She was extremely angry, frustrated, and on the verge of tears. Standing directly in front of me, she poked the top of my desk with her index finger and exclaimed, ‘My bicycle was stolen and where were you?’ I leaned back in my chair and thought for a moment. Then I said, ‘Your bicycle was stolen… where were you?’ The people in the room thought that was funny.
Chief Dylan continued. “This woman held the expectation that the police should take care of her property so, when her bicycle came up missing, she blamed us. We have to stop looking for someone to blame and begin looking for solutions. There’s no reasonable expectation that any number of police officers can prevent all incidents of crime, let alone protect a particular unidentified bicycle.” Light laughter and chuckling broke out in the room again. Dylan went on to say, “Each of us must assume responsibility for taking care of ourselves and our property. After all, who should be more responsible for you than you?
“Earlier, I told you that President Ronald Reagan had been shot while he was surrounded by people who had no other purpose in life except to protect him. So, what makes you believe that the number of officers we have in this city can protect every visitor or resident from every incident or circumstance of crime? We cannot use the police as surrogates for dealing with our social disorder issues. It takes all of us, working together, with each of us accepting responsibility for the state of our community.
“The young lady and I talked about how her bicycle was stolen. She’d done everything wrong if she wanted to keep her bicycle from being taken. We all have a responsibility to protect ourselves and our property, and that’s policing.”
By this time I couldn’t contain myself. I raised my hand and a man with a microphone trotted over.
“Chief Dylan,” I said, “I don’t understand the criminal justice system. It seems that more and more people are going to jail. Some are going to jail for offenses that appear to warrant a different treatment. How are we to make any sense of this?”
The chief glanced around the room before he allowed his eyes to settle on me. “We’ve let passion overrule reason,” he responded. “If we, or someone we care about, get injured as a result of someone else committing a crime, we become preoccupied with how we’ll acquire that proverbial pound of flesh. In so doing, we forget that the issues that induced or allowed the offender to commit the act in the first place still exist and will likely contribute to another offense unless or until the circumstances have either been eliminated or substantially mitigated. Approximately 70 percent of the people currently in prison have been there before and will likely return after they get out.
“I should point out that the vast majority of people now incarcerated are being held for non-violent offenses. The system should be concerned with protecting society from violent offenders, not warehousing social miscreants who pose no real danger to others or who could benefit from rehabilitation in a less restrictive environment. Our resources would be better used to help these individuals become useful, productive members of society and by requiring them to make restitution to those they’ve harmed.
“There’s a misconception that rehabilitation doesn’t work. That simply isn’t true. It is true that certain rehabilitative efforts have failed. Unfortunately, there were some early attempts at rehabilitation that were in large part nothing more than feel-good programs for the people who designed them. Some approximated mere shams and offered nothing of value to the inmate or to society. We simply must recognize that long-term incarceration for non-violent offenders within the current system is out of sync with the reintegration of offenders into the mainstream of society. If you’re confused, don’t feel like the Lone Ranger. So are a lot of us.”
The moderator stepped in and told us that the next question would be the last. She then pre-empted a further question from the floor by asking one herself.
“Chief,” she asked, “what are the educational requirements for police officers in the city? Also, given the fact that you have a Ph.D., what do you believe the standard should be?”
“The current requirement is a high school education or a GED. This, however, appears to be inconsistent with the nature of the position and its accompanying duties and responsibilities. The statutes police work with every day were written for people with at least three years of education beyond the undergraduate level. It’s unreasonable to expect an individual with a high school education or a GED to read, understand, interpret, and apply the statutes within a split second when attorneys take weeks—even months—to review their decisions and attack the basis upon which those decisions were made.
“Let me say this as a final note. The traditional policing model has been bastardized and now represents nothing more than a prescription for the enforcement of the law. We simply must return to the basic tenets of policing, which incorporate a broad base of responsibilities for tending to the ills of our society while increasing the standards for those attending to the complexities of the profession.
“As a society, we must hold ourselves accountable for the actions of the police. Ultimately, everything that happens within our institutions of policing is the responsibility of the public. If the finger of blame is to be pointed, one should be facing a mirror. Reality, right now, is very much out of line with our expectations. The ways we expect things to be in the world of policing, and the way they actually are, are two different things. We refuse somehow to see what we really see! While we’re doing somewhat better in reducing the incidence of crime during the past few years, we’re not nearly as effective as we could be. Things occur around us every day that we simply ignore or pretend not to be affected by. We’ve lost our sense of community, of responsibility to one another, and our greater sense of family.
“What conditions would have to exist before you’d commit a crime? How can an offender overcome the effects of a system designed to keep violators repressed? If bad guys can’t interact with good people in society, how do we get them to behave better? When do we as a society accept that there’s a place in our culture for punishment, but also for compassion? The greater punishment, it seems, is to have people accept responsibility for their actions, provide remuneration to their victims, and become useful, productive members of society—not to merely accept confinement to a cell.
“Only through cooperation and collaboration—with the police as facilitators and the public as interested, active participants—do our streets get taken back. Remember, the police don’t take back the streets! You people do! Only when you’ve had enough, and you begin to work with the police, can we make any real progress toward taking back our streets. You and I have to accept that we are, in fact, our brother’s keeper.” He stepped back.
There was another energetic ovation and while we were still clapping, the man standing next to me leaned over and said, “Well, what do you think?”
I answered, “I’m really glad I didn’t rush all the way here only to find a stereotypical good ole’ boy drawling and drooling all over the podium.”
“Me, too,” he said, smiling as if he’d just gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Leaning toward his ear, I said, “I don’t believe I’ve ever heard another chief—or any cop, for that matter—say the kind of things I heard come out of this guy’s mouth tonight. Are you sure he’s a cop?”
Chuckling, the man said, “He has some interesting views regarding police community partnerships, doesn’t he? Who’s ever heard of a police chief who’s really willing to hold the cops accountable or who’s willing to share information about it with the public? You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“I know. He’s bound to catch some flak about saying he believes racial profiling is going on and that he won’t tolerate it. Wait until that hits the morning paper!
