Monday, October 19, 2015
What?!!! He Can't Be Serious! I Hope What We Need Is a New Police Chief.
I got from Chuck Ross, our CrimeWatch Chairman, an e-mail about crime events over this past weekend. Our police chief, Cornelius (Rusty) McKenna, had the nerve to make the following statements about us:
THEFTS: Four cars were illegally entered by an unknown person(s) overnight. Two were on NE 116th St near 7th Ave, one was on NE 119th St. near 9th Ave, and one was on NE 115th St. near 7th Ave. All of the four cars were unlocked. A Dell Laptop computer was taken from one car, and a child’s lunch pail was taken from another car. All four of the cars were ransacked. If you have any information about any of the thefts, please contact Detective Lieutenant Pineda at 786-447-7122.
I have highlighted in red, and italics, and bold, the outrageous assertion Rusty made. The outright nerve of this man. What kinds of rubes does he think we are, anyway? Well, what kind? To accuse us--at least four of us-- of walking away from our cars, and going into our homes for the night, and not locking our car doors! Does he think we were born yesterday? Anyway, if the Chief, or even Chuck Ross, thinks it's important that we lock our car doors, why didn't they ever tell us that?
And as if this wasn't insulting enough, he also took the trouble to point out that one of our very own neighbors saw something very suspicious, and didn't even intervene personally! Instead, the neighbor called 911. The result of this tactic was to invoke police action, further resulting in the detention of someone who had two loaded handguns with him. If Rusty is suggesting that BP residents themselves aren't courageous enough to confront an unknown trespasser who has two loaded handguns, I can't see how he could have been more patronizing.
Clearly, I intend to take all of this up with Heidi Siegel, our Manager. Just wait until she finds out what Rusty is saying, for worse and for "better," about BP residents.
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Two people have contacted me about this post. One was concerned that the tongue-in-cheek sarcasm would go unrecognized, and that the impression would be that I was criticizing our police, or our Chief. The other assumed that was exactly what I was doing--criticizing them-- and appreciated my confrontation of them.
ReplyDeleteThis issue, of car doors left unlocked, has come up many times. Apparently, no matter how many times it comes up, it isn't enough. LOCK YOUR CAR DOORS!
As for whether we are getting adequate service from our police, my sense of it is that we very definitely are. But there is never an endpoint, and it is always important to improve every place there is to improve. And we will.
I'm a little embarrassed to recall having participated in trumpeting what we thought were the remarkable successes of our last police administration, only to learn they were portrayed as more impressive than they really were. The fact that that doesn't happen any more is not a reason to criticize our current force, or our management.
If we can do better, we will.
Fred
From Linda Dillon:
ReplyDeleteSometimes I find your comments about residents to be disparaging. This time I think you give some too much credit for being able to understand your message.
Just saying.
L.
My guess is if someone was predisposed to think that you were being serious about the police then they would completely miss the sarcasm.
ReplyDeleteAlso, if they just read the lead and skimmed the content they won't get it.
Anyway, just to reinforce the point of your post, I don't know what more we can possibly do to ask people to check that their cars are locked up at night. It's a crime of opportunity. There are now five reports for early morning Monday, no doubt it was the same person or persons. They all were in the area of 115th to 119th St from NE 7th to NE 9th Ave. So what you probably have is one crime committed 5 times. If anyone else had their car rummaged through, please file a police report. Call the MDC Non-Emergency # 305-476-5423
So please folks, lock those cars up at all times and check them twice.
Lastly, if you see something or someone suspicious stay away and call 911. Besides the fact that you may put yourself in harm’s way you will also scare them away before the police arrive on the scene.
Chuck Ross
I should add that we should all give a Big "Shout Out" to the resident that acted properly by calling 911 and did not insert
ReplyDeletethemself in the situation, this resulted in an arrest and the seizure of two hand guns that are now off the street.
Also to the resident that called 911 in connection with the attempt to steal the wheels off the Porsche on Griffing Blvd.
And last but not least another Big "Shout Out" goes to our Police Officers that promptly responded to both of these incidents and all the good work they do for us in Biscayne Park.
Chuck
And how!
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