Citizens first, hired help second.

"I have to realize every single day that I come to work that the decisions that I make -- you always have to say, how does this impact a patrol officer interacting with the community? " Roessler said. "I'm looking forward to the honor and the privilege to serve all the members of what I call the police family."

Artists concept of Roessler

No, wrong. Decisions made by government officials should be based on how they affect the citizens who employ them. Not the other way around. Decisions should not be made on the impact they will have on employees hired by the citizens to run their government.

Citizens first, hired help second.

Roessler is the latest in a long string of police executives who probably live in a bubble, a bubble that makes them fail to understand that the honor and privilege is in serving the citizens of the community and not the cops the community pays and pays and funds (And far above the national average, at that.)

It's our government, not theirs and so long as the county allows the vast majority of our well paid cops to live outside the county, it will never be their government.  Other counties have live in requirement for their police. We don’t. The cops have that kind of pull in your government.

Roessler appears to be part of, if not one of the architects of, the“us first” mentality that permeates the Fairfax County Police. But we can’t blame him. The cops have been out of control (and grossly over funded) for decades and the guilty finger for their arrogance and brutality should be directly pointed at us, the county residents, the owners of the government who keep reelecting the same old tread-mill thinking hustlers in slightly shiny suits who let the cops run rampant on our traffic jammed crowded roads (and ridiculously overcrowded schools.)

We don’t have the money for more roads (or more schools.)  But the cops have enough money to employ a dozen deputy chiefs, a navy and an air force that may or may not includes drones with a few bucks left over to hire even more cops and open even more police stations. Think about that while you sit on the beltway.

The policeman is not your friend. The Fairfax County Police Department holds its self-interest far above your wants and needs. In fact, the full time job of the several dozen assistant to the assistant chiefs of police we carry on the payroll, is to get you to trust the cops and not to ask too many questions. They need you to stay dumb. Trust us, the cops tell you, we don’t need police oversight in Fairfax County, we’ll handle it ourselves. Trust us.

Your elected officials agree with the cops. They don’t want police oversight because the hundreds of misdeeds, transgression and criminal actions the cops get involved in every year….on your dime….. would go public and citizens would be aware that the elected officials we pay to run government aren’t very good at what they do, and, proving the cops point, should not be trusted.

Trust us, the cops say. We’re hiring nine new cops this year because we need them. We won’t offer any proof, your elected officials won’t ask why, they trust us, why don’t you?

Local government, hell government in general, runs better and is more efficient in delivering services when it’s not trusted.  The cops know that and in their view,  as, long as citizens stay asleep, everything will be just fine.

Don’t trust the bastards, by not trusting them we not only empower ourselves and keep the collected elected sleaze on their toes, we give the hundreds of good, decent people who work in government, the ones who have nothing to hide, a boost up and a chance at running things, out in the open.

Roessler has been raised in the “trust me” culture of the Fairfax County Police and that form of leadership sets the tone for further abuse, mismanagement and secrecy by the police.

We need to hire a police chief not born and bred in the old south-redneck, good ole boy network that is the Fairfax County Police. It’s a new century. It's time to change things. We’ll need to look outside the Fairfax cops secrecy system, outside the county and probably outside the state to find someone capable to tear down the “trust me”-think mentality that runs the cops, someone who will attract more outsiders to the force, hiring fewer white boys with Nazi haircuts and mangers who are creative, committed to the community, and idealistic in their goals.

engagement announced ...................

We're watching

March 19, 2013  A-1 – RENEWAL OF A MEMORANDUM OF AGREEMENT (MOA)

BETWEEN THE FAIRFAX COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT (FCPD)

AND THE UNITED STATES BUREAU OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO,

FIREARMS, AND EXPLOSIVES (ATFE) (12:55 p.m.)

Supervisor Gross moved that the Board concur in the recommendation of staff

and authorize the Chief of Police to sign the MOA between the FCPS and the

Bureau of ATFE. Supervisor Hyland seconded the motion.

