOLVE all those past cases of theft, robbery, and Such they had NO arrests.
Re: "According to MPD data"
… MPD ‘DATA’ is highly unreliable, as is its spin by the politician Mayor
it is foolish to trust the MPD at any level; they have a strong record of incompetence and malfeasance
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… you do realize that CSI and all the other cop-dramas on television are fiction, don’t you?
Crooks don’t conveniently leave bare fingerprints on glass, or step in mud that only occurs in one locality, or like that. They don’t mug for the camera, conveniently drive like a maniac in their stolen car, or any of those other tropes you see from hollywood. … ususally, anyway.
You do get a few who post to instagram and facebook with their loot, though.
Re: Re: Considering
How bad the cops are at this, I would think the Crooks would be lazy, and forget the rubber gloves.
Or they would ask the neighbors and check local camera’s.
As to cars? as i mentioned your neighbors. And stealing from a Poor person is not Safe NOR profitable.
s/Despite/Because of/
Unreported crime
This is all well and good, but those that believe more is better are just going to say that the only difference is that crime is not being reported and criminals are going away with more. What “used” to be some people ignoring stats/facts, has turned into most people ignoring stats/facts. Particularly from the “law and order” party.
Re: 'Someone broke into your house? We'll be right over to shoot the place up.'
I mean I’d be willing to give the idea some weight but not in a way that makes cops look better, namely that people aren’t reporting crimes because they’ve come to learn either personally or through the experience of others that as bad as the original crime might have been calling the police will just make things worse.
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Yep, all the murders and carjackings are now unreported.
Not the briar patch, anything but that...
Yeah, the biggest problem with the ‘if the cops aren’t around the criminals will have free reign’ argument is that this whole mess is in large part because the police are the biggest criminals on the streets, robbing, assauling if not flat out murdering people with near total immunity which leads to their ‘threat’ being in effect ‘if you won’t let us keep violating rights, breaking laws and taking lives we’ll stop doing that’.
You mean a smaller number of police officers doesn’t result in a new crime wave or the death of the middle class?
Huh, it’s almost like davec was desperately lying out of his ass or something. I’m shocked, I tell you. Shocked!
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Another Explanation
Or crime could be “dropping” because people don’t feel there’s any point in reporting it anymore.
That’s certainly the case in L.A., where merchants are fed up with calling the cops on shoplifters only to be told “there’s nothing we can do” by the police due to the D.A.’s blanket declination on property crime cases. So they don’t even bother calling it in anymore.
And if people aren’t reporting hundreds, if not thousands, of crimes, suddenly the official stats look like crime is going down when in reality it’s exploding.
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Is davec currently occupied that you had to show up in his stead? Weaksauce.
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I saw that, you little millennial twerp. Had to jump in here before logging in, but when you inconvenience my son and LostinLodos having very intimate discussions on the state of the country, you have it coming. You leave my family of true Americans alone, you probably non-binary loser.
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They literally do news stories on it here regularly. How the merchants no longer bother reporting crime because it gets them nowhere.
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btr1701’s always eager to french kiss the nearest fascist boot.
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Every one of those retailers have a policy of not doing anything to stop someone ahoplifting, Also. They don’t post competent security because that’s costs real money, so they want the taxpayer to foot the bill.
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Exactly. Too many retailers have a policy of literally doing nothing and you will be fired for trying to do anything to shoplifters other than to basically follow them around and kill them with kindness by offering help finding something. They are too lazy and cheap to put actual security in place. And only hope the presence of cameras (even if inoperable),mirrors and barely adequate staffing will be enough deterrence. But it isn’t.
Ask me how I know: worked for a billion dollar pharmacy/retailer for nearly a decade.
(All the while the conservatives complaining about there being no real punishment for the serfs and homeless stealing from law enforcement. Some acknowledge the company’s spinless behavior as well. But not as often. Employees are treated more like criminals than actual thieves.)
Mother worked for a huge multi-million retailer for about a decade and was fired for actually getting tired of the nonsense and actually tried to stop an active shoplifter.
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(1) The “serfs” and homeless aren’t stealing from law enforcement, you boob. They’re stealing from the merchants.
(2) No conservatives are complaining about them stealing from law enforcement, either.
(3) Many of the stores hit hardest by the lack of law enforcement/prosecution of thieves are small individually-owned businesses, not those evol, evol, “multi-million corporation” boogeymen y’all love to go on about. Not only are they individually-owned stores, but a significant percentage of them are minority-owned as well. So the very “marginalized communities” our D.A. pretends he’s protecting with his hug-a-thug policies are the ones hit hardest by them.
And they have to have a “do nothing” policy with regard to shoplifters or their insurance won’t cover them and they’ll be subject to not only being robbed directly by these savages, but sued by them after the fact as well when they find some shyster and file a claim that the employee injured them when he tried to stop their thieving.
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So, why’s Costco saying the numbners on this supposed shoplifting crime wave are… not relevant and Target is shuttering stores?
Is it because TARGET IS TOO CHEAP TO HIRE AND TRAIN PEOPLE? Unlike Costco?
Really makes you think…
Re: Re: Re:3
You have to show a membership card just to get into Costco and you have to show a receipt for any merchandise when you exit the store.
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Which is partly why Costco is, I dunno, not affected by the “shoplifting wave”.
Hey, that’s not such a bad idea if you go there every week…
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Yes, heaven forfend we get actual law enforcement for all the taxes we pay.
If I’m a merchant and I have to hire “competent security” because the police and the D.A. will do nothing, then I should be able to retain the taxes I normally pay for those services to pay for it.
