Law Enforcement - Fighting Crime

Police departments in large cities (250,000 or higher) operate special units to target certain types of crime. The 1994 Crime Act played a vital role in this fight. The legislation, regarded as the most comprehensive piece of crime fighting legislation in history, authorized $8.8 billion in grants in community policing efforts. It also helped put an extra 100,000 police officers on the street.

In 1990, all large departments reported having personnel devoted full or part-time to crime prevention. That figure fell to 97% in 2000, perhaps in response to a decrease in the number of crimes being reported to law enforcement. Perhaps departments decided their efforts would be better served in targeting specific crimes. Crime prevention programs have obvious value: target problem areas and educate the public on how to protect themselves. When crimes do occur, more departments seem ready to help the victims: Agencies with units devoted to victim assistance increased from 45% to 71%.

Some of these special units specifically target young people — who are both perpetrators and victims of many types of crime. Ninety-eight percent of departments now have either part-time or full-time personnel addressing gangs. Gangs have traditionally been a thorny issue for law enforcement. The Department of Justice argues that government and police have often turned a blind eye to gangs, while citizens' groups and social agencies were more likely to acknowledge the problems created by these young people. In the 1970s, youth gangs were reported in 19 states; in 1995, all 50 states and the District of Columbia reported gang problems in at least one of their cities. Assuming the Department of Justice's belief is true, more departments appear willing to address this issue. Drug education in schools slipped only slightly during the 1990s; 95% of agencies have some sort of unit devoted to this (perhaps futile) task.

Many of these departments address behavior; they try to change attitudes and actions before a crime actually occurs. What about those who have had a "few too many"? Over 80% of police departments now have special units devoted to drunk driving, up from 76% in 1990. Alcohol played a role in 38% of all traffic fatalities in 2000, down from 50% in 1990. But more than 17,000 people died from alcohol-related accidents in 2001, about one every half hour, according to Mothers Against Drunk Driving. More than 70% of police departments now have units devoted to bias-related crimes, up sharply from 1990. Over 8,000 such crimes were reported in 2000. The issue of hate crime legislation became energized by several high profile murders of gays and blacks during the decade. Indeed, the government only began to track the number of bias-related incidents in the mid-1990s. Police efforts are important in tracking a crime that may be vastly underre-ported.

The percent of departments with personnel devoted to domestic violence increased during the 1990s. Roughly 1 million reported actions of violence by an intimate partner (current or former spouse, current of former boyfriend/girlfriend) are reported annually. But how many occur behind closed doors? The programs provide information to victims about where to go for help.

The percent of agencies with some sort of missing children's program remained steady during the decade. Most of these are part-time departments, in existence for when the unthinkable happens. How many children vanish each year? Justice Department officials and missing children groups estimate that between 2,400 and 3,600 kids are taken each year. These numbers include those children found very quickly after their disappearance.

Sources: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Police Departments in Large Cities, 1990-2000; Leinwand, Donna. "Kidnapping Problem Impossible to Quantify." USA Today, August 15, 2002, p. 3A; community policing data comes from http://www.usdoj.gov; "Gang Cities." available from http://www.ncjrs.org; Mothers Against Drunk Driving website located at http://www.mad.org.