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This is scandalous. I wonder if you could somehow sue the police for not doing their job, or report the guy who refused to investigate.

maximinus_thrax 4y ago
At least in the US, you can't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_of_Castle_Rock_v._Gonzales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_of_Castle_Rock_v._Gonzale... Not sure about other jurisdictions.
zdragnar 4y ago
There seems to be some silly misconception that police sit around twiddling their thumbs doing their level best to ignore crime. The truth is there is far more crime being reported than they can possibly respond to, especially in places like Seattle (which has the highest per-capita rate of property crime overall in the nation, iirc). On top of that, police staffing levels are at historic lows in some cities- in Seattle, they're at a 30-year low. If someone isn't in immediate danger, and the situation isn't evolving, the item stolen is particularly mobile and difficult to identify (such as a commodity bike), and not worth a lot of money (cars worth much more are stolen every day) it's going to be way at the bottom of their priority list.
- dclowd9901 4y ago
  Property crime is up everywhere. Nothing societally has changed, so I think the onus is on you to prove they aren’t just sitting there twiddling their thumbs. With their powerful unions and patterns of “blue flu”, the police don’t exactly have a great track record of response (not even going into the weeds of armed responses gone awry).
  - zdragnar 4y ago
    Here is some super trivial googling for you: https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/wa/seattle/crime https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/wa/seattle/crime Over 46k crimes (property and violent) 1200 officers funded, though I've seen other stats that there are only 940 active employed 800k 911 calls per year https://www.seattle.gov/police/about-us/about-the-department/department-fact-sheet https://www.seattle.gov/police/about-us/about-the-department... That's 3-ish 911 responses per day, assuming an average of one officer for every call. Add on top of that all of the other things happening, and you would need to be wilfully blind to believe they are sitting around with nothing better to do than look for a stolen bike.
    - yodsanklai 4y ago
      46k crimes, that would be about 120 crimes per day for 1000 officers, probably including a lot of smaller crimes such as stolen bikes. If they never investigate a stolen bike (esp. in that case where the stolen bike was localized), they make bike stealing de facto legal. That being said, I understand they need to prioritize.
    - dclowd9901 4y ago
      911 calls can’t be used in this metric since they encompass non-police emergencies and non-emergencies as well. So going off reported crimes, we have 1/10 of a crime per officer per day, or maybe better put, 1 crime per 10 days per officer. So tell me more about how they’re not twiddling their thumbs. Even accounting for administrative work (court appearances, paperwork, etc), that is a ridiculously low crime response rate.
      - zdragnar 4y ago
        You can't seriously write off 800,000 emergency calls because "maybe not all of them require police response", and then presume that 9/10 police officers sit around twiddling their thumbs. This is pure intellectual dishonesty. Edit: Also, there's more that police do than administrative paperwork and investigating crime. I'd hazard a guess that a plurality, if not a majority, of police officers on any given shift are walking a beat, patrolling, enforcing traffic laws (i.e. speed limits), car crashes, etc.
        vkou 4y ago
        SPD hasn't done any meaningful traffic enforcement for years. The roads are an utter madhouse. They might show up to a car crash, though.
- vkou 4y ago
  > (which has the highest per-capita rate of property crime overall in the nation, iirc). 12th on burglary, 13th on larceny, 40th on motor vehicle theft, 14th 'total' out of 100 US cities. 51st on violent crime, though, so surely, there should be plenty of police resources that aren't devoted on homicides and assaults and drug violence, and other things of that nature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_crime_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...

maximinus_thrax 4y ago

At least in the US, you can't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_of_Castle_Rock_v._Gonzales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_of_Castle_Rock_v._Gonzale... Not sure about other jurisdictions.

zdragnar 4y ago

There seems to be some silly misconception that police sit around twiddling their thumbs doing their level best to ignore crime. The truth is there is far more crime being reported than they can possibly respond to, especially in places like Seattle (which has the highest per-capita rate of property crime overall in the nation, iirc). On top of that, police staffing levels are at historic lows in some cities- in Seattle, they're at a 30-year low. If someone isn't in immediate danger, and the situation isn't evolving, the item stolen is particularly mobile and difficult to identify (such as a commodity bike), and not worth a lot of money (cars worth much more are stolen every day) it's going to be way at the bottom of their priority list.

dclowd9901 4y ago
Property crime is up everywhere. Nothing societally has changed, so I think the onus is on you to prove they aren’t just sitting there twiddling their thumbs. With their powerful unions and patterns of “blue flu”, the police don’t exactly have a great track record of response (not even going into the weeds of armed responses gone awry).
- zdragnar 4y ago
  Here is some super trivial googling for you: https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/wa/seattle/crime https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/wa/seattle/crime Over 46k crimes (property and violent) 1200 officers funded, though I've seen other stats that there are only 940 active employed 800k 911 calls per year https://www.seattle.gov/police/about-us/about-the-department/department-fact-sheet https://www.seattle.gov/police/about-us/about-the-department... That's 3-ish 911 responses per day, assuming an average of one officer for every call. Add on top of that all of the other things happening, and you would need to be wilfully blind to believe they are sitting around with nothing better to do than look for a stolen bike.
  - yodsanklai 4y ago
    46k crimes, that would be about 120 crimes per day for 1000 officers, probably including a lot of smaller crimes such as stolen bikes. If they never investigate a stolen bike (esp. in that case where the stolen bike was localized), they make bike stealing de facto legal. That being said, I understand they need to prioritize.
  - dclowd9901 4y ago
    911 calls can’t be used in this metric since they encompass non-police emergencies and non-emergencies as well. So going off reported crimes, we have 1/10 of a crime per officer per day, or maybe better put, 1 crime per 10 days per officer. So tell me more about how they’re not twiddling their thumbs. Even accounting for administrative work (court appearances, paperwork, etc), that is a ridiculously low crime response rate.
    - zdragnar 4y ago
      You can't seriously write off 800,000 emergency calls because "maybe not all of them require police response", and then presume that 9/10 police officers sit around twiddling their thumbs. This is pure intellectual dishonesty. Edit: Also, there's more that police do than administrative paperwork and investigating crime. I'd hazard a guess that a plurality, if not a majority, of police officers on any given shift are walking a beat, patrolling, enforcing traffic laws (i.e. speed limits), car crashes, etc.
      - vkou 4y ago
        SPD hasn't done any meaningful traffic enforcement for years. The roads are an utter madhouse. They might show up to a car crash, though.
vkou 4y ago
> (which has the highest per-capita rate of property crime overall in the nation, iirc). 12th on burglary, 13th on larceny, 40th on motor vehicle theft, 14th 'total' out of 100 US cities. 51st on violent crime, though, so surely, there should be plenty of police resources that aren't devoted on homicides and assaults and drug violence, and other things of that nature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_crime_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...