Supervisor Cook raised a question regarding whether County police officers will

be used to fill in for furloughed Federal officers and if there is an agreement in

place to avoid that, and discussion ensued, with input from Captain Bruce

Ferguson, Police Department.

Supervisor Cook asked unanimous consent that the Board direct staff to examine

the issue and report its findings to the Board. Without objectio The question was called on the motion and it carried by unanimous vote.

OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE ON DRINKING AND DRIVING

The Board deferred the appointment of the At-Large Chairman’s Representative,

and the Hunter Mill and Sully District Representatives.

Confirmation of:

 Mr. John Murray as the Commonwealth Attorney Representative

 Captain John Snyder as the Office of the Sheriff Representative

 Lt. Col. Tom Ryan as the Police Department Representative

Gerry with a G says: I just love the cops, dearie

Saginaw, Michigan: The family of a man who died after being shocked by a taser by police has filed a lawsuit against officers that claims his civil rights were violated. The man’s uncle says that the incident was not his nephew’s first encounter with police and they should have known he had mental problems. ow.ly/jdXGY

Des Moines, Iowa: A former police officer has been given probation for using excessive force on a man during a traffic stop. He was accused of beating the driver with a baton. ow.ly/jdO6L

Update: Charleston County, South Carolina (First reported 12-11-12): A deputy has been charged and is on administrative leave after dashcam video of an arrest was released. Some are calling the incident police brutality. ow.ly/jdgAh

Morrow, Ohio (First reported 1-31-13): The now-former officer who stole from the fund of a fallen deputy’s memorial golf outing, and then repaid the funds with money stolen from a client of his printing business, will spend 90 days in jail. “Dishonoring your friend’s memory is going to be a terrible flaw on your character for the rest of your life,” the judge told him. “There’s no way to remove that stain nor should there be.” ow.ly/jdbIB

Memphis, Tennessee: A police officer has been arrested and charged with simple assault/DV, DUI, and refusal to submit to a BAC test. He is currently relieved of duty. ow.ly/jd6fv

Hennepin County, Minnesota: A man has filed a lawsuit against an officer accusing him of “excessive force and violation of his constitutional rights…” The officer was previously involved in an excessive force complaint that cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars. ow.ly/jd2CP

Chicago, Illinois: Police shot a store owner 11 times after armed gunmen robbed him, then handcuffed him to his hospital bed and harassed him to cover up their “gross misconduct,” the businessman has said in court. ow.ly/iVKDR

St. Paul, Minnesota: A man has alleged in a lawsuit that he was left with a broken jaw and fractured vertebrae after an encounter with two officers. “This was a low-level offense, he was completely complying, he was surrendering, and they used deadly force on him,” said the man’s attorney. ow.ly/iVGJA

Nelsonville, Ohio: A man has alleged that two police officers beat him and delayed taking him to a hospital after he complained of chest pains and fears he was having a heart attack after an unwarranted traffic stop. He has filed a federal lawsuit. ow.ly/iVJHt

York, Pennsylvania: A pair of federal civil lawsuits claim that police officers beat two suspects in separate incidents and then made false reports to cover up the assaults. Both were partially captured on film. ow.ly/iVAXN

Altoona, Pennsylvania: An officer who helped beat up a bar patron nearly three years ago and then participated in a cover-up said during his sentencing hearing, “I should have come forward and said what happened.” The judge put him on probation for four years for simple assault and conspiracy to obstruct justice, saying to him, “Nobody – not judges, lawyers, police officers or government officials – are above the law.” http://ow.ly/jdLxf

Today’s stupid question: Do Arrest Quotas Encourage Police Officers to Break the Law?

Today’s stupid question: Do Arrest Quotas Encourage Police Officers to Break the Law?

