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Vjornaxx t1_iub84ji wrote

Reply to comment by TheRepoCode in Why are all these New Yorkers going to the Baltimore Police Academy? by caro822

>but the conventional wisdom is that BPD you don't learn shit.

That’s not true. If you spend a year in patrol, you are likely to have responded to multiple homicides, shootings, cuttings, robberies, car jackings, residential and commercial burglaries, and domestics. Very few other agencies offer that kind of experience.

Furthermore, the consent decree has made BPD’s law course extremely solid. It is popular on this sub to disparage the perceived knowledge of case law that BPD officers possess; but the truth is that BPD’s law program is one of the best ones in the nation and the BPD law staff is comprised of actual lawyers. Trainees come out of the academy with a solid law foundation and when they go through field training, they learn how to functionally apply case law to their actions.

When I have trainees, I always explain which case law is applicable to the actions I did or did not take. Before we arrive at calls, I tell them to explain to me what case laws may be applicable when we arrive and what that means for what we can and cannot do.

Officers with a year in patrol will respond to multiple hot calls that get their adrenaline pumping. They will participate in multiple foot chases. This means that they will develop effective strategies to manage the adrenaline dump and stay focused under stressful conditions and have a lot of experience doing it. They will be comfortable calling out suspect descriptions and locations on the radio. They will be comfortable dealing with subjects on scene screaming at them. They will have plenty of experience driving code in an urban environment.

In addition to the volume of critical incidents BPD officers will respond to, they will also be immersed in the narcotics trade. They will learn to recognize the players in the drug trade. They will learn how these crews operate, recognize the various drugs sold and how they are typically packaged and distributed. They will learn to recognize behaviors and signs that dealers are concealing drugs or weapons on or near them. They will learn to recognize the various paraphernalia that users keep on or near their person and what those objects are specifically used for. They will probably administer Narcan on an overdosing patient and probably administer CPR once or twice their first year.

I went to a conference with about 1000 cops from various agencies across America and very few outside of major cities have responded to a single homicide call. I was also shocked at how few of them were taught more than Terry v Ohio and Graham v Connor.

I admit that BPD has a lot it could do better, but it is a fact that officers with even a year on the street in Baltimore make for very strong candidates. It’s one of the reasons that we have such an immense staffing problem. Officers graduate and complete field training, then put in applications for other agencies who are happy to hire an officer with the kind of experience that BPD offers.

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HopefulSuccotash t1_iude67p wrote

You should do an AMA. I've got questions, feel free to ignore them or just answer the first one which relates to your actual comment.

Are we losing most of our top tier candidates to other agencies and do you have any idea what that costs us? (It happens in our school system and I don't know the cost)

Why does it often feel like the police work is extremely lackluster when you're the victim of a crime?

Ivan Bates says that he's going to get cops enforcing traffic laws and squeegee statutes. Is this realistic, or is he "pissing on my leg and telling me it's raining"?

What does the average day and average week look like on patrol?

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Vjornaxx t1_iudloee wrote

>Are we losing most of our top tier candidates to other agencies and do you have any idea what that costs us? (It happens in our school system and I don't know the cost)

I don’t believe that the quality of candidates plays into who is leaving. Officers across the board are leaving and it’s not limited to Baltimore. For officers with more time, other agencies offer higher pay for the same amount of years in grade in addition to large signing bonuses. For newer officers, they may be using BPD as a stepping stone towards their first choice agency. Other officers might want to get into specialized units and other agencies offer a better chance to do the kind of work they’d like. Some officers have had bad experiences and want to work for an agency or jurisdiction that has stronger relationships with officers.

As to the cost - I can only speculate and I wouldn’t even know where to begin. Trainees are taught as a class, so the money spent paying training staff and facility upkeep isn’t exactly lost. If the trainee graduated, made it through field training, and spent any time pushing a car in patrol, then the city got something out of them which means they put their training to use, so it’s not a lost cost; and I don’t think you could argue that their paycheck was somehow a lost investment if that officer answered calls for service. If it was an officer with a lot of time on, I think the cost is better viewed as loss of experienced personnel rather than a financial loss directly attributable to retention.

>Why does it often feel like the police work is extremely lackluster when you're the victim of a crime?

There is a lot that may contribute to this perception.

The FBI defines crimes in their Uniform Crime Reporting standard. Many calls that I respond to do not actually rise to the level of a reportable crime per UCR. Common calls include reports of “threats” which do not actually fit the definition of an assault by threat and is therefore simply a dispute which is not a crime.

Also, even with a UCR crime, enforcement can only take place when a suspect is identifiable. From a patrol perspective, we do our best to try to interview witnesses and canvass for cameras; but when we can not immediately identify a suspect, that task usually falls on detectives. I have not worked in a detective unit, but I know that the process of sifting through footage, statements, and interviews in order to positively identify a suspect takes a lot of time. Furthermore, the case load that BPD detectives carry is ridiculous - easily 4 to 5 times the FBI recommended case load per detective.

In many cases, it is almost impossible to identify a suspect in a manner which rises to probable cause. It is the difference between what you know and what you can prove. This is common with larceny incidents. Person A left their stuff in their house while Person B was also there. Person B leaves and Person A’s property is missing. Person A did not see Person B take it. Person B probably took it, but there is not enough evidence to name Person B as the suspect.

