By Patrick Robinson

Crime of all kinds, in the past six months is down in our area, but that’s in contrast to last year and early this year when crime went up alarmingly in both Southwest Seattle and in King County. Shootings in areas like White Center, Burien, SeaTac and other South King County communities were “through the roof”  in 2016 according to King County Sheriff John Urquhart. Residential burglaries in West Seattle were “out of control” last year, driven largely by the opioid epidemic, according to Southwest Precinct Commander Pierre Davis. But the methods they used to reverse these crime trends were different.

“The first four months of this year from January through May 9th the number of gun homicides in King County? 16, “ said Urquhart. “Shots fired injuries? 45 cases. Shots fired property? 101. Shots fired calls? Well over 100. That’s a lot. 

King County forms a task force

In King County “Operation Quiet Nights” was formed earlier this year as a coalition between more than 70 officers and nearly two dozen agencies whose mission, armed with information and warrants was to send small teams out to find gang members suspected in shootings. It went into action in May. That worked. 26 arrests were made in the initial stages of the operation and Urquhart says more are coming. “Since I’ve been Sheriff the crime rate has gone down every single year and the amount of crimes that we have solved has gone up. In fact it’s never been higher.” 

He noted that this was the first time so many diverse law enforcement agencies had come together to address the same issue.

"If you look at the calls from May 10 to Aug. 7," said Urquhart, "Homicides from 16 down to 4, Shots fired injuries from 45 down to 20, Shots fired property down to 60, almost in half, General Shots Fired calls, about the same. This is because of arrests and working with the Prosecutors office we were able to keep these people in jail. Who's doing all this? If you are one side of the debate, it's undocumented immigrants. But that's just plain not true. These are young people from 15 to 25 who were born in this country. Yes, they may have an ethnicity such as hispanic or African American, that's quite common. But they are gang members of one sort or another. There's a resurgence in gang activity for some reason. We don't know why but it's definitely here. What's unique is that we were able to put a stop to this or at least reduce it during the summer months when it's usually just the opposite."

Urquhart offered some insight into the reasons behind the shootings. "Is this over drugs? No, these aren't drug wars. Are they turf wars? Maybe Graffiti wars? Or oftentimes it's 'You disrespected my girlfriend' or 'This is my corner today' and tomorrow they don't care about it. That's the thing about gangs in this part of the country. It's not like you see on television. Not like it is in Chicago or Oakland or other areas. You can be in a gang one day and not the next. They are very loose knit organizations."

In Southwest Seattle Precinct Commander Davis said that property crimes saw a jump that surprised them and to get a handle on solving and preventing them meant pointed use of a powerful database system called SeaStat, linked to the city’s Real Time Crime Center (RTCC). That combined system has made a major difference in both apprehension and prevention.

SeaStat, in place since 2014 and RTCC established in 2015 enable the police to look at crime occurrences and see how they might be tied to specific areas or other crimes that happen in sequence, so officers can be dispatched and investigations assisted.

SeaStat is aimed at quickly addressing crime hotspots based on analysis of crime data and community reports of incidents. Emphasis is on using real-time data, getting direct feedback from community members, and increasing communication and collaboration throughout the department.Variations of SeaStat, often called Compstat, are used by police departments around the country including New York and Los Angeles, to combat serious crime. 

'What we do is arm our community members with information," said Davis," and we do that through the community meetings we hold here, such as Blockwatch meetings, Precinct Advisory Councils we hold once a month or our Crime Prevention meetings we hold here. There are times we bring in guest speakers. Plus we have our own Crime Prevention Coordinator now. We want our community to know first hand what we can do for them and what they can do for themselves."

Captain Davis explained, "We had a car prowl epidemic last year and we ended up last year reaching over 18% more than we were the year before. We had individuals from outside the city to steal. West Seattle is a nice place and people are friendly and for the most part well to do. These individuals see that and they are more sophisticated now. These guys will steal a car and then steal what they can. The catalyst for these types of crimes is the opioid addiction. These guys are feeding their habits." He acknowledged the problem is far worse now than a few years ago. "This is the worst I've seen."