On Monday, Baltimore police officer Kendell Richburg pleaded guilty to drug conspiracy charges that could earn him a maximum sentence of life in prison. Looking at the actions that Justin Fenton detailed in his Baltimore Sun article about the case—distributing drugs to be sold on the street, facilitating robberies, planning to frame innocent people—it seems clear that Richburg was a bad cop.

And yet, oddly, it seems like this was actually a case of a bad cop who was trying to be a good cop—at least at the outset. Richburg did these things not for personal gain, but to benefit a confidential informant who fed him information that helped him make arrests. In order to keep his confidential informant on the street, Richburg gave him drugs that he could sell. Richburg tipped off the informant to police activity, helping him avoid arrest. But eventually, their arrangement took a more sinister turn. “As Richburg conspired with the informant, the two discussed plans to set up innocent people,” writes Fenton. “In another instance, Richburg helped the informant plot a robbery.”

Richburg was part of a plainclothes police unit known as the Violent Crimes Impact Section. The VCIS was charged with getting guns and drug dealers off the streets of Baltimore. (The unit was renamed and effectively disbanded last December by new police commissioner Anthony Batts, in the wake of citizen and City Council criticism that its tactics were too aggressive.) Lots of urban police departments have employed specialty units like these, tasked with moving into high-crime areas and rapidly lowering crime rates. These units persist because they work. They make a lot of arrests, seize a lot of guns and drugs, and generally produce the kind of statistics that police officials can proudly tout to politicians and the press. They are blunt objects, and sometimes you need a blunt object if you want to make a dent.

But look closely at incidents of police brutality or corruption and you’ll often see them connected to these “jump-out boys,” so named because the officers tend to jump out of cars and aggressively pursue their targets. In 2011, the city of Chicago disbanded its extremely effective Mobile Strike Force unit, in part because citizens complained that its members played too rough. (In a 2012 Chicago magazine story about the city’s new police chief, Noah Isackson mentioned the 2006 revelations that “some officers robbed and kidnapped residents, and the accusations a year later that one officer plotted to murder another.”) In 2002, New York City disbanded its Street Crimes Unit, three years after four plainclothes officers fired 41 shots at an unarmed man named Amadou Diallo, killing him on the steps of his apartment. (The proximate cause of the unit’s downfall was the lawsuit Daniels , et al. v. the City of New York, brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights in the wake of the Diallo shooting, alleging racial profiling in the Street Crimes Unit and the NYPD at large.)

One of the main problems with these units is that they are often disconnected from the communities they serve. Since they’re not walking beats or attending community meetings like ordinary cops, they don’t always have to directly reckon with the wrath of the law-abiding people they offend. Officers in plainclothes units have been accused of acting indiscriminately and assuming criminal behavior from everyone they encounter. They make arrests, and then move on to the next hot spot.

These units are instruments of the “at any cost” school of policing, where success is measured by the number of arrests made or amount of contraband seized—by meeting often-unrealistic statistical targets imposed from on high. According to Richburg’s attorney, Warren Brown, tactics like those his client employed were common in the VCIS among officers worried about making their arrest quotas. “ ‘[I]f the curtain was pulled back, you would see that his M.O. was standard operating procedure,’ ” Brown told theSun—which isn’t really a defense for conspiring to commit robbery, but is maybe an explanation for why a certain type of police officer might think that helping an informant commit a robbery is defensible if it encourages that informant to keep feeding him actionable information.

Baltimore’s police department obviously isn’t the only one that allegedly instructs its officers to meet various quotas. In a 1999 New York Times article, for instance, an anonymous member of the NYPD’s Street Crimes Unit told David Kocieniewski that the officers were oppressed by stat-driven police tactics, and that they worked under a quota system that said they had to seize at least one illegal firearm per month:

"There are guys who are willing to toss anyone who's walking with his hands in his pockets," said an officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "We frisk 20, maybe 30 people a day. Are they all by the book? Of course not; it's safer and easier to just toss people. And if it's the 25th of the month and you haven't got your gun yet? Things can get a little desperate."

