A Look at Crime Statistics in Lakewood

Guest post from Bill Foshag

During public comments at the February 26^th Lakewood City Council meeting, Tom Gonzales, a Lakewood resident remarked that he was told by Lakewood Police Department (“LPD”) officers there was nothing they could do about the panhandling (window washers) on street corners – that the police “were handcuffed”.  Later, Councilman Rich Olver posed a question based on these remarks to Deputy City Manager Ben Goldstein – is it true that our officers are “handcuffed” or is there something they could do about panhandling on street corners?  Mr. Goldstein answered that it depends on the circumstances (what safety issues are at play), that it’s a matter of resources (not having enough staff), and that “it is a complex issue”.  Mr. Goldstein suggested that LPD could put together a report for Council that would address the issue. 

Under Lakewood Municipal Code 12.18.020, it would seem that window washing would be clearly prohibited:

A. It shall be unlawful for any person to solicit employment, business, contributions, or sales of any kind, or collect monies for the same, from the occupant of any vehicle traveling upon any street or highway when such solicitation or collection:

1. Causes the person performing the activity to enter onto the traveled portion of a street or highway;

2. Involves the person performing the activity to be located upon any median area which separates traffic lanes for vehicular travel in opposite directions;

3. Causes the traffic on the traveled portion of a street or highway to be delayed or impeded;

or 4. The person performing the activity is located such that vehicles cannot move into a legal parking area to safely conduct the transaction

B. It shall be unlawful for any person to solicit or attempt to solicit employment, business, contributions, or sales of any kind from the occupant of any vehicle traveling upon any controlled-access highway including any entrance to or exit from such highway.

Why certain city codes are not being enforced is perplexing. 

Seeing window washers at Alameda and Wadsworth at mid-day, walking between the lanes of traffic and between cars while trying to return to the median when the light turns green is clearly not safe for those individuals or for the drivers who have to maneuver their cars to avoid hitting them.  Common sense would dictate that it would not be difficult for an officer witnessing this activity to pull over and issue a citation – there should be nothing “complex” about this.  This is not the fault of the officers, who are employed to serve the citizens of Lakewood, and put their lives on the line for us every day. They follow the instructions they are given by their managers and whatever guidelines the City has adopted concerning law enforcement. It appears that a decision has been made by someone in a leadership position within the city that certain laws will not be enforced.

Reviewing the numbers

A review of crime figures in Lakewood might help shed a little light on what seems to be happening.

Lakewood publishes a couple of reports containing crime statistics each year, a Chief’s Report and a LPD Annual Report.  Looking at these reports for the reporting years of 2019 thru 2022 (the latest year available), the reports typically include the number of criminal offenses for the report year, plus the figures for a couple of previous years for comparison.  However, the crimes that are reported each year are not always the same.  An example being the 2018 and 2019 LPD Annual reports do not include a number of property crimes (mostly fraud and some theft related crimes) that are included in reports for 2020 and later. There are also some unexplained differences in the annual totals that are reported. For instance, crimes for the year 2019 total 12,127 in the 2021 LPD Annual Report, 12,299 in the 2020 report, 11,877, in the 2019 report.  Some of these differences may be due to newer reporting standards. 

Most law enforcement agencies across the US report crimes to the FBI using the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS), which succeeds and expands on the earlier Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) system that dates back to the 1920’s.  However, not all agencies in the US report to NIBRS, as some have incomplete historical data and others are still working to convert their UCR data to NIBRS. Crime data thru 2023 for Lakewood is in NIBRS, but Lakewood yet to publish their LPD Annual Report for 2023.  NIBRS breaks crimes in to two major groups, Group A Offenses and Group B Offenses. Group A Offenses, generally considered more serious offenses, are further broken down and grouped as Crimes Against Persons, Crimes Against Property, and Crimes Against Society.   Group B Offenses are generally less serious offenses and include trespassing, disorderly conduct, DUI, liquor violations, and “other offenses”.  Group B Offenses report actual arrests, whereas Group A Offenses only reflect the report of a crime whether or not an arrest is made. The NIBRS data lends itself better to analysis as it is more detailed, complete, and consistent compared to the data that is in the LPD Annual Reports and the Chief’s Reports.  

The NIBRS figures show normal fluctuations in reported offense totals from year to year. Three-year averaging was used to remove some of the statistical noise and establish a longer term trend.  Looking at average number of crimes reported for 2017 thru 2019, compared to 2021 thru 2023, the NIBRS data is showing an overall increase of 13.5% in Group A Offenses.  This includes in a 9.4% increase in Crimes Against Persons, a 12.4% increase in Crimes Against Property, and a 23.5% increase in Crimes Against Society.  Some of the offenses that are driving this increase include assaults, car (and car parts) theft, and destruction of property.

What Lakewood is not reporting

Within Group A Offenses, reported incidences of Crimes Against Society (mostly including drug and weapon related violations) increased from 2,475 to 3,056 (+23.5%) on average for the 2017-2019 and 2021-2023 reporting periods respectively.  Crimes Against Society figures are not included in the LPD Annual Reports.

