To sum up...
Michael Nutter gave testimony to the State Judiciary Committee waaaaay back in August (remember August? One declared candidate... stifling hot weather...), that included the basic points of his crime plan. Included in the plan, this point:
3. Get handguns off the streets by encouraging more frequent police use of their Constitutional stop & frisk powers recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court, the most effective method known for reducing gun violence (as shown in 5 separate tests in Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Indianapolis).
On January 8th (Elvis' Birthday, thank you very much), Chaka Fattah released his "Plan for a Gun Safe Philadelphia," an event I attended and wrote about extensively. On page 3 of the plan, you find:
Designate Patrol Officers to Go After Illegal Guns. With our existing police force, we will designate specially trained patrol officers in each Police District to go after illegal guns and the criminals who are most likely to use them. This targeted enforcement has been proven to be effective in other cities. A 1992-93 study conducted by the University of Pennsylvania's Lawrence Sherman showed that targeted patrols in an area of Kansas City, Missouri with a murder rate six times higher than the city as a whole showed a 49% drop in gun crimes and a 65% increase in gun seizures. A 1997 study in Indianapolis showed that targeted patrols in one high crime district reduced gun crimes by 29%.
Hmmm... Kansas City... Indianapolis. Interesting. Could he be talking about the same stop and frisk plan that Nutter had talked about in August. I know he spent a lot of exploratory fund money on putting together his teams of experts to write up this policy papers. Maybe one of his experts saw Nutter's testimony. (Actually, Fattah said that Lawrence Sherman was one of his advisors so it's likely that this idea came directly from the guy who has done the most work on the issue). Since I was at the event, I asked. Surprisingly, he said yes.
Ok... continuing on...
About a week after Fattah released his plan, Nutter released his "Safety Now" plan.
Folks on YPP have been debating the point about both Fattah and Nutter having this point in their crime plans and why Fattah is able to attack Nutter for "stop and frisk" when he has it in his own plan. To their credit, they've been talking about this apparent similiarity in the two plans for at least as long as I have. Today's debate is long and there are a lot of comments in there by people who don't really understand the subtleties of the plan, preferring instead to stop reading at "stop and frisk" and make up their own interpretation. It seems that the essential point is that the difference between Nutter and Fattah on this point is that Fattah didn't include the phrase "stop and frisk" and Nutter will actually do it.
Today, Dwight Evans jumped into the mix with his own event to criticize Nutter's plan and point out his own record on crime (in a way that left me strangely hungry). However, when Evans was on Radio Times with Lawrence Sherman back in July, he didn't seem too critical.
And finally, now that the Inquirer's Great Expectations blog has picked up on it (Fattah feeling frisky, too?), I guess people have finally figured it out.
I couldn't care less about the "stop and frisk" plan itself. If anything, I was actually pretty sold on it when I heard Lawrence Sherman and civil rights attorney David Rudovsky come to terms on how the city could implement it in a constitutionally-protected way. The plan seems to deal directly with a pretty big problem that we're having here without running afoul of the state legislature or all of the other NRA folks who continue to keep us from keeping the guns out of the bad guys' hands in the first place.
What I do care about is hypocrisy. Nutter has put out a plan. A plan that, rightly, should be scrutinized and explained fully. But for Fattah to criticize a point that his own plan includes smacks of that hypocrisy.
The press, including this site, should be looking into the background of the plan and whether it could actually lead to a violation of people's civil rights. We should also be sensitive to the attitudes that many people have about the police department, probably based in experiences dating all the way back to the Rizzo era.
Should that distrust lead us to handcuff the police and take away a power that the Supreme Court has said that they have? No. If anything, we need to rebuild a level of trust between the police and citizens in Philadelphia so that those citizens believe that these searches are being conducted according to the law.
I've heard that a lot of media outlets are picking up the ball and running with a point I've been making since Elvis' birthday. My question is, what took you so long?