If cops are under pressure to make numbers, then it follows that they’ll try hard to make those numbers, even if it means bending some rules in the process. So if a confidential informant is giving an officer good, actionable information, it’s to that officer’s benefit to keep that informant on the streets, even if it means giving that informant drugs to sell. And it makes sense that commanding officers, under pressure from superiors to reduce crime, might look the other way and give their subordinates room to operate however they see fit.

There’s no point in being too idealistic about the mechanics of urban police work. It’s a game of compromises, of weighing relative evils. But so many of these compromises seem to sacrifice long-term progress in favor of short-term rewards. Units like the Street Crimes Unit and the VCIS are an answer, yes, but they’re an answer to an incomplete question: "How do we fix the crime problem right now?" The second half of that question—“What do we do after that?”—is hard to answer with rule-bending shortcuts. I don’t want to imply that it’s not important to make arrests and get criminals off the streets. But it matters how you do it, and doing so in a way that destroys community trust, engenders resentment, inhibits cooperation, and incentivizes bad cop behavior will only make the good cops’ jobs harder—and the streets more dangerous—in the long run.

THE DOG THAT DOESN’T BARK. WHEN JOURNALISM CROSSES THE LINE.

THE DOG THAT DOESN’T BARK. WHEN JOURNALISM CROSSES THE LINE.

 

A journalist should report that the Fairfax County cops arrested 2,600 people for drunk driving last year.  That is what a journalist should do. The role of the press, after all, is to report issues that need attention.  But the role of the press is also to publicly hold government leaders accountable to the people and that can’t be done if government is using the media as a tool for its own self-praise or if individuals in government are using the press as a means of self-promotion to advance their career, to say, police chief as an example.

The other vital role the press plays in a free society is to educate citizens so they can make informed decisions on pertinent issues and this is done by asking questions. As an example, in regard to the drunk driving story, a good journalist will ask, “How many of those arrests resulted in conviction?” because Fairfax County cops justify themselves through a body count. A good journalist would also ask:

“In how many of those cases did the cop fail to show up in court?"

“And how many of those cases were simply tossed out of court?”  

“Who was stopped? White people? Black people? Asians? Latinos? ” 

The good journalist should examine that side of the issue because racial profiling by the police is a serious national issue. 

The good journalist would also put the arrests in perspective. There are about 5,600,000 people in the greater Washington DC Area and in one year Fairfax County police arrested 0.0004 of them for drunk driving.  In a county of 1,200,000 citizens, the 2600 arrests would total less than 0.002% of the population.

Drunk driving arrests are down 2.5 nationwide in 2011 and 2012.  In fact, in the past two decades drunk driving fatalities have declined by 35% in the general population and almost 60% in the teen driver population.

So with those facts in mind, facts that were not covered in the story,  why were there so many Fairfax cops trying to arrest drunk drivers on a recent Saturday night, enough so that “the lights atop Fairfax County Police Department cruisers along Leesburg Pike lit up the night sky like swarms of blue fireflies".

Poor management seems to be the answer. Shouldn't the cops be doing something more productive and less intrusive to the community?  (A community where less than 9% of the force lives.)

 The summation of the drunk driving story appeared to be one of two things; one that the story was that drunk driving is a non-issue because arrests for drunk driving are down.  So what was the point of reporting this story at all?

The other slant may have been a cop glorification feature piece which was based on the baseless claim by the Fairfax County Police that they lowered drunk driving in the county through sobriety checkpoints, directed patrols and business compliance checks.

The problem is that slant discounts reality based on the facts above.

But there was a story here if the journalist had taken it one step further, one step into the uncomfortable,  and had asked the cops (and thereby the reading public) if they see any danger in randomly stopping citizens to find out what they can be arrested for.

A journalist should ask if those random “sobriety checkpoints” touted by the Fairfax County cops,  have a place in a democratic society. Should cops be stopping people they suspect of committing a crime based on magical and slightly scary “sixth sense” as one cop claimed to have, when it comes to spotting drunk drivers?   