In other cases, the suspect description is so generic and cameras captured barely usable footage that there is little hope of actually identifying the offender. Even more common is that someone did see who did it, but refuses to cooperate with the police.

Even if an incident gets all the way to identifying the suspect, sometimes the responsibility of filing charges against that suspect falls upon the victim. This is true in cases such as a destruction of property, common assault (not domestic), larceny, and trespassing. In many cases, particularly domestic incidents, the victim refuses to show up for court or file for a protective order and then get angry at responding officers for “not doing anything.”

>Ivan Bates says that he's going to get cops enforcing traffic laws and squeegee statutes. Is this realistic, or is he "pissing on my leg and telling me it's raining"?

Maybe - it depends on how such a program is implemented. Mosby made a public statement and listed which crimes her office would decline to prosecute. Simply being able to enforce those named crimes would likely have a positive effect on enforcement. Quality of life crimes such as disorderly conduct, loitering, littering, spitting, etc. are generally not prosecuted and those types of charges can be useful tools to keep dealers off of corners. The problem with QOL crimes is that they are too easy to overuse and can lead to overzealous enforcement.

I’m not sure how the SAO would be able to increase traffic enforcement. There is no standing order to write traffic tickets and any such order would likely run afoul of laws against quotas; specifically Maryland PS § 3-504. I don’t see how the department could force officers to pull over more cars and issue more citations.

As for squeegee statutes - there is already a city code which prohibits squeegee behavior, Article 19 § 47-4 (4), but if the States Attorney’s Office declines to charge this crime, then it does not seem to be worth risking a foot chase in traffic and a use of force to enforce it. The question would still remain even if it were being prosecuted: Is it worth you or the suspect getting hit by a car or getting injured in a use of force for squeegeeing?

>What does the average day and average week look like on patrol?

It varies a lot by shift, by day of the week, and by season.

Midnights may get calls from 2300h - 0300h, but then the volume goes to almost zero. Day work doesn’t usually get calls until 1000h. Swing shift is almost always busy.

Peak crimes is usually on Friday and Saturday. Sunday is usually dead. Call volume peaks in the summer and dies down significantly in the winter.

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EthanSayfo t1_iubtu7k wrote

>In addition to the volume of critical incidents BPD officers will respond to, they will also be immersed in the narcotics trade.

Based on what we've learned about the GTTF, this certainly seems to be an accurate statement...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oShTJ90fC34&ab_channel=geekfemme2

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Vjornaxx t1_iucozgt wrote

GTTF is something that BPD does not shy away from. The officers that were involved and their conduct are used as case studies in the academy. Every trainee that hits the streets has GTTF as a reminder of what happens to them if they do things the wrong way.

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EthanSayfo t1_iucwynh wrote

That’s honestly good to hear, but here’s a question: Was GTTF the underlying disease, or just a symptom?

Please bear with the public who thinks that maybe just maybe, it was more of a symptom. We all know how much looking the other way happens, and how this culture allowed GTTF to happen.

I for one have a difficult time believing it’s all just been sorted out, because the GTTF got busted (long, long after it should have been noticed and put down).

With that said, as a community I feel we do need to be open to a BPD that can genuinely improve (and here’s a note: the public does NOT overwhelmingly feel this process is complete — not by a long shot).

But this notion that everything in BPD is just all sorted out and squeaky-clean at this point? Going to take more than some overtime community engagement on Reddit to have most of us convinced.

We eagerly await the day when we actually are, as the city needs a healthy and productive police force.

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Vjornaxx t1_iud6z7h wrote

The opinion of the public at large is going to be slow to change and that is largely due to the fact that police don’t interact with as many lawful citizens as we do with citizens with a long history of criminal involvement. The stories that news outlets choose to publish rarely cover the gun, drug, or domestic arrests we make every day - and it is our conduct on those incidents that establishes our reputation with the people we interact with the most.

I cannot speak for all officers, but I know that my conduct on those types of incidents has earned me a reputation of being fair. I know that I work hard to show trainees that earning a reputation on the street for being fair makes everyone’s lives easier. I know that at least at the patrol level, the cultural changes that have taken place within the department have been significant. But cultural shifts take time to fully set in and one of the side benefits of being understaffed is that there is a lot of new blood coming out of the academy who are learning how to police the modern way.

BPD still has a lot of work to do to earn trust from the public at large. But I think that the public simply does not see the things that might sway their opinions. The public does not see the daily interactions we have with our “regulars.” The public does not seem to know or does not seem to care about the training that BPD puts its officers through. The public attributes a large amount or issues with the city to the police, even when the issues are outside of police control.

So yes, there is work to be done. Yes, the public still isn’t 100% on board with BPD. But I know that on my post and in my sector, the public wants us there. The community members feel comfortable enough with me to walk up to me and talk about their issues. It’s only the dealers on the corner who don’t want me around - and they may not like what I do, but they have never accused me of being unfair.

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EthanSayfo t1_iudhxyf wrote

Listen, I appreciate your thoughtful response, and acknowledgement that there is still work to be done.

I absolutely respect the police of the city who do the hard work day in and day out, and do it without breaking the law themselves. Please know that 95%+ of the community wants BPD to be the best possible version of itself.

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