Temps are up and the criminals are back from vacation
With three homicides in PSA1, you can’t say it was a great month. Robberies were down a bit though as the police keep the pressure on the FTC area. Motor vehicle thefts were also down.
Curious thing when I was doing the report noticed that the homicide on the avenue where the female victim was found buried was not classified as a homicide. I think that was because it was kind of hard to classify. I included it in this report as a homicide.
The chart below gives the summary and this link will take you to a pdf of the specifics.
Crime continues to decline in PSA1 (includes Frankford/Northwood and Bridesburg) in February compared to December of 2014 however there has been a dramatic increase in armed robbery in Northwood. There were 6 incidents on Harrison, Foulkrod and Fillmore Streets during the month with the latest on February 28th on the 1000 block of Fillmore. Residents keep your eyes open, the predator seems to operate at all times of the day and night.
Even accounting for fewer days in February, December 2014 averaged 5.9 incidents per day. In February there were 4.4 incidents per day. Did the cold drive the bums indoors, Spring will tell.
Dec-14
Jan-15
Feb-15
Aggravated Assault Firearm
5
12
2
Aggravated Assault No Firearm
17
11
12
Burglary Non Residential
4
5
3
Burglary Residential
14
15
9
Homicide
0
1
0
Homicide – gross negligence
0
0
1
Motor Vehicle Recovery
26
15
16
Motor Vehicle Theft
13
16
11
Rape
7
4
2
Robbery Firearm
22
12
13
Robbery no Firearm
6
17
13
Theft
49
36
32
Theft from Vehicle
21
19
9
Total
184
163
123
days
31
31
28
Average per day
5.9
5.3
4.4
You can read the complete crime report in a pdf file at this link.
SEPTA police chief Tom Nestel spoke at the Frankford Civic Association meeting on February 5th. The issue that prompted the invitation was the most recent PSA meeting where residents noted that criminal activity is rampant at the Margaret-Orthodox El station, often apparently under the eyes of SEPTA personnel. The individuals who sell drugs openly stand at the top of the El steps and don’t seem to be intimidated by SEPTA police. When Philadelphia police are in the area, they will often move on to SEPTA property seemingly using it as a safe haven.
Nestel said that January 11th saw redeployment in district 4 which is headed by Sgt Cavallaro and includes the Margaret-Orthodox El station. It now has double the number of personnel than any other district. That redeployment was driven by data indicating that crimes rates in district 4 are the highest in the system. He acknowledged that this area has not been receiving the attention it should and said “Give me a couple of months and see if there is a difference”.
He went on to talk about the Broken windows theory and its application to crime on the SEPTA system. Last year there were 5,172 arrests for fare evasion while at the same time felony crime went down by 16% after 10 years of rising crime. Nestel says “If they think they can get away with jumping the turnstiles they’ll think they can get away with robbing somebody”. “If you’re selling loosies, you’re not doing it to make a living or to feed your kids. You’re not going to make enough money selling loosies to take care of anybody. You’re selling loosies to be in an area so that you can watch and look and see for a better opportunity to arise.”
The result has been push back from the court system which has had to add days on the calendar exclusively dedicated to SEPTA arrests.
But the big question from the Veronica Daniel, who lead the talk for the CDC was are the SEPTA police and the PPD (Philadelphia Police Department) working together to address the crime issue not only at Margaret-Orthodox but all along the line in Frankford?
The answer is – not so much. In regard to resources, the PPD has 6500 officers while SEPTA has 275. Nestel says he has excellent relationships with both Captain McCloskey and Commissioner Ramsey but it is apparent at this point that the Captain feels he has adequate resources to do the job.
However, SEPTA does monitor the J band on police radio and when a need arises, offers assistance to the PPD. Nestel notes “We didn’t know about the robbery pattern surrounding Frankford and Bridge until one of our customers told us” but when they became aware of the situation they deployed one of their mobile video cameras which did in fact record one of the robberies taking place.
One interesting piece of information is that SEPTA has 13,000 video cameras and their radio dispatch can look at any one of them if they get a call. So if you see something suspicious like that guy making the hand off on the platform, call 215-580-8111 and tell them what’s going on. If you have a major non time critical gripe call Tom Nestel or better yet email him. 215-580-3640 email tnestel@septa.org
I recommend that you take a look at the video of the meeting, its long but not boring and very informative. Part 1 is below. This is a link to part 2 and here is a link to part 3.
The next Frankford Civic Association meeting will be held on March 5th at 7PM at St. Mark’s Church.
Of course if you are a victim, that is a different story. There were 184 incidents reported in December and 163 in January. That is about an 11% decline.
There were 12 aggravated assaults. 4 of those came from 2 incidents. One on Penn Street and the other on Adams Avenue.
We use data from Open Data Philly which come directly from the Police Department. I noticed this month that the number of homicides did not add up. Captain McCloskey mentioned at the PSA meeting in January that those two incidents resulted in multiple fatalities. It looks like they were initially classified as aggravated assaults but then the victim died at a later time. The bottom line is homicides are higher than reported and aggravated assaults are lower.
If you would like to see Captain McCloskey in person, along with Tom Nestel, chief of SEPTA police, they are scheduled to attend the Frankford Civic Association meeting Thursday, February 5th at 7PM at St. Mark’s church (4442 Frankford Avenue).
Meanwhile, the crime summary is below. This is a link to a pdf file where the details for January are available.
Captain McCloskey attended the meeting on January 22nd at Aria Hospital with about 15 community residents. The issues covered were a recap of the most recent violence in Frankford. The shootings on Penn Street and Adams Avenue and the robberies around the Frankford Transportation center. We have a short video below. Turn up your volume, there was a lot of background noise.
The next PSA1 meeting will be on February 26th at 7PM at Aria Hospital at 4900 Frankford Avenue.