Even more disturbing than that is the fact that the cop in question has an engineering degreefrom Virginia Tech but would have to work the third shift in a bedroom community “sensing” drunks on the road.

The journalist could have asked the obvious question…..if drunk driving barely scratches the judicial surface then why are the cops turning out in force to address this secondary  issue.  This could have led to two very obvious answers, both are generally assumed to be true by the general public.  One is that the cops are bored and don’t have much else to do and the other is money.   Drunk driving fines range from $250 to $1,000, ($625 average fine  X 2600 fines=$1,625,000). All of that revenue is poured into the county coffers and eventually into the behemoth budget of the Fairfax County Police.

Is there any truth to this commonly held rumor? We don’t know because the reporter failed to go that far. However, we do know that the cop who would rather work nights has a “lucky flower” in the car's visor. 

Move over Carl Bernstein, there’s a new gunslinger in these here parts.

But it was Bernstein who said it best. The reporter’s job is to "achieve the best obtainable version of the truth" and, I would add, the best obtainable version of the truth for the public’s good and not for the benefit of the government’s profile. It is crucial that the press be an outsider and never, ever, under any circumstances share the same aims as government, the legislature, religion or commerce. The only responsibility the reporter has is to their own standards and ethics.  This is no small thing because the free press is part of a larger right of free expression, a right that the public assumes that the press will help to protect.  

So in that light, a good journalist would ask “Is this story free PR for cops at the expense of the free press?”  And if the answer, even vaguely, appears to be “yes” then that is a very serious infringement on the role of the press in a free society and should not be taken lightly, no matter how innocuous the story.

The craft of reporting, and it is a craft, is found in the reporter's ability to research, to ask questions, to observe, to sift through self –serving propaganda disguised as news and then to place it in context so that the public can evaluate where the truth is. All of that makes the reporter the  community's witness to the process of government. Crossing the line makes the reporter part of the government. So what was this drunk driver story?

The press is a powerful instrument which must exist independently from the other main centers of power in society because, among other things, it is often in the best interests of those other power centers to control or quash the press.

This rule of separation is especially true in dealing with the well-heeled Fairfax County Police Department, which is widely considered to be the least transparent law enforcement agency in the state of Virginia. The Fairfax County Police have failed, repeatedly, to show that they understand the simple truth that the free flow of information is a civic responsibility because information, even when it makes a department look bad, is the fuel of democracy. Instead, the department has mastered the art of avoiding public scrutiny by simply refusing to deal with the press….unless the press wants to do a fluff & kisses piece about them. And that’s what is wrong with plopping down the non-issue drunk driving feature piece.  Reporting balanced news is vital to the health and well-being of a democracy as is the cop’s responsibility to inform the public that pays them. When journalists start backsliding down that very slippery slope by writing glory stories when the cops don’t deserve it, it is dangerous, unethical and sets a very bad precedent.  

It’s about integrity. If the reporter loses their integrity they have lost everything and they have lost it forever, for themselves and their publication and it is easy to lose integrity because the damn thing about a free press is that the fight to keep the press free never ends.  Rather it is a battle that is never won because the prize is much too valuable for other powers not to want to control it and to manipulate it.   And those battles to keep the free press free are rarely epic, rather they are tiny skirmishes, say, as an example, a police department noted for playing a one sided game, trying to get a local reporter to skim over the facts and avoid the comfortable questions and write what they want to see in print.  

 

Stuck in traffic because we don’t have enough roads? No, you’re stuck in traffic because the cops got your road improvement money.

 “The insufferable arrogance of human beings to think that Nature was made solely for their benefit, as if it was conceivable that the sun had been set afire merely to ripen men's apples and head their cabbages.”  Cyrano De Bergerac

 

Stuck in traffic because we don’t have enough roads? No, you’re stuck in traffic because the cops got your road improvement money.

