Police Show It’s a Bad Time to Try Crime

Last week’s earthquake has brought out the best in many Southern Californians, thousands of whom have rallied to help friends and neighbors in need. It has also, according to police, drawn out some of the region’s dumbest criminals.

On Monday, police say, a pair of 18-year-old wanna-be bank robbers, with ski masks and an automatic pistol, spotted a financial institution that must have looked ripe for robbing. According to police officers and FBI agents, the youths burst into the bank, near Ventura and Reseda boulevards, and threatened to kill anyone who stood between them and the money.

But they must have overlooked the roving anti-looter patrols outside the bank because when they came storming out, police say, the two suspects ran smack into one of the largest police deployments in the modern history of Los Angeles.

Within minutes, the money was recovered and both suspects were arrested.

Meanwhile, three less-than-brilliant burglars were busy stealing a stereo from a parked car. As a witness called police, the suspects fled to a nearby parking lot at Birmingham High School--a local command post for the LAPD and the National Guard.

Less than two minutes later, all three were in handcuffs.

“What’s always been on our side when you’re dealing with criminals is that I don’t think they’re dealing with a full deck,” said LAPD Sgt. Dan Mastro. “Anybody who would do this with all these people deployed out here is definitely very stupid.”

LAPD officials say the quick arrests are testament not only to the stupidity of some criminals but to the effectiveness of flooding an area with police. That argument, of course, serves the department’s political interests, as Chief Willie L. Williams and Mayor Richard Riordan stump for a plan to increase the size of the LAPD.

More officers not only make quicker arrests, department leaders say, but also deter crime. Arrests since the earthquake have dropped dramatically, suggesting to department analysts that the abundance of police officers has helped persuade some would-be criminals that they are better off cooling their heels at home.

The LAPD arrested 73 people in the 24 hours after the quake struck Monday morning, a fraction of the number of arrests the department makes during an average 24-hour period. In 1993, the LAPD arrested more than 190,000 people for various crimes--an average of 534 a day.

Department officials credited public cooperation and the large deployment of police officers for the one-day drop after the quake, and their enthusiasm grew when the numbers stayed low all week. As of Tuesday, the LAPD had arrested 405 people since the quake--fewer people in a week than it normally corrals in a day.

“I like to think that in a way the earthquake is proving to be the antidote to the riots,” said Police Commission President Gary Greenebaum, who is both a rabbi and a police commissioner. “During the riots, there was a tendency to deny or ignore each other’s humanity. . . . A natural disaster like this is a humbling process, and people are beginning to recognize each other’s humanity again.”

But while Greenebaum the rabbi credits an outpouring of community good will for the low number of arrests, Greenebaum the police commissioner adds that more police officers have almost certainly helped that good will along.

“We really have been able to show that more officers on the beat does lower the crime rate,” he said.

City Council members and residents also have praised the beefed-up police patrols, particularly in the hard-hit areas of the San Fernando Valley. Many attribute the absence of looting in the wake of the earthquake--in contrast to the rash of crime that overwhelmed the city during the 1992 riots--to the presence of the extra police.

Officers derided during the riots have been welcomed in community after community this time, greeted by residents anxious for help in protecting their neighborhoods.

“The citizens out here love this deployment,” said Mastro. “At least for the moment, this is an extremely safe place to live.”

The LAPD has begun to scale back its mobilization, and some officers have returned from working 12-hour shifts to their regular eight hours a day. At least for the immediate future, the Valley will remain staffed with extra officers as specialized units are tapped to bolster the department’s presence in the area.

But no matter how long the mobilization continues or how many police patrol the streets of Los Angeles, officers admit their jobs will always be made easier by suspects who go about their business so ham-handedly.

“You know what they say,” Mastro said Wednesday. “If they were smart, they wouldn’t be criminals.”