Savannah-Chatham police know where most of the city’s violence occurs.
Using statistics from last year, the department has generated maps showing where the highest concentrations of shootings and robberies took place. Maj. Richard Zapal is using that information to direct an overtime detail of officers to the areas hit hardest by such crimes, and he expects to see an impact.
The Robberies and Aggravated Assaults Interdiction Detail puts five uniformed officers in marked patrol cars in five beats that collectively saw more than 70 aggravated assaults and 100 robberies in 2014. They can’t leave unless they’re helping a nearby officer or another one on the same detail, and they’re not assigned to respond to the typical calls for service the rest of the police on patrol are riding.
“We’re not going to send them on a barking-dog call,” Zapal said. “They’re out there specifically for deterrence. They’re out there for visibility. They’re out there to talk to people and let people know that we’re taking the streets back.”
The major said he thinks people in these areas are comfortable committing crimes because they’re close to where they live.
“I want the criminals uncomfortable in their own environment,” he said.
The highest-priority hot spot is Cuyler-Brownville and its immediate surrounding area. That’s where Zapal says police are seeing aggravated assaults and robberies overlap. Twenty-six aggravated assaults and 13 robberies were reported in that neighborhood last year. Nearby Metropolitan saw 12 aggravated assaults and 24 robberies.
“The major concern right now for everyone in the community is the shooting, so that’s what we’ve got to solve,” he said.
Other areas police are targeting include neighborhoods immediately southwest of Forsyth Park, along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and around the entertainment district of downtown.
Downtown it’s mainly robberies, Zapal said. For the stats police are using for the operation, a purse snatching gets classified the same as an armed robbery.
Zapal cautioned that the stats are based on a year’s worth of information: People aren’t getting robbed downtown or shot every day. In all of 2014, 18 robberies were reported in the area of downtown where most bars, restaurants and entertainment venues are located.
“They’re not bad areas,” Zapal said. “They’re just where we have some numbers and we’re trying to cut those numbers.”
The seven-day-a-week operation, funded on overtime, puts one officer in each of the five beats and has a sergeant. The officers work two shifts during times police say data show them crimes are occurring.
Goals are for officers working the operation to talk to at least three residents or suspicious people and come in contact with at least two businesses per shift. Zapal expects at least a 10 percent reduction in aggravated assaults and robberies and quicker response times.
Zapal said the operation is “just good police work,” and that sometimes criminals will notice such initiatives and use phones to let each other know where officers are. The idea with this one, though, is not to give them anywhere else to go.
“We keep moving and they keep calling,” Zapal said. “Sooner or later, you go, ‘The cops are everywhere — let’s just go home.’”
Alderman Van Johnson called the operation welcome.
“Criminals don’t feel threatened, and they entrench themselves in these areas, and everybody in these communities knows where these hot spots are,” Johnson said. “I would like to see (criminals) very uncomfortable.”
Zapal, too, said residents know when there’s a problem in their community.
“This is a police and community operation,” Zapal said. “We want people to see the cops out there riding on a regular basis in these areas where they know stuff happens.”