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What became clear at Thursday night's packed community meeting about a rash of street robberies in the Silver Lake and Echo Park communities is that police and the community need to work more closely together. The need has always been there, but after residents felt angry when the city was slow to identify and report crime patterns, they took to the streets and internet with the information they had and spread the word themselves.
In total throughout LAPD's Northeast Division, which also covers communities as far East as Highland Park and Eagle Rock, there were 93 violent crimes, 52 of which that were robberies, between January 4th and 31st. Eleven of those were in the Silver Lake-Echo Park area, known to police as Basic Car A71. The 11 robberies that the basic car experienced was a 175% increase, or 7 more robberies than the same reporting period in 2008, police said last night.
LAPD Captain William Murphy admitted to those in attendance they need to get better at communicating with the public and pledged to so. But he and Councilman Tom Labonge said it was a two way street. "Some of it is on you," Murphy said.
Case in point, during Q&A, some residents described problems that they had known about for weeks but admitted they did not report it to the city. One detective said car break ins are often underreported. "If you're not going to tell your insurance, why would you tell me?" he said urging that residents really need to report all crimes, otherwise police cannot recognize all the crime patterns and focus attention where it needs to be.
But others said they've repeatedly called police for problems that have never gotten solved. "If you're not happy with our service, let us know, otherwise we don't know there is a problem," Murphy responded.
Labonge said they are looking into new ways to do more instant communication and a representative from Councilman Eric Garcetti's office said a needs assessment study is in progress to determine if it would make sense to divide Northeast Division and give the Silver Lake-Echo Park area its own police station. Silver Lake's street layout might be causing slower response times and a lack of presence.
No more large events are planned for the community yet, but a number of neighborhood watch meetings will probably be put together soon.
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Sounds like a good plan, I suppose no one noticed the increased graffiti on Tracy and Hyperion. But I suppose it's better late than never.
Easy to report, just call 3-1-1 any time of the day or go to this website and fill out the form: http://www.lacity.org/bpw/OCS/grsr.htm
My friend lives in Echo Park and had his car stolen from that area last month. The cops eventually found the car... one minor problem though, it was stripped.
A cousin and I used to talk about this years ago: eventually, the criminal element of said areas would notice the changes in the neighborhoods and want it back. Also, four cholos crossing paths with two skinny hipsters – come on, fish in a barrel. The honeymoon's over.
I hate to say it, but both Silver Lake and Echo Park still have unstable, gang infested areas. Not ready for prime-time gentrification. You can say you want to gentrify an area all you want, buy houses perched on a hill, and throw great martini parties, but you will not change the street neighborhoods unless you flush them with police and private security.
Street crime has always been, and will always be, a problem in Silver Lake and Echo Park. Either you wage all out war against the gangs and criminals....or you can kiss your real estate investment goodbye.
Someone who gets it. I love you.
Unfortunately, our community is lulled into a false sense of security because the LAPD crime maps on http://www.lapdcrimemaps.org/ contains WHOLLY INCOMPLETE crime data
You should research the ten robberies that the Northeast division claims is a part of this “trend.” NONE of the Silver Lake robberies including the slicing of the victim’s face robbery on Rowena appear on the crime maps. This total numbers fuzzing and creating public ignorance of crime in their own backyard. This is a prime hit story in the marking for this station or the LA Times to uncover. I’ve tracked dozens of robberies and Aggravated Assaults s in the Northeast division that do not appear on LAPD crime maps.
Reach out to Labonge & Garvetti, the LAPD Northeast Captains, and the Los Angeles Police Commission and ask why we were are being denied this info on the LAPD public crime maps. This map is suppose to inform the community with current data on major crimes in our neighborhood. This data is being grossly omitted and jeopardizes our safety.
Seriously with these comments? 4 cholos, 2 hipsters, fish in a barrel? You will not change the street neighborhoods unless you infest them with police? I thought I was reading LAist, not some conservative Republican website from Alabama. We moved into these neighborhoods. We knew what the history was. This is all part of the process of gentrification folks. How do you change this? Know your neighbors, genius. Instead of running to your car because that scary Mexican guy in that ridiculous outfit of "almost pants" (calf-length shorts with knee-high socks) is standing outside and might hurt your long haired skinny pants wearing ass, maybe you should try to engage them somehow. I don't know, make some stupid excuse to offer them a soda, or an extra copy of the newspaper or just fucking say hi! You know, if your cool with the "cholos" they tend to look out for you too. Maybe I'm being to idealistic, but its far better than making this an "us-vs-them" issue.
HAHA.
Ok.
Sure.
Hahahahaha ha... . You must come from wealth with that perspective. Engage them somehow? It sounds as if your talking about some curious neighborhood cat that pokes around your garbage. Homeboy sees your out of state ass as a mark. No one is "scared of the Mexicans" - stop trying to be the great voice of reason amongst the bigots. Give them a copy of the newspaper??? Where did you grow up?
As somebody who has lived in the area all his life, I can honestly say that the great majority of "concerned citizens" have no clue what they're scared of. They are scared of nothing. Judging from the people's accents (ranging from the Midwestern accent, to Boston, to Australian accent), a lot of people have no clue of the reality of their surroundings.
Put simply, the area is a relatively safe place to live if you use common sense. Make sure you keep your area well-lit at night. Make sure you don't have the car of a pack-rat saince that attracts thieves. Unfortunately, you also have to watch out for who you hire to do gardening & construction work in your area because these folks will look around your neighborhood in the day to see what they can steal & will have their friends come back at night to commit crimes. Still, this reality does not justify class warfare. Just be careful & use common sense. Don't talk about anything that reveals security vulnerabilities in your property or that makes your car attractive for theft.
Some of the questions asked at the meeting were frankly stupid. Among some included, "is there a gang war going on [in the Silverlake and Echo Park areas]" and "how can you identify a gang member?" First off, if there was a gang war, you'd know about it. Gang wars don't happen in Silverlake & Echo Park. Second, you should already know from, I don't know, common sense how to identify a gang member.
Another thing, "gang member" is just a code word the LAPD uses to make easier for them to prosecute poor minorities. We have no clue whether or not the criminals were actually gang members. Nobody bothered to ask "which gang" when the Captain Bill Murphy said gang members were out commiting these crimes. This is just rhetoric used to wage class warfare against poor minorities, a class of people considered useless to the creation of wealth. "Gang member" is a word automatically ascribed to ethinic minorities regardless of actual gang affiliation because it's easier to prosecute them. The LAPD, along with existing political machine, is just using this rise in crime to help their political clout. They don't actually care about hate crimes!
Nobody ever asks about people like Chief of Police Bill Bratton or Captain Bill Murphy about their potential ties to organized crime because of their Irish ancestry. Has anybody noticed that the leadership positions in the LAPD are being filled by Boston-accented Irish Americans? Nobody ever asks why Los Angeles would appoint police all the way from 3,000 miles away to be leaders in the LAPD. Is there something up? Were these individuals disgraced by scandal in their respective home towns? For all we know, the Irish mob could be running the LAPD! We don't know. Nodody cares to ask.
Let's not forget that, not too long ago, the Irish weren't popularly considered "whites." The word "hispanic" was reated by Nixon to ethnically segregate these people from the "whites." Before then, "hispanics" were considered white just like everybody else.
Stop the class warfare. People on this message board, rather than caring about the crime, seem really to care more about waging class warfare. The LAPD is happy to oblige, but only because it benefits their reputation. It's like G said, "I thought I was reading LAist, not some conservative Republican website from Alabama." If crime's a problem deal with it objectively. Don't give the LAPD a reason to ethnically cleanse areas of gentrified Los Angeles.