reducing bus crime

[libellum]

This article was published today about Boris reducing bus crime in London:
Bus-related crime across the capital fell by 18 per cent in the first year of Boris Johnson’s administration, and has fallen by a further 10.5 per cent in a ten month period taking the figures to a six year low

Comments

[libellum]

Yeah, except that if "normally" there wouldn't be 40 officers involved then it wouldn't provide any useful sort of training, would it? Plus there were a mixture of Met and BTP. I dunno, it seems to match the description of the Hub Teams that Boris is so smug about to me.

[friend_of_tofu]

I don't think it's quite as simple as that - see my comment below for my experiences of the 29 when working for TfL.

[maga_dogg]

I mean, I assume it's a fares raid, as they'd be unlikely to bag several violent criminals or vandals in one go.

I dunno about this. Simplest way that could happen: group of kids start violently harassing a busload of people, bus driver calls it in, cops pick them up; after which you need a lot of cops to get statements. Just a possibility, of course; and you were there.

But passengers on buses are easier to intimidate. Especially if there are forty of you.
Broken Windows is really popular among cops and conservatives - I'm sure you're aware of it, and of its shaky statistical justifications.

[libellum]

Broken Windows? No, I'm not - what's the story?

[yiskah]

My understanding of it (from working in community safety) is that fixing small but visible problems in a city - like vandalism, kids hanging about on street corners, etc. - increases people's feeling of investment in their community and brings about a commensurate drop in serious crime. It's a big part of the reason why cities like Nottingham expended so much time, money and effort on tackling 'anti-social behaviour' at a time (2004/05) when it could be said they had bigger fish to fry, crime-wise.

The wiki article seems quite good, from my brief scan of it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixing_Broken_Windows

[maga_dogg]

The theory is, roughly, that if people feel they can get away with minor crimes - vandalism, fare-dodging - they'll be more likely to commit more serious offences. Once one window gets broken in a building, it encourages more vandalism, then burglaries, etc. Therefore, the best strategy for preventing violent crime is to come down like a ton of bricks on any crime; by nabbing fare-dodgers you're preventing rapes and muggings.

The poster-child for this is New York, which implemented this strategy with apparent dramatic success under Giuliani. Serious crime did indeed fall, but this was mostly down to demographic change (serious crime fell as a whole across the US during the same period) and increased police numbers (which reduce crime irrespective of tactics.) This detail has not particularly reduced conservative fondness for the theory, which boils down to brutalisation as virtue.

[friend_of_tofu]

Hm. I used to work TfL shifts on the 29 bus route. It was notorious, not only for being one of the most fare-evading routes but also for being subject to violent crime, muggings, drunk & disorderly, etc. It's just anecdata, but I was mildly sexually assaulted on the very first 29 shift I worked

[jossish]

Yeah, I second all of this (not having worked for TFL, but as someone who takes the 29 fairly regularly). I have never been on it and NOT seen someone harrassing someone else in some way, no matter what time of day or night I'm there.

[asw909]

Not seen much trouble on the 29 myself in recent months, but mass police-assisted ticket checks are the norm on "bendy-bus" routes, as fare evasion is reported to be higher. Turnpike Lane and Camden Town are usual points for these mass checks - it appears they need the assistance of a lot of police officers as they need, on my observation, three officers to block each door, a couple to assist the revenue inspectors, and then more to help "booking" those that they catch.

It does seem like overkill, however with the amount of people they seem to catch each time there certainly is a fare evasion issue.

[libellum]

Also, is there not a conflation happening here between ticket-checks and violent crime? Violent crime is used to justify the show of force, but the effect of the bust is to get lots of people for fare-dodging and very few for violence, unless you literally catch them in the act, or have witnesses / CCTV of a specific thing that happened just before the team arrived.

This seems more... procedural than that. Teaching a lesson to everyone who might ever ride the 29 by making an example of some. I dunno, something about it makes me uncomfortable.

[emarkienna]

I agree it all seems rather over the top. I had a similar feeling when I experienced Cambridge's yearly police drug catching exercise at the station last year - the over the top scale of it, I honestly thought it was a murder or terrorism scare at first. And indeed I had the same experience of them questioning me about taking a photo in public.

[libellum]

Oh, yeah, I remember that! Strawberry Fair, right? It's certainly intimidating

[_pinkdaisy_]

it was a fare raid- i get that bus home from work (i may have been on that very bus!) and last week there were a couple of days where they were doing fare checks at that stop- it astonishes me how many people get caught every time!

[libellum]

Surely it's not a sensible use of resources? I mean the wages of those officers must be substantially more than the money lost through fare evasion.