POSTCARD / ST. PETERSBURG : He Cried Wolf With This ‘Crime’ Report

This city’s mayor, Anatoly Sobchak, blames the Western media for St. Petersburg’s image as a burgeoning crime capital.

In fact, the most graphic report of crime here, as well as in other Russian cities, came in the form of a U.S. State Department advisory to Americans living in or visiting the country.

It warned: “Pickpocketing, assaults and robberies occur both day and night, and most frequently on city streets, in underground walkways and the subway; on inter-city trains, especially the Moscow-St. Petersburg overnight train; at markets, tourist attractions and restaurants, and in hotel rooms and residences, even when locked or occupied.”

In other words, danger lurks everywhere except church, the police station and Sobchak’s office.

While the mayor attempted to gloss over the problem, local law enforcement officials prepared for the worst. Recognizing that a crime wave during the Goodwill Games would provide even more fodder for the Western media, they recruited 3,000 policemen from other regions to join the 10,000 who are normally on the streets and increased patrols in the city by 65%.

“Perhaps we can’t protect our guests against a Martian invasion, but we are well prepared to cope with any serious trouble which could break out in a public place,” Col. Viktor Kuznetsov, Goodwill Games security chief, told the St. Petersburg Press.

According to the newspaper, Kuznetsov even revoked the special license that allows Sobchak’s driver to disobey certain traffic regulations.

Thus assured, those of us here for the Goodwill Games went about our chores without any more than the usual amount of paranoia that comes with being in a city of 5 million residents . . . until a reporter for another newspaper informed us that his laptop computer had been stolen from his hotel room.

“What about that, Mr. Sobchak?” we asked as we hurried to our rooms to hide our laptops, either in locked suitcases or closets or under a mattress.

We then knew that the reports were true. The saint in Petersburg was elsewhere.

The next morning, the reporter sheepishly told us that he received a call the night before from Goodwill Games officials informing him that his computer had been returned to lost-and-found. Apparently, he left it on a bus, and the driver, at the end of his rounds, turned it in.

The reporter called the bus company and offered a reward to the driver, but he rejected it. Just doing his job, he said.