Money left for community policing after virus?
Wesport Police Chief Foti Koskinas’ plans to extend the margins of community policing by using drones to help his officers manage the coronavirus pandemic — an idea that was grounded almost on takeoff — drew a quick and uncensored rebuke from a former NYPD commissioner.
“He was out of his f—ing mind. This isn’t gestapoland,” said Bernie Kerik, who was granted a pardon this year by President Donald Trump following his own swift fall from grace after pleading guilty to eight felony charges 11 years ago and serving three years behind bars.
“I’m frustrated by it. It calls into question if these police executives have ever read the constitution of the United States. Locking up someone for playing catch with his daughter when no one else was in the park is inexcusable,” said Kerik, who runs the Kerick Group, a security consulting company that offers special operations, police and correction training and consulting.
Keriik was referring to an incident that happened in a Colorado park in early April when police quickly admitted overreach and apologized.
Talking to experts about where community policing is heading in the wake of the coronavirus may not have revealed such real disagreements like those held held by Koskinas and Kerik of the months and years to come, but not everyone is seeing the future in clear focus.
Possibly the most informed view of where community policing is headed — and the most ominous — comes from retired Branford Police Chief John DeCarlo, associate professor and director of the master’s program in Criminal Justice at the Henry C. Lee College of Criminal Justice and Forensic Sciences at the University of New Haven.
DeCarlo, who retired from the department in 2011, said we are experiencing “the largest social experiment since World War II.” DeCarlo said one of the basic tenets of community policing is a collaborative effort between police and the community to ensure public safety.
“It’s not reactive policing. If you wait for crime to happen, you are being a reactive police department,” he said.
Community policing takes training and requires building relationships with residents.
“If you have a department that is saying we have community policing because we have an officer who rides a bike and has ice cream with the kids, that is not community policing,” DeCarlo said. “Everybody has to be onboard with the philosophy of community policing. It’s about commitment to a consensual style of policing.”
But that takes time and money — something DeCarlo wonders how much there will be for the 102 organized police departments and about 9,000 officers in the state once the pandemic is over.
“Community policing depends on smart cops who are highly motivated and highly trained and skilled. But we cannot teach, or train or equip without money,” he said.
Unlike Kerik, John Jay College of Criminal Justice adjunct assistant professor Keith Taylor says he isn’t so sure the Westport chief had the wrong idea about using drones. Taylor, who spent 23 years in the NYPD and retired in 2015 as an assistant commissioner of the New York City Department of Correction, said mechanical means to patrol areas while reducing exposure of police personnel might be an innovative way to get both the work done while maintaining the optimal safety for your staff.
“The last thing you want is for your first responders to get sick while doing their job. If they can’t help others because they are sick, it makes it very difficult,” he said. “We should be looking at every possible means to optimize the safety and security of my staff to make sure the pubic is safe and to think about what methods can I introduce to minimize the spread of this terrible virus.”
Taylor expects police will also have to adapt as crime changes in the aftermath of the pandemic. He said sheltering at home has opened the opportunity for burglars of commercial businesses. Taylor believes vehicle break-ins and thefts will go up as a result of people using their cars less.
Taylor says murders may go down because of less opportunity, but domestic violence cases will increase as a result of people being “stuck together” in their homes.
“How is the law enforcement community going to manage the social disruption that may occur as a result of tens of millions of people now without work,” Taylor said. “It is the challenge of a lifetime for those in positions of leadership.”
As advocates call for fewer people to be held in jail to avoid getting sick, Taylor said the practice of letting criminals go after their arrests will likely continue.
Kerick said the practice, which has been occurring under the banner of bail reform, has created a “revolving door” for defendants.
“It is complete stupidity. It is dangerous and should not be happening,” said Kerik, who also said a realistic look into a defendant’s background must be considered when setting a court appearance bond. “This is going to be a mess for a while. It is going to be bad for a while.”
But Taryn Merkl, senior counsel at the Bennett Center for Justice at the New York University Law School, said knee-jerk arrests and incarcerations do not provide the best results for the safety of the public.
“Citing and releasing is a more appropriate tactic many jurisdictions who are trying to minimize the incarceration approach are finding out, and many of the things police reform groups have been advocating are coming to the fore,” she said. “Default arrests might not be the best strategy, depending upon the offense at issue.”