The LPD Annual Report also excludes the less serious Group B Offenses.  NIBRS figures show a decrease in Group B Offenses of 44.6% when comparing 2021-2023 to the 2017-2019 averages. The Group B Offenses contributing to this reduction are disorderly conduct (-53.0%), DUI (-15.5%), liquor law violations (-77.6%), trespassing (-14.7%), and “all other offenses” (-47.7%).  The bulk of the drop in reported offenses occurred between 2019 and 2020, when total reported Group B Offenses dropped from 4,673 to 3,220.   Since Group B Offenses reflect actual arrests, these figures can be viewed as actual drops in arrests.

Total incidence reports in the Crimes and Group B Offenses that are not reported in the LPD Annual Report vary from year to year, but in general amount to approximately 30% of the total crimes (Group A and Group B combined) in the NIBRS figures.

Incidences of total combined Group A and B Offenses averaged over 2017-2018 and 2022-2023 are virtually the same.  This is because the increase in reported Group A Offenses is offset by the reduction in reported Group B Offenses.   

One other statistic Lakewood does not include in their LPD Annual Reports are arrest numbers.  Using the same 2017-2019 and 2021-2023 averaging periods, we see that arrests for Group A Offenses dropped by 12.1% (recall that these reported offenses increased 13.5 in this same period).  Arrests for both Group A and B Offenses for this same period are down 29.3%, in large part due to the drop in Group B Offenses (which require an arrest).

One would generally think that crime trends would move in the same direction – if Group A Offenses increase then so should Group B Offenses. It is possible that LPD is not focusing as much on the less serious Group B Offenses (as seen in the larger drop in Group B Offense arrests). If this is the case, there may be a perception amongst criminals that if lesser crimes are not being enforced they can get away with committing serious crimes. That would possibly account for the increase in reported Group A Offenses.  It is also possible that people involved in certain Group B Offenses are more likely to be diverted to various social programs addressing mental health, addiction, or homelessness issues, and those incidences are not being reported as crimes (but this would not necessarily account for the increase in Group A Offenses).

A sense of resignation

In a posting on the City of Lakewood’s website from February 2022, there is a comment attributed to a Lakewood Police sergeant concerning law enforcement in the city: 

“Let’s be honest. If they (criminals) have had 30 tickets for shoplifting, trespassing, drinking in public, do we really think that the 31st ticket is going to be that magical step that solves the problem?… We recognize that is probably not the case. That’s why the city and our chief of police recognize the importance of trying new things, not being afraid to step out and say, ‘This isn’t working. The status quo is not working. Let’s try something new’.”

The tone of this remark reflects a sense of resignation on the part of Lakewood and LPD to enforce laws.  The problem in this statement is, if someone has 30 outstanding tickets, they obviously are not being held accountable for their offenses.  The problem is not that the tickets are not being paid. The problem is that laws are not being enforced.  In cases of habitual offenders, they need to be put in jail until they can be brought before a judge. 

In July of 2021, Lakewood adopted the LEAD (Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, or alternatively, Let Everyone Advance with Dignity) to assist people with “unmet mental needs, addiction and homelessness”.  Instead of charging individuals identified as candidates for the LEAD program with certain crimes, they are diverted to social programs to address the issues they are struggling with in hopes they will recover and return to society, not to be repeat offenders.  LEAD has been adopted by several other Colorado communities, as well as several large cities including Seattle, Portland, and Baltimore. The LEAD Support Bureau, which advises Lakewood in this program, and their affiliate P.D.A. (Purpose. Dignity. Action., formerly Public Defender Association of Seattle), are a group of people with background experience such as include public defenders and social justice activists.  It is important to understand that the national LEAD program is run by advocates for criminals and they actively seek to divert people involved in certain crimes into social programs and away from the criminal justice system.  It is possible that the drop in reported Crimes Against Society and Group B Offenses is in part due to persons being diverted via the LEAD initiative rather than being charged with a crime.

What others are doing about crime

Some cities struggling with severe social and criminal problems are finally starting to take action by getting tough on crime.   In San Francisco, residents recently approved Proposition F which requires drug testing for locally-funded welfare recipients.  They also approved Proposition E, which eases restrictions on the police and allows stepped-up enforcement actions to reduce crime.  The Governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, has ordered the National Guard to the subway system in New York City to combat an uptick in crime. Washington D.C. recently passed the Secure D.C. Omnibus Amendment Act, which makes certain crimes easier to prosecute and steps up punishment guidelines.  Leaders are beginning to see the failure of go-soft-on-crime policies and are finally responding to the cries of their constituents by taking a harder stance on crime.

Expectations and Accountability

Considering other cities have abandoned their years-long soft-on-crime policies, we should not expect to go soft on crime in Lakewood in hopes of success where others have failed. Laws are put in place to protect us and our property.  When laws are not enforced we are no longer safe