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The price of a Browning Hi-point, with ammo, is a lot cheaper than hiring a few people. If you really want to talk costs.
No, I’m not implying you should shoot shoplifters. I bet you wanna, though.
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This frankly sounds more like a problem on the part of incompetent police rather than the DA having their hands tied. Or the police having their priorities fucked up.
You read the articles on Techdirt yourself, they’d rather use simpering dogs and questionable field tests to catch people with marijuana in their cars – despite recreational weed usage being legal in those states – than be competent mall guards.
Why is that the fault of the civilian?
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Yes, I know this is TechDirt so everything must be the fault of the police, but no. In Los Angeles, District Attorney George Gascon has a blanket declination policy on property crimes. In his own words, “Property crime is what insurance is for, not the criminal justice system.”
So there’s no point for the police to arrest shoplifters when they know the D.A. won’t prosecute the case.
Re: Re: Re:3
So there’s no point for the police to arrest shoplifters when they know the D.A. won’t prosecute the case.
That’s for the DA to decide. Remember that cops have argued they’re too stupid to know the laws they enforce. Why do they get discretion here?
And whether or not the DA prosecutes is not the cop’s concern. They were hired to do a job – what happens next in the process is no excuse to do absolutely nothing.
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The D.A. has decided. Do you not know what a blanket declination is?
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Since when are the stores actually paying for the law enforcement? Generally they get tax breaks for moving into town. Often they won’t pay a dime in taxes for a decade or more! WE are the ones paying for these cops. But when WE get robbed, do they care? Do they show up? Of course not! When someone breaks into your home and robs you while you’re away, let me know if you can even get a cop to talk to you. They certainly won’t around here. Not if it’s an apartment anyway…maybe they’ll come around if it’s some McMansion….and this ain’t a new problem, I have a few personal experiences with this going back to when I was in highschool almost twenty years ago…across multiple states, in small towns and larger cities. If you don’t have money, the cops aren’t helping you. Hell, there have even been multiple court cases where the cops have “proven” that they have no obligation to respond to crimes or to catch criminals — even if that crime is happening right in front of them.
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No man, your taxes don’t pay for corporate security much like my taxes don’t pay for home security. They are two different things.
Or their captain Vimes is on holiday
/s
“Fewer cops means more crime, folks. That’s just simple math.”
I looked at the numbers y’all and, the math ain’t mathin’!
While I’m delighted when crime goes down, it doesn’t look like much of a dent. The comparison of 2023 to 2022 doesn’t mention that we are only through ¾ of 2023. Yes there are fewer Minneapolis cops, but that doesn’t mean there are fewer cops in Minneapolis.
Minneapolis officials announce new public safety plan, details to come | MPR News
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2022/09/22/minneapolis-officials-announce-new-public-safety-plan-details-to-come
I read this from the Minneapolis Police on X. I hope these young officers remember this day always and their service honors those that came to see them start their careers. I hope the citizens of Minneapolis treat them as allies and they stay with MPD.
(4) Minneapolis Police on X: “Late last week, nine stellar MPD Academy graduates were sworn in as Minneapolis Police Officers before their loved ones, family, and friends. Congratulations to recruit class 2023-3! Keep that same passion as you enter into field training, we’re happy to have you out there! https://t.co/kOxLdIHwni” / X (twitter.com)
Even San Francisco is starting to turn the corner.
San Francisco police make several arrests in blitz operation against retail theft – CBS San Francisco (cbsnews.com)
https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/san-francisco-police-several-arrests-blitz-operation-retail-theft/
I question unfounded statistics
It’s just as easy that these could be reported statistics. And that the reported or acted on numbers went down because there are less police to act on crimes.
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^^^. The usual bunch are going on about how those evil bad fascist police leaving the force are causing crime to go down, but I doubt it. Timothy’s article seems more concerned with using emotionally charged language than actually acknowledging whether or not the stats are REPORTED crimes or TOTAL, actual crimes. It could totally be that less crimes are getting reported, so the percentage goes down and the city gets to blab about how less cops = less crime.
Naturally, anyone who questions this gets flagged and told off with snark, this crucial question left unanswered. Because they can’t answer it either.
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Just Google about crime and police int Minneapolis.
About the number of officers.
“This is absolutely not sustainable,” Minneapolis police Chief Brian O’Hara told the outlet. “Thank God for all these other agencies that are filling this gap.”
The MPD also is too low on officers to restart their “community engagement unit,” which is seen as a way to build trust between the police and the community.
“It’s unfortunate, but that’s the stuff that goes away first,” O’Hara told the outlet. “We’re never going to change people’s perception of us — and we’re never going to establish meaningful relationships with people — if the only thing we’re doing is responding from emergency to emergency to emergency.”
St. Paul has 575 officers.
Is St. Paul safer than Minneapolis?
St. Paul is, on average, a safer city than its twin, Minneapolis. While both cities are certainly safe places to visit, St. Paul has a lower murder rate, robbery rate, and aggravated assault rate.
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Tim hates cops. It’s that simple.
Like every other defund the police person, he will continue to hate cops until he is a victim of actual crime.
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Yeah this is the vibe I get from a select number of Tim’s TD posts. He lets his personal bias define his writing a lot.
Which would be fine, normally. TD is a blog and is therefore basically all opinion pieces, but when Tim does this it feels built specifically to misled by omitting key answers.
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*mislead. Crap, now I feel stupid.
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…hallucinated nobody mentally competent, ever.