Police cuts in cities are tied to dip in arrests

Police in Camden and other New Jersey cities where departments have had deep layoffs are making fewer arrests for minor offenses - a trend experts fear could lead to a rise in the most serious crimes.

Camden, Atlantic City, Newark, Trenton, and Paterson - all densely populated cities with significant crime problems - have made deep cuts in their police departments since the start of 2010, the result of less tax revenue and declining aid from state government.

An Associated Press analysis of municipal court data shows that when police are laid off, department priorities shift. Arrests and summonses of all kinds drop, with enforcement for minor crimes and traffic violations suffering most as police focus their remaining resources on more serious offenses.

The strategy may make sense, but experts say it leaves a troubling gap in law enforcement.

"I think it has emboldened those who are committing the crimes," said Camden County Prosecutor Warren Faulk. "They do not get arrested, and consequently they continue committing these crimes."

Denise Skinner, 51, who lives in Camden's Waterfront South neighborhood, a haven for drug dealing and prostitution, is frustrated when she sees drug dealers continue to work their corners.

"It's getting worse," Skinner said. "We don't have enough cops."

The data, collected by the state judiciary, break down arrests and summonses by broad category of crime, but not specific offenses.

From January 2009 through November 2010, Newark police made arrests or issued summonses about 5,100 times a month for infractions classified as "other," including curfew, noise, and littering violations. Since the layoffs, the AP found, the number has dropped by nearly half, to 2,600 a month.

In Camden, monthly reports of traffic summonses for infractions such as speeding and running stoplights plunged from 3,820 to 1,850 after police layoffs.

In Paterson, arrests for charges such as shoplifting and possessing a small amount of drugs went from slightly more than 700 a month before the April layoffs to an average of 545 in the five months afterward.

The drop might not be immediately noticeable, but police experts are worried about the long-term impact.

Since the 1980s, police departments across the country have paid more attention to so-called quality-of-life crimes. A crackdown on minor infractions, the idea goes, leads to community pride and puts behind bars more people who might otherwise be committing serious crimes.

That approach to policing is credited with having sharply cut rates for major crimes across the country.

The new data show that layoffs are undermining that approach, said Wayne Fisher, director of the Police Institute at Rutgers University's Newark campus.

"We begin the downward spiral," Fisher warned. "We may go back to the kind of crime level we were all used to in the '70s and into the '80s."

In Camden, one of the most impoverished and crime-ridden cities in the nation, about half the force was laid off in January. The cuts in the other cities were not as extreme.

All the cities have secured money - largely in federal grants - to bring back some officers. But so far, only Atlantic City's force is close to the size it was before the layoffs.

Reported crime in Camden has been up in almost all categories this year compared with 2010 and 2009. But crime has multiple causes, and experts caution that it's hard to determine how much of the increase could be attributed to layoffs.

The comprehensive arrest data collected by the New Jersey courts provide a picture of how police priorities have changed after the police layoffs.

The statistics include arrests and summonses by offense category and are compiled monthly. The AP reviewed data from January 2009 through September in order to capture trends before and after the police layoffs.

In four of the cities with deep cuts, the story has been similar. There have been fewer arrests per month since the layoffs for most types of offenses, but the biggest decreases are for the least serious crimes.

"In general, the less serious stuff is treated with more discretion," said Mike Maxfield, a criminal justice professor at New York City's John Jay College. "You can't write off a bank robbery. You can't ignore a homicide."

Officials in Camden, Newark, Trenton, and Paterson have either declined to be interviewed about the drop in arrests or not responded to requests. In general, officials in cities where officers have been laid off have taken the position that they will prioritize the most important crimes and find ways to do more with fewer officers.

The dramatic declines in arrests seem to be unique to the cities with deep layoffs. Statewide, total monthly arrest figures - including in the five cities - have been stable in the period reviewed by the AP.

In Camden, monthly arrests and summonses were down in every category after the layoffs there in January: 21 percent for indictable crimes, 25 percent for disorderly persons, and 50 percent for ordinance and other violations. Moving traffic violations also fell more than 50 percent.

Camden's declines were even larger in the first months after layoffs, before officers began to be rehired.

Much of this impact was foreseen even as layoffs were announced, though officials in some cities promised just as many patrols as took place earlier.

In some municipalities, police won't go to the scene of many fender benders. In Camden, Police Chief Scott Thomson announced when the layoffs were made that police would not respond to minor theft complaints either.

Rutgers' Fisher said the police officers who remain spend much of their shifts going from call to call. That leaves little opportunity for them to deal with loitering and other violations they might spot.

"It's an important consequence of these layoffs that needs to be reported to the public," Fisher said. "There is a price as a result of these cutbacks in public-safety positions."