‘Broken windows’ might finally get fixed
JUST as every beginning offers new hope, last week’s assumption by Director General Ricardo Marquez of the top post at the Philippine National Police may usher in a new era of stewardship that could regain the people’s trust and confidence in the PNP.
While many believe that the PNP’s public image may possibly have sunk to its lowest levels when the previous PNP chief was suspended and eventually dismissed from the service, expectations are high that Marquez’s leadership could inspire significant progress to make the PNP attain its declared purpose for existence: to serve and protect.
Our country’s new top cop has his work cut out for him when he said in his inaugural speech,“The reality is that the fear of crime remains in the hearts of our citizens.” Not only have the criminals become so emboldened in committing dastardly acts; some policemen themselves have turned into criminals.
As a lawyer whose career started in the field of human rights, it pains me to learn on TV news that hours after Marquez’s appointment was announced a week ago, a uniformed police officer was seen on CCTV shooting to death a tricycle driver whose arms were raised in surrender.
While the PNP’s bad eggs are very few, their impact unfairly depicts the entire basket to be rotten, deepens people’s mistrust in law enforcement, and even subverts confidence in the entire criminal justice system.
Robert Kennedy once said, “Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves…every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on.” And what the people deserve, and what government is duty-bound to provide, is the most basic of services: maintaining peace and order and ensuring the safety of every citizen at all times. Let us demand what we deserve.
Critics of the dismissed former PNP chief have attributed rampant criminality and impunity of rogue cops to failure of leadership. With Director General Marquez now at the helm, his quality of leadership is crucial. If it is beyond reproach, it should inspire the support of PNP men and women striving for excellence.
In light of my past experience as Secretary of the Interior and Local Government and chairman of the Napolcom, I’d like to share some pointers that I’ve tackled in previous columns— the need for citizens’ active involvement, the need for intensive screening to ferret out scalawags, and the need for police to anticipate criminal behavior and prevent crimes aside from solving them.
On citizens’ involvement, people can pressure local governments for more CCTVs and mobilize themselves into groups of active volunteers to watch for and instantly report crimes, criminals, and potential crime situations to Patrol 117 (an emergency hotline which I strengthened and was proven successful during my stewardship of the DILG).
To spot police misfits, the PNP must conduct periodic evaluation to continually determine physical, mental, emotional, and moral fitness of cops. Police recruits must have better screening, selection, and training, and values formation must be strengthened.
Marquez has said that “after years of experimenting with local variants of the New York Crime Control Model or the CompStat, without much impact on the crime situation, we are now implementing ‘Oplan Lambat Sibat’ with very impressive results.” Well and good. Both Oplan Lambat Sibat and Compstat make use of crime incidence data to identify “crime hot spots” and “crime patterns” so that resources are allocated to “most effectively reduce crime and improve police performance.”
Marquez has also intensified police patrolling and rotating checkpoints to prevent crimes. The PNP could implement a “stop-and-frisk” policy 24/7 on suspicious-looking characters, similar to that done in New York City, which led to significant crime reduction. ( However, a recent court order stopped it amid complaints from blacks and Latinos who felt unduly targeted.)
The “stop-and-frisk” policy is based on the “broken windows theory” in criminology, whereby vandals who see an abandoned building with a few broken windows tend to break more until all are destroyed, walls are spray-painted, interiors and exteriors of the whole building are ruined, and eventually the entire neighborhood ends up in shambles.
Preventing this domino effect is the premise behind the policy. Address minor crimes so they will not escalate into bigger and more serious crimes. The “stop-and-frisk” program can reduce crimes in identified high-crime areas by simply searching for weapons and guns and keeping them off the streets before they are used in more serious crimes.
Let’s hope Marquez succeeds in fixing broken windows.
E-mail: finding.lina@yahoo. com