The cops in McLean spent $20,000,000 of your money...…money that won’t go to schools or road improvements or a library……because they wanted to make a few improvements to their office space. Twenty million dollars’ worth of improvement.   Constructing a new building would have cost less.   

“The roof has been leaking for years and we don’t have anywhere to park our cruisers,” said Supreme Allied Commander Janickey.

Leaky roofs?  Oh come on. The red necks you hire never knew a roof didn’t leak until they came way north to Fairfax County. How do you think they got water into the house?

When we in the non-millionaire class have a leaky roof we don’t build a new $20,000,000 home. We repair the roof.  You call a roof guy, he shows up with a hammer or something and closes the leaks and you pay him.

So are we clear, Mister Howl?  You repair the roof you don’t build a new building. I don’t care what “That’s Gerry with G Dearie” Hyland told you.

The second “good” reason Commander Spendthrift has to build a $20, 000, 000 addition to the existing police station (while salivating at the possibility of building a second station a few blocks away) is parking.

That’s right. There is a parking shortage at red neck central so the morons are spending $20, 000,000 of your money on their home improvements.

“We don’t have anywhere to park our cruisers” Super Commandant Janickey whined.

Well, just park like you do at home back in Prince William County where almost 90% of you live….park on the front lawn next to the ole truck up on cinder blocks that don’t still work no how.

Star Fleet Commander Janickey apparently thinks we are all blind and can’t see through the open chain link fence around the McLean police station with its half empty parking lot and two dozen unused police cars sitting idly within.

Want more room in your half empty lot?   Get rid of the two dozen cop cars you don’t use, that’ll give you room in your parking lot.  Here’s another idea to make more room. Get rid of some of the 180 people you have on staff.  You could get by with half that number of people on staff and you know it. 

Since this is obviously a case of the police out of control we went straight to the bastion of control in Fairfax County, the board of supervisors. 

“If I had a backbone, I’d stand up to these cops” said McLean area Supervisor John W. Foust “instead I’m going to pretend this isn’t an outrage and pray it goes away. If it doesn’t we’ll just toss more money at it until it does go away.”

“And I’ll be there to catch it,” said Sharon “show me the money” Bulova, although no one asked her.

“Of course they can have two new police stations and twenty four new cops for a crime problem that doesn’t exist!” said Supervisor “Gerry with G” Hyland. “Money is not an issue. I have spent my entire life in government and in those many years of avoiding real work I have learned that when you need more money you simply send someone out to the magic money tree to get it. And that’s exactly what we’ll do here. The people should kneel before the police to show how grateful they are. I’m always on my knees when it comes to the cops.”

In other words, the board of supervisors, the people you elected to protect your interests, have nothing to say on the issue.  

So as you sit in traffic, late for everything and burning gas remember the words of Commander and Spend Janickey who said, “It’s a good time to be at the McLean station.” And he’s right.  Life for your local police is very, very good.

FAIRFAX COUTY POLICE TALKING OUT OF THEIR ASS

FAIRFAX COUTY POLICE TALKING OUT OF THEIR ASS

Earlier this year, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority reported an increase in crime across the Metro rail system.  This news has tossed Dan Janickey, grand imperial wizard, or something like that, of the unnecessary McLean Police Station to leap into action…..again.   He gives the sense that the opportunity to hire more cops with our money does for him what porn does for a pervert.

Increased crime on the metro has space commander Dan all aroused.  But increased crime from what? That’s the question. What are we talking here?  From no crime at all to 1 crime a year? Or, are we talking crime wave like from a Batman movie?

Where did the crime increase? Virginia? Maryland? DC?  Our immediate concern should be Northern Virginia.

And what sort of crime increased? Is it the sort of crime that a competent police force could hinder…calm down Janickey, I said competent…….See what too much sugar on your donuts does?

Artist rendering of Private Janickey on the day the metro opens

  Anyway, Supreme Field General of Overreaction Dan is all aflutter.

