Montgomery County police responded to a report of a 2nd-degree assault at Westfield Montgomery Mall in Bethesda on the evening of October 24, 2024. The assault was reported at the mall at 7:22 PM. Two police cruisers pulled up to Entrance 5 by The Cheesecake Factory in response to the incident.
This was the tenth assault reported at the mall this year, which has already doubled the five assaults reported in all of 2023 at the popular retail center. The last assault took place on August 8. Montgomery County police opened a "resource room" at the mall in 2022, in an attempt to address elevated crime at the property - part of a general crime wave that has persisted countywide since 2020, after the County Council defunded the police - after 12 assaults were reported there that year. The police department is down 194 officers since 2020, and 179 police officer positions are now vacant, according to a County Council staff memo released earlier this year.
19 comments:
Easy solution, let the Council Council moonlight as guards.
If MCPD has 179 open positions, that speaks to a recruitment issue, not a problem with the police having been "defunded." The county isn't holding open 179 slots for which they have no money to pay the salaries.
6:03: I provided a link right there to the FY-21 defunding that took place in 2020. If you want to address vacant positions and recruitment, ask why a prospective police officer would want to work in a jurisdiction where a majority of the elected officials have publicly expressed anti-police views.
Why would anyone want to do such a thankless job? I am very grateful for the job they do but there are so many who aren’t. The disrespect that some show these officers is disgraceful.
Do you remember when residents of East Bethesda were "up in arms" with a sign posted at the Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church on East West Highway that said: “Grateful for our cops putting their lives on the line each day for you & me?” No wonder it is difficult for Montgomery County to recruit police officers. https://moco360.media/2020/06/19/bethesda-church-sign-praising-police-officers-upsets-some-local-residents/
Goodness, I had no idea the police were so delicate. "[E]lected officials have publicly expressed anti-police views." what ever became of the old saw, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me"? Was it the creation of the Police Accountability Board that set our local police sulking? Perhaps it was the DOJ-mandated consent decree, requiring data be kept on police interactions with the public, which was issued after multiple claims were substantiated of racial profiling and of violation of citizen's Constitutional rights by law enforcement? Was it the mandatory use of bodycams by uniformed officers that sparked police outrage? Their compulsory anti-bias training? "Ensuring guardian culture in department's mission, value statements, training, and other literature"? (Quoted from this 4/17/23 memorandum from Susan J. Farag, Legislative Analyst --https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/council/Resources/Files/agenda/cm/2023/20230420/20230420_PS1.pdf)
There is a commonly held belief that crime can be effectively battled only by cloaking law enforcement in a veil of secrecy and allowing them unfettered, unrestrained, unaccountable total freedom to act however they choose in the execution of their duties; that any oversight, any accountability or expectation police function within the monumentally lenient, vast, generous boundaries established by the courts and legislatures will paralyze them, render them Kryptonite-impotent to investigate crimes and arrest offenders. Nonsense. Let's look at today's (October 28, 2024) news, shall we?
"On Monday, officials with the Montgomery County Department of Police (MCPD) talked with members of the Montgomery County Council Public Safety Committee about how crime against people, property and society has significantly decreased from last year along with initiatives they’ve implemented to continue reducing crime. . . Crimes against persons are 3% less, crimes against property are 3.9% less and crimes against society are 21.3% lower than in 2023."
https://www.dcnewsnow.com/news/local-news/maryland/montgomery-county/statistics-show-crime-is-down-across-montgomery-county/
As for the link you mentioned, Farag says FY19 authorized sworn compliment was 1,307 and has been at 1,280-1,282 since FY20. That has zero to do with how many people have decided to either apply for or retire from MCPD. There is a PD staffing shortage, no question, you betcha. It is obvious from listening to a scanner, where one now frequently hears non-emergency calls held until later --the barking dogs, cars double-parked, loud party complaints that 30 years ago were seen to by an officer upon receiving the complainant's call are now frequently held while cops are tied up with actual *crime* stuff. (Those calls do get taken care of, but not as quickly as once they were.) So, yes, you and I would be better served if more people chose to accept the county’s $20,000 signing bonus to join up for one of those many score empty positions at MCPD. But if people elect not to sign up, it is disingenuous to blame the staffing shortage on budget cuts. The overwhelming majority of the active headcount reductions in police personnel owe to people who have chosen not to be employed as police officers in this jurisdiction. Since FY19, actual budget cuts have reduced sworn personnel by 25, according to Farag. The balance are people who either quit, retired, or chose never to join in the first place. That failure to attract and retain personnel is a HUGE problem that needs to be addressed, especially if, as Farag suggests, more retirements are looming in the coming year. But it is not caused by the county bean-counters culling the number of cops they're willing to pay. Quite the opposite, as that 20 grand bonus attests.
N/a, eloquent but your argument fails, crime is up, what other misinfo is embedded in your observations? The bottom line is crime, up. Police numbers, down, disrespect, up, bad morale, up, criminal mollycoddling, off the charts. If you were close to correct, even DT SS would be safe. There is no doubt that MC is going the way of PG County and DC. Eloquence won't stop.the perps.
I appreciate your posting this information. MoCo and Westfield keep it hidden. Crime at the mall is the problem, and shoppers need to know. Next, they need to do something about safety for all of the people that work there when they leave at night.
Thank you
It's a mixed bag, with car thefts down, shoplifting up. Details in WTOP link, below. Data released by MoCo yesterday.
Article:
Montgomery Co. crime stats show downward trends, but continued problems
https://wtop.com/montgomery-county/2024/10/montgomery-county-crime-downward-trends-continued-problems/
Great idea!!!
@12:22, I'm glad MCPD's presenting statistics to the contrary do nothing to sway you from your unsubstantiated feeling that "crime is up." In matters like this, are you going to be swayed by demonstrable facts and actual data, or are you going to listen to your gut? Oh, and full marks for your citing Silver Spring crime to reject the county's overall crime rate. Sort of like someone painting the entire house --except the porch-- and your rejecting any claims the house is more painted than it was, because --porch!
Eloquence may not stop perps, but it does a fair job showing your logic to be porous and wrong.
@11:23 Try checking the revised FBI statistics which went from over a 2% drop in violent crime to more than a 4% increase. Of course your networks don't report bad news that affect the left. Keep telling everyone not to believe their lying eyes.
Tell us what the immunity shot is that MoCo can get, that will differentiate us from the rest of the country.
When you're a victim, it jumps to 100 percent. We're all victims eventually unless you live with Security. Keep believing crime is down and you're just aiding and abetting. Bring them to your neighborhood, not mine. Crime is up everywhere.
12:22 let's talk after you get (nowadays mildly) assaulted and threatened, almost robbed but for too many witnesses, and try to file a police report. They will do their level best to keep from adding more numbers. That perp just goes to another victim, next opportunity. Next summer will be interesting times.
Slowing down criminals in the mall? Is that why ALL the escalators at the mall were "broken" on one side yesterday? Had to hunt for the elevator in Macy''s but now I know where it is....next to the women's restroom that is finally getting a much needed renovation:)
4:03 - Yes, I do remember that sign at Lourdes very well. This area is beyond disturbed when a message of support of the men and women in blue is a controversial one. That neighborhood is extremely Left of center.
IF it's true that the mall 's security strategy is to make it more difficult for thieves to get away, it just might be putting patrons in harm's way. Wouldn't surprise me one bit, but me thinks (and hopes) their logic is more about 'unnecessary' power consumption. Judging by the turn over and patronage certainly overhead costs have got to be brutal.
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