Board of Police Commissioners, Evening Community Meeting

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And they’re off! Meeting has been called to order

After some preliminary banter, the Board is moving on to the Chief of Police Report. Violent crime is down 12%

Chief Bettison has been traveling around doing various publicity events, including recruiting new officers.

Question from Comm’r Bernard:
I see that a percentage of mental health calls have gone unanswered. Why is that?

Answer: I don’t know. The policy is to answer them.

Pressley: why are some officers not presenting search warrants in request? Is it not standard practice?

Answer: there is no law that compels us to provide the warrant before the search is completed. Safety reasons

Note that a search warrant is required by the 4th Amendment to the US Constitution, protecting citizens from “unreasonable search and seizure”

My question is: if the police are not required to produce their warrant before the search, how can a person be sure they are conducting a legit search?

After praising Chief Bettison for his work, The commission moved on and will be hearing the 10th precinct report

10th precinct reports 12% reduction is part I crimes, although homicides are up

Armed robberies are up a surprising 38%, but the precinct says that is due to the way armed robberies are counted. That is, by victim rather than perpetrator.

The precinct has contracted 35 guns so far this year through search warrants and ShotSpotter

The 10th employs an “ended social worker” to help both victims and perpetrators

The Commission praised the captain of the 10th for his hard work and commitment to quickly answering citizens. Comm’r noted that they used to call the 10th the “Terrible 10th”

Next up, public comment

First caller expressed his concerns about the continuing issue of people running red lights, and opined that that contributes to the intolerable insurance rates in the city.

Next commenter called in to praise the DPD 10th precinct for responding so quickly to her crisis. She, a senior citizen, experienced a malfunction in her loft and the DPD came and “rescued” her in less than 5 minutes.

Darryl Woods is leaving the Commission and his replacement will be elected soon.

Moving into Unfinished business , they want to extend the special orders they are currently working under. The orders are in the packet given to the Board, but not provided to the public. But here are all DPD’s current policies and orders.

https://detroitmi.gov/node/75186

Passed unanimously

The meeting was adjourned at 7:25pm

Well folks, this closes my coverage of the Detroit Board of Police Commissioners meeting for March 13th. Learn more about our coverage of local meetings at https://documenters.org

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