Chawla's is among hundreds of car burglary reports this year that Dallas police have labeled untrustworthy. In doing so, the department escapes reporting their existence to federal authorities who keep track of crime statistics.

The procedure, implemented last year, is one of several initiatives designed to bring down Dallas' crime numbers in relation to other cities � or as police officials have put it, to more accurately report the amount of crime actually taking place.

But a Dallas Morning News review of car burglary reports from April revealed a system that lets real crime fall through the cracks.

Details.

Dallas PD's new procedure for blowing off victims may be cutting edge for law enforcement, but it is old hat for credit card companies, cell phone service companies, mortgage companies, banks, and in fact many big businesses that deal with the public.

These kinds of companies have big "Customer Service" departments, which could be staffed by well trained parrots, since all they usually say when there is a problem is: "we'll look into it," and then, "I'm sorry, but there is nothing we can do." They give the illusion the company is doing something, you get to talk to someone, but all they do is lead you round and round the mulberry bush. If you have been extremely fortunate, and not had a run-in with these bandits, go to


BankOfAmericaSucks
.com to see what I mean.

I am very saddened that a major police department has so lost sight of its reason for being that it would adopt these dishonest tactics.

[This message was edited by Terry Breen on 09-16-09 at .]

[This message was edited by Terry Breen on 09-16-09 at .]

Dallas PD is engaging in the kind of gamesmanship that only ACORN can appreciate.

If you are ashamed of your statistics, do something honest about it. And, adopting a new way to "count" while pretending that nothing has changed, is not honest.

In a one-week sample of cases from this summer, a Dallas Morning News review estimated that the department's tally of aggravated assaults should have been at least 50 percent higher.

Details.

I have to say I'm on the Dallas PD's side on this one. Every single case that some weapon is alleged to be used can not be proven to be an agg assault--in fact we just lost a jury trial on one of those with a bottle because we couldn't prove the bottle existed (we think it broke and the officer didn't retrieve pieces) and there were varying versions of how it was used....and there was no scar to be seen. Just because the FBI says "uniformity" is essential doesn't make it that simple. Maybe they should change their classifications to show that an assault involved any weapon rather than the only two choices being simple assault and deadly weapon--that would make their reporting even more clear, I would think.


And that leads me to my next question that has probably been discussed before...why isn't there something in-between in our Penal Code? It seems logical that hitting someone with a cement block ought to have a higher punishment range than a fist (even if it was not used in a way that could actually kill you or permanently impair you), so why not an offense involving a weapon, without having to show that the it was intended or used as a deadly weapon?? Has that been discussed in Texas before?

Back in the 80s, when I worked for a police department, we were taking a lot of stolen vehicle reports and finding a lot of occupied stolen vehicles that had been reported in other jurisdictions.

The filing policy of the DA's office (at the time) made it virtually impossible to file a theft charge, so we opted to file UUMV. It was much easier to proof and back then UUMV was a 3rd degree felony.

UUMV was not a reportable crime, so according to the UCR report, we didn't have any auto thefts in our city for about a year.

[This message was edited by John B. Lyons on 12-15-09 at .]

[This message was edited by John B. Lyons on 12-31-09 at .]

If you report your car burglarized, Dallas police are more likely now to take your word for it than they were a few months ago - and your report is more likely to be counted in the city's crime rate.

Details.

[This message was edited by JB on 01-01-10 at .]

I don't see the difference in Dallas PD manipulating statistics and the practice of some DA's offices changing convictions on plea bargains. It seems to be common practice to plea a DWI down to a lesser offense--sometimes even a class C. The DA's office then claims an astronomical conviction rate during the next election cycle.

rns

I which case both are wrong

I have never seen a coviction rate touted in an election.

I've seen an opponent raise the acquittal rate against an incumbent.

More than a hundred retired New York Police Department captains and higher-ranking officers said in a survey that the intense pressure to produce annual crime reductions led some supervisors and precinct commanders to manipulate crime statistics, according to two criminologists studying the department.

Details.