“We’re doubling the amount of stations we’ll have in Fairfax County,” he said, which begs the question…….what does he care about the rest of Fairfax County? He’s supposed to police McLean. Let the other guys worry about their end of the county.  Don’t worry about three other stations. Again, see what too much sugar on your donuts does?

Where the hell is Pear Head Morris when you need him? He’d be happy here. Mclean used to be an orchard. Shouldn’t he show up here five days a week……I refuse to use the word work in regard to the police….instead of the Mister Excitement they’ve sent us?

“It’s going to change the way we police.” Janickey said in what was either a question or perhaps a threat.  

Oh no it isn’t…….., enough with the drama already…..it’s just a fucking metro station, it won’t hurt you. Calm down, things change.  Relax. Go to the evidence room, have a Quaalude, put your feet up. Everything is going to be okay. 

Gees.

Janickey said his “officers are ready to police the expanding area”….well I should fucking hope so.  Why do you think we pay you? To hand out self-aggrandizing awards to each other?  Oh by the way, the McLean cops gave cops 13 awards to themselves in one season. Thirteen.

Artist rendering of Corporal Janickey.  Interesting side note here, many say that originally the name Janickey meant “Don’t look at me, the cows are dying, that’s what causing the smell”

“They’re excited about it,” said Corporal Janickey of the police. “It’s going to be interesting to see how things go when the stations open.”

Yeah, their excited about it. Can you picture the Fairfax County Cops high fiving their donut laden hooves in the air shouting “Holy Moly!  We get to guard a railroad station! I knew that five years of high school would pay off!”

No, that didn’t happen and it’s not going to happen and if there is any cop anywhere in the world who is excited about guarding a metro station, we need to get that cop a new job with a sound medical plan.

Janickey also said the cops are “ready for anything”…..okay, that’s enough. Dude, get a fucking grip. Again…… IT’S A METRO STATION for God’s sakes not an invasion of hostile brain eating aliens from another galaxy out to destroy a boring suburb.

Artist’s rendering of Glorious Field Marshal Janickey preparing for metro Station opening 

No more coffee or war movies for Janickey and let’s keep him away from the microphones as well.

There were 157 crimes committed in 10 of Virginia’s 20 metro stations, or about 3 crimes a week that resulted in only 17 arrests in one year in those stations.

Not a hot spot of criminal activity.  There are only six metro stations in the county and none of the Metro stations with the most crimes overall are in Northern Virginia. Those stations are in DC or PG County.

Most of the crime increase on the Metro system, system wide, from 2011 to 2012 was attributable to an increase in theft of small electronic devices and from pickpockets, about 670 incidents in all.  The system covers over 1,500 miles that includes 150 miles of track. 

So what we have is 670 crimes, narrowed to specific places, during 215,000,000 passenger trips, policed by less than 500 transit cops. If Metro were a state, it would be the safest state in the union.  

Metro police are doing their job to decrease those crimes through a successful program that places undercover cops holding decoy electronic devices in order to become “victims” and make arrests. It’s working.  In 2012, undercover Metro cops made 149 arrests.  Paltry statistics for what is the second-busiest rapid transit system in the United States (in number of passenger trips) after the New York City Subway.

Fairfax County Cops will do the most good sitting outside a station staring off into space, but even there, Metro station parking lot crime reached a ten-year low in 2012.

There were 157 crimes committed in 10 of Virginia’s 20 metro stations, or about 3 crimes a week that resulted in only 17 arrests in one year in those stations.

The primary mission of the Fairfax County police is to increase the size of its already bloated force and incredibly lavish budget and that’s what this is all about. Let the Metro police handle the Metrorail. They know what they’re doing. Let the McLean station police sleep it off in the parks.  

Welcome to our latest member of the "That's Gerry with a G" club

 

 

It's great to have so many among the Fairfax County Police, why I would bend over to help the Fairfax County Police....I meant, I would bend over backwards....backwards think of the possibilities....for the Fairfax County Police.