Since “solving the crime” clearly states that the subject is in fact a crime and since it implies prosecution if necessary, I am not sure this is about decriminalization. Still, it is an interesting development socially and philosophically regarding the prioritization of crime and the protections a class of citizen gets regarding material wealth.
Something like this has been true in Lane County, Oregon where i live. Three or four years back, the county prosecutor announced that crimes of property were beyond the budget. Of course, the police don’t work to hard at unprosecutable crimes. If you have registered a complaint listing your lost items they will return your stuff to you if they run across it incidentally during an arrest. Also if you convince them that you are going to prosecute, and stay on the case with updated information, they are likely to help to some degree or another.
It has become an insurance and security thing. Much like tankers passing Somalia, it is about the balance of insurance premiums, fuel mileage for driving farther off shore and security deterrence.
The one who can’t afford the insurance, security and insulating distance has to consider a more dynamic equation of what they can afford to own.
So they still respond to residential burglaries? That’s really more than the police do here in the South SF bay area; for most property crimes you get a case number for insurance purposes and that’s it. Unlike in the UK, they discourage people from investigating things themselves, however. I can’t really blame them - fingerprints for non-violent crimes take years before they’ll get processed, and without someone actually seeing the crime, there’s little they can do, so why waste everyone’s time pretending otherwise?
A friend of mine had his wallet stolen from a gym, there was CCTV footage of the guy at all the places he used the stolen cards, and they still closed the case due to lack of evidence.
The police don’t respond to shit. Here’s your case number. Now fuck off and talk to your insurance company, we’ve got lucrative speeding motorists to catch.
I had my card cloned, and nobody at the police or the bank could give even the slightest crap about trying to catch someone.
A different friend got stabbed on the night bus (knifecrime island) and the basic response was, well, you shouldn’t have sat on the top deck. Case closed.
Arseholes, the stinking lot of them.
That’s why the next iteration is DIY incarceration. Warm up those arc-welders, you makers, there’s some bars to install on the basement windows!
Will they have time when I (UK equivalent of subpoena) the entirety of the UK surveillance net to find who stole my garden gnome?
“Can’t anybody in this town take the law into their own hands??”
Yeah, I witnessed a hit and run accident where the perp fucking left his license plate behind… and the cops blew it off. No injuries, right, so no incentive for them to care.
Racist cops enforcing selectively, using too much force, facing zero accountability and blowing off victims… there’s not much good reason to respect them or their law, is there?
Well, with the local police, I’m somewhat sympathetic. If you divide the number of reported property crimes by the police in the appropriate division, you end up with something like a couple hours total, at best, to devote to each report. That’s not enough time to get anywhere, so they can either do nothing for anyone, or devote their resources to a few of the more serious cases where they actually have a chance of getting results and deal with everything else in the most perfunctory way possible. Unfortunately this is indistinguishable from police officers who just can’t be arsed, which do, of course, also exist in places with better police officer/crime ratios.
It isn’t that distinguishable from having no police at all, either.
My sister’s a police officer. From what I understand from her the job is mostly dealing with the aftermath of domestic violence cases and road traffic accidents.
Anyway…
My house was burglarized in Baltimore a number of years ago. The police came out, and they even sent a forensic tech from the force to dust for prints. I was pretty impressed.
What really kind weirded me out is when I saw the tech that dusted my house for prints on a TV documentary a few years later regarding some horrible crime committed in Baltimore. I think it was one of those shows that’s behind the scenes in an ER, and it was about a child a parent had shaken to death for crying.
Bake 'em away, toys.
Weird. Years ago, I was reading up on the history of police, and one thing that stuck out was that the only category of crime at which police investigation had a better than even success rate was auto theft. So it’s odd they’d give that up.
The government would never go along with that. The current system of congressional bribery is far too profitable for congress to stop having other people pay private corporations to lock up the millions of non-violent, non-problematic, minor-drug-offense prisoners. Why would they take business away from the very people who shower lavish gifts, expensive trips, and high-paid post-congressional jobs on them?
The purpose of the police is not to serve citizens, but to serve the interests of the ruling class.
That is why money is found to spy on peaceful groups which oppose the ruling class, or for mass surveillance (got to keep us proles under control).
Anti-terrorism spending serves to keep us in a state of fear and gives them the tools for mass suppression of dissent.
You see this in the US where the police are so often an occupying force (and have that mentality).
This is not to say that individual officers do not sincerely wish to help, but the institution discourages that - to get on and keep your job (with the aim of helping people) you have to acquiesce to the institutional demmands, which do not allow you to help. A bit like politics really…
Are you rich or powerful? No?
The police isn´t here for you, silly.
Well if I gave to investigate it myself I’m sure they won’t mind it I try and convict myself will they? I think having all the fingers on one hand smashed with a hammer is fair for theft and toes if its vehicle related.
Mind you I suspect this is only for us plebs, if it’s the local mayor or a member of the grand lodge it’ll get top priority.
The “do your own investigating” bit gets me a lot. Among other things, does the UK not have rules of evidence?
When my bicycle was stolen = last century - I was obliged to report it to the police because the insurance companies require a case number before they’ll even consider paying up, which they did. But I remember being quite surprised that the local nick sent a police officer out to my place to interview me. I would have been quite happy to have gone to their place, if they’d asked, which they didn’t. I thought at the time that this was hardly being cost-effective for a non-serious crime (about 300 quidsworth of property, nobody hurt).
But that’s the custom and practice of the time. So I’m now quite surprised that - if true - they’re not even going to investigate beyond generating a case number for insurance purposes. They’re still going to have to do that, so it’s not as if this will cut down the numbers on the old crime statistics. Nor am I under any illusion that hordes of bobbies were out looking for my bike at the time. But - custom and practice, man, you don’t mess with custom and practice.
