Prairie Grove OKs Earlier Curfew

CITY HOPES TO CURB JUVENILE CRIME

PRAIRIE GROVE — Youth under the age of 18 will have to be home an hour earlier every night to comply with a change in the city’s curfew ordinance.

Prairie Grove City Council approved an earlier curfew for minors that requires them to be off the streets at 10 p.m. Sunday through Friday and by 11 p.m. on Saturdays. The ordinance was approved July 16 and takes effect in 60 days.

Capt. Jeff O’Brien said the police department hopes an earlier curfew will help in deterring criminal mischief and other illegal activities that occur when kids are out late at night and into the early hours of the morning.

Officers have made 23 curfew arrests since May 1 and most of these arrests have been associated with other crimes, O’Brien said. Since May 1, officers have charged juveniles with breaking or entering, theft, criminal trespass, criminal mischief and alcohol, all along with curfew violations.

Most recently, the police arrested three youth for breaking into the high school’s football fieldhouse, destroying iPads and stealing spray paint. The juveniles then went around town painting vulgar pictures and gang related graffiti on city streets and sidewalks. That same night, the kids broke into several vehicles and stole items.

The city’s curfew ordinance says it is unlawful for any minor to be on the streets, sidewalks, parks, playgrounds, public places and vacant lots or to ride in, drive or be a passenger in a vehicle or bicycle from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Sunday through Friday and from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. Saturday.

The curfew violations and problems are not with kids driving home late from a ballgame, a movie in Fayetteville or another activity, O’Brien said.

“The problems we’re having are the kids roaming around on foot,” O’Brien said. “We’re driving up to a subdivision and seeing kids darting around in the dark. They’re hopping into cars, breaking into schools and spray painting our streets.”

O’Brien said the police department talked to city officials about an earlier curfew that gives officers a legal reason to stop and detain kids who are walking around late at night after curfew.

“This gives us one more hour if we find kids walking around

and there’s no logical reason for them to be out. It’s giving us cause to stop and detain and contact parents and enforce the curfew if it needs to be done.”

Officers have discretion when it comes to curfew violations. O’Brien said if one teen is out late at night and says he’s coming home from a friend’s house or is on his way to a friend’s house, his officers can just talk to the teen about the curfew ordinance and give a warning.

For others, though, officers can use the ordinance to deter crime from happening, he said.

“Without a curfew violation, we have no cause to stop them and so I have to drive on and when I drive on, they break into a car,” he said.

O’Brien said he doesn’t know why the city seems to be dealing with more juvenile crime this summer. Maybe, he said, an increased population in town may be one reason. Another reason, he said, is that in many cases, parents are not involved with their children’s lives and at times, parents have blamed officers for “picking on” their kids and are denying their children are doing anything wrong, O’Brien said.

However, he said more arrests are being made because the department is being proactive in looking for kids out after curfew and increasing patrols in neighborhoods on weekends.