He noted that the normal advice of locking your car, not leaving items in plain sight, parking in a well lit area all  help and that having officers present to act as a deterrent or arrest people when necessary works too. "But you are not going to arrest your way out of this problem. So what you do is offer these individuals some type of assistance while they are incarcerated. In lieu of serving more time. Punishment is one thing and rehab is another and then there's both. But if their crime is too horrific then obviously that's off the table. Drug court can help. Part of me would like to think that this is just another tool to help us prevent a rash of these instances down the road."

Some quick facts about the King County Sheriff’s Dept:

• It’s the second largest local police agency in the state with 725 officers (Seattle is largest with around 1300)
• Their budget is approximately $175 million annually
• Their patrol area covers 2200 square miles up to Stevens Pass. 
• They are contracted by other communities for police coverage including Skykomish, Burien, SeaTac, Maple Valley, Covington, Woodinville, Shoreline, Carnation, and others.
• They provide security and law enforcement for King County Metro Transit and Sound Transit on busses and light rail and heavy rail.
• Uniquely they provide security for the King County Airport (Boeing Field) and the Muckleshoot Indian Reservation
• They maintain a SWAT Team, Helicopter unit, and a Bomb Squad.
• 550,000 people in King County depend on the King County Sheriff for law enforcement

Both Urquhart and Davis say the most important tool they have is community involvement. "If you hear gun shots call 911, if you know a young person 15 to 25 running around with a bad element, let us know," said Urquhart. "You need to get them out of that life because they are going to die. It's not us that will shoot them. It's other gang members." 

"We hold community meetings all the time here at the Precinct to get people involved. We need people to let us know as soon as possible about crime that is taking place or just happened. Often times we can catch the people involved and prevent more crime from taking place," said Davis," these people don't just stop after one score. They can keep going and commit 20 car prowls in a weekend."

The White Center Chamber of Commerce is taking the issue of violence seriously by revitalizing the organization under interim President Tommy Martin of TommySound Studios. They held an Anti-Violence Summit on August 17 with King County Councilmember Joe McDermott and Sheriff Urquhart speaking, an anti-grafitti hotline is now set up for businesses (206-403-1408) and Martin is pushing for better lighting, and more patrols in the area.

SPD partners with the community

'What we do is arm our community members with information," said Davis," and we do that through the community meetings we hold here, such as Blockwatch meetings, Precinct Advisory Councils we hold once a month or our Crime Prevention meetings we hold here. There are times we bring in guest speakers. Plus we have our own Crime Prevention Coordinator now. We want our community to know first hand what we can do for them and what they can do for themselves."

Captain Davis explained, "We had a car prowl epidemic last year and we ended up last year reaching over 18% more than we were the year before. We had individuals from outside the city to steal. West Seattle is a nice place and people are friendly and for the most part well to do. These individuals see that and they are more sophisticated now. These guys will steal a car and then steal what they can. The catalyst for these types of crimes is the opioid addiction. These guys are feeding their habits." He acknowledged the problem is far worse now than a few years ago. "This is the worst I've seen."

He noted that the normal advice of locking your car, not leaving items in plain sight, parking in a well lit area all  help and that having officers present to act as a deterrent or arrest people when necessary works too. "But you are not going to arrest your way out of this problem. So what you do is offer these individuals some type of assistance while they are incarcerated. In lieu of serving more time. Punishment is one thing and rehab is another and then there's both. But if their crime is too horrific then obviously that's off the table. Drug court can help. Part of me would like to think that this is just another tool to help us prevent a rash of these instances down the road."

Davis said that the opioid users are a serious problem at WestCrest Park and Roxhill Park because they have so many hidden areas where drug users can inject themselves. "Those are areas of concern but you can go off in an alley and inject yourself." pointing out that the Junction, and other busy areas still see discarded needles. "We go by what our community tells us. That's half of our intelligence. That's why we have such a great rapport with our community. 911 is always going to be the best."

Calls to 911 are always filtered but "what that does is generate that information" meaning the type of crime, the time, the location and more are put into SeaStat which helps them look at where enforcement needs to go.

Davis said, "it's always going to be the police and the community against their crime issue." West Seattle is unique in that the community involvement is much higher than other areas of the city. That has meant that the police here tend to stay and others want to serve here. The side effect is that officers here develop longer term relationships with the community at large. That in turn leads to more cooperation and more information flowing into the SPD database.

The Hollywood depictions of crime fighters are colorful and entertaining but the real work of crime prevention and enforcement is based in information, outreach, and analysis plus good old hard work.