Comments (17)
Yes Dan most of what you have here is true, but if you notice Fattah has backed off of his version of S&F. It is just to risky. Dr. Anderson at PENN himself said that more studies need to be undertaken surrounding this issue before it is implemented. And remember... Philadelphia isn't Kansas City; Different part of the country Dan. All it takes is one accidental shooting under Michael's policy and it's lawsuit- city for the police department and the Mayor's office. And if anyone on this blog says that there is no way this can happen they are flat out lying to you!
Posted by Son of Anonymous | May 8, 2007 6:31 PM
That's cool Dan, but both Nutter's and Fattah's name appear in your post. If you want a nameless response to your offerings then you shouldn't put the candidates names in play? Right? From now on well discuss the proposals but not the candidates names. That is the fairest way to do this.
Posted by Son of Anonymous | May 8, 2007 7:07 PM
One more thing Dan, I am White, possible "racial profiling" will not affect me directly. But I have African-American friends whom I have been out with (South Street on Sat. night) and watched this phenomenon play out. Some, not most, but some police officers will pick with persons of color, just because they can. And we are not just talking about white cops, but black ones also. Sometimes black cops are more testy with my friends than the white ones. Let me make this clear, all of my friends black and white are law abiding citizens. But all it takes is to catch a cop on a bad day and BANG!
Posted by Son of Anonymous | May 8, 2007 7:21 PM
There have been police shootings in Philadelphia in the past and we aren't in "lawsuit-city."
Posted by Anonymous | May 8, 2007 7:45 PM
Fattah's own web site states he supports the same plan as Nutter.
I used to think Fattah was John Street II. Now it appears he is more like T. Milton Street II.
Posted by Anonymous | May 8, 2007 8:35 PM
Dan-
Yep, they both talk about S&F, as we have both noted.
Why I think Nutter gets hit harder is because I think there is a tendency with the crime plans to use S&F as shorthand for the whole thing. And, as a whole, the plans are different. Nutter's plans, with curfews in entire neighborhoods, really are more draconian than Fattah's, whether you think they are good or not.
Posted by Dan U-A | May 8, 2007 9:02 PM
It seems like Son of anonymous has not bothered to listed to or read any of the materials cited above. The program involves a small specially trained group of officers who look for signs in bulges in the clothing and body language indicating someone is carrying a piece. It isn't across the baord stops but rather a deterent (becuase you can have your gun taken away from you at an time) to taking the gun out in the first place. Its effective not becuse so many illegal guns are rounded up, but because noone wants to be busted carrying so they leave the piece at home. That way when some minor fight breaks out it does not escalate into a gunfight.
But people simply refuse to read or listen or discuss the evidence and the case studies that show it works and has been been ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court.
Why? Because they would rather score political brownie points than find a solution to the killings tearing this city apart.
Posted by seand | May 8, 2007 9:06 PM
Dan, thank you; this post is great.
Posted by SK | May 8, 2007 9:13 PM
Thanks, Dan for your post. I have gotten some calls and emails from friends who are Nutter supporters but have questions about stop and frisk and were hoping I could clarify.
Now, thanks to you, I have a post I can email which lays out the issues in what I think is a fair way and which is easily grasped by those of us who are not criminal justice lawyers.
Posted by karen | May 8, 2007 10:34 PM
Stop and Frisk is going to be used as a scare tactic and deterrent as much as a way to actually get guns from criminals. At least gun carriers will know a policy is in place and they are at risk of being harrassed by the cops if they are hanging on corners at 2AM shooting dice or whatever. There is no policy now other than having cops drive around, stay in cars and respond to 911 calls. The whole point of racial profiling is to stop people for NO reason other than being a minority. As far as I know Philly has actually had few problems with this. I know Timoney stressed probable cause for stopping people when he was here and it seems like it worked. All of this concern by white liberals about police going around stopping and frisking black men walking to work downtown is a little ridiculous. No one seems to want to poll the people in these neighborhoods to see what they have to say.
Posted by sj | May 9, 2007 8:09 AM
Let me see if I got this right, Dan.
Let's put the policy in place and try it out to see if it works before we question its viability?
There's no reason to be concerned that cops will be overly aggressive in its implementation? You think that Walla Walla, Washington has the same history as Philly of hosilities between the police and black communities? Despite the fact that black communities will disproportionately affected, no one will feel the policy amounts to racial profiling because it wasn't designed to specifically target blacks?
It isn't even the policy itself so much that disturbs me as it is the willingness of people (including Nutter) to out of hand dismiss associated problems of such magnitude as potential civil rights problems, complications with the implementation (what are you going to do with all those folks caught carrying illegal guns because cops spotted that they had a "bulge" in under their clothing?), potential blowback (despite initial popularity), the fact that Nutter's plan also calls for "States of Emergency" which will mean a lot more than just frisking people who are walking "suspiciously," etc.
The plan may be a place to start, but you seem that we should all abdicate our right to question the policy because some guy at Penn did a study. Sorry if I can't agree
Posted by D.E. II | May 9, 2007 9:06 AM
I'm a "root cause," "long-term solution" kind of guy. I especially tend to be distrustful of short-term strategies when they're part of campaign rhetoric.
That said, it's pretty obvious there is a need for action, and that if something effective can be done while the larger issues are being worked on - fine.
I think that a more aggressive policing strategy probably has viability - but I think it also has very real potential to make the situation worse. Studying what has been done elsewhere is also very important, but it's important to carefully adapt any ideas for the specifics of Philly.
As far as Nutter's plan, to me, the key is buy-in. Therefore, I think that it is crucial that there is meaningful community involvement in the DEVELOPMENT of any final plan. Next, there needs to be a massive outreach to communicate fully what a plan would entail and what the safeguards would be against misapplication of the plan. Next, there need to be careful outcomes-based metrics set up for measurement of how the plan is going, and contingent plans set out accordingly. And there needs to be clear and intelligent plans set out for what happens to people caught carrying guns illegally.
Finally, if we don't take measures to limit the in-flow of illegal guns, then the impact of efforts to take away the guns that are already there now will necessarily be limited. The next mayor needs to go on a very high visibility campaign to get gun purchase limitations in place.
Short of including any of those components (and I'm sure others I haven't thought of), I will remain highly skeptical.
And BTW, it should be noted that in the studies cited, while gun violence was reduced by these kinds of policies (including increased police profile in violent neighborhoods), overall violence was not. Reducing gun violence is a good goal - but these policies are inherently limited, and should be recognized as such. It is important that the next mayor demonstrates that he is taking people's concerns seriously, but capitalizing on people's desire for greater protection by dismissing the complicated nature of a solution won't work.
Posted by D.E. II | May 9, 2007 9:56 AM
BTW, your question about what the media can do is a very good one.
The media should play a huge role in this process. They should work with the police and the mayor to publicize meetings where the plan will be discussed and where there will be opportunity for input to be given by citizens. Then, they can conduct a massive campaign regarding the implimentation of any plan, and publicize how people can address any abuses that might occur. They can also publicize the outcome measurements of how a plan is progressing.
Posted by D.E. II | May 9, 2007 10:00 AM
Maybe if the public media went hard at the commercial media, and if the next mayor and the police did the same, we'd get somewhere. They could try to outdo each other in a ratings war based on which station is more responsive to the community's needs (yeah, fat chance).
Posted by D.E. II | May 9, 2007 10:51 AM
D.E. II Thank you for the above fair and thoughtful assesment of the S&F proposal. This is all I have been trying to say all along. Because I am White it allows me and others like myself to sidestep the issue of race for a topic such as this. The decades long feelings of mistrust between the police and the African- American community has not gone away. I would hate to be the pastor, minister or city official to have to tell someone's mother their child was blown away because someone saw a bulge in his or her pocket. By the way, D. E. II take a look at page 7 of today's Daily News and tell me police cannot get out of hand!
Posted by Anonymous | May 9, 2007 12:58 PM
The above post was by Son of Anonymous. Not my Nutter loving father... sorry!
Posted by Son of Anonymous | May 9, 2007 1:00 PM
What's with all these people whining about stop-and-frisk?
Possibly, you like to tote around an illegal gun, or a couple bags of dope??
Or maybe, your son, who is such a goood boy, packs a pistol?
Please, put a cop on my block and frisk everybody! I'd love it!!
Posted by Anonymous | May 12, 2007 8:58 AM