You probably saw the piece in The State about efforts to beef up the Columbia police department, but you may have missed the story in The New York Times Sunday about our capital city and its troubles with too many crooks and too few cops.
So I pass it on for your perusal.
I was particularly struck by this brief explanation of just how shorthanded Chief Tandy Carter is:
The southern part of town, where most of Columbia’s residents live, is divided into 11 patrol districts. On a recent evening, as on most nights, a complement of seven officers patrols the whole terrain, leaving four areas uncovered.
I also call to your attention this passage featuring my twin, Leon, and a USC prof explaining the rather obvious reason for an uptick in property crime:
National crime statistics and academic literature generally support the notion that property crime tends to increase with unemployment, said Geoff Alpert, a criminologist at the University of South Carolina.
“When people get desperate, they’re going to feed their family,” said Sheriff Leon Lott of Richland County, whose jurisdiction includes parts of Columbia and its suburbs.
Sheriff Lott has noticed a pronounced increase in insurance fraud and credit card scams in recent months. “When you catch people and ask them why they did it, they’ll say: ‘I’m desperate. I can’t pay my bills.’ ”
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I never saw thefts stop when the economy was booming.
What we have to day is a subculture where lying, cheating, swindling, and stealing is acceptable. The adults cheat on welfare by lying about how many children they have. Some collect welfare in 2 or 3 states. The children see adults shoplifting, and the teens in gangs. Anyone who works an honest job is a “sucka”.
These people don’t rob “the rich”.
These people rob their neighbors, pizza delivery drivers, AA meetings, old ladies on busses.
Does Lott’s jurisdiction include “parts of Columbia?” I thought the sheriff was limited to the unincorporated parts of the county as far as criminal enforcement was concerned.
How many police officers could have been paid for with the money the City squandered over the past few years?
The sheriff has jurisdiction over the entire county which elected them.
Police chiefs only have jurisdiction over the municipalities which hired them.
a sheriff has certain jurisdiction countywide such as the enforcement of judgments and evictions (civil enforcement actions) but I do not believe a sheriff’s deputy has criminal enforcement authority within incorporated municipalities in the absence of specific agreements (e.g. Arcadia Lakes which does not have its own police force).
Historically, there municipal police are a rather recent development.
Sheriffs date back to medieval England.
They use deputies. They used to call upon the local militias, which were also organized by county.
Let’s hope we maintain electoral control over our law enforcement.
I know that the Sheriff enforces drug laws in Martin Luther King/Lower Waverly because one of the residents got tired of the inadequate response he felt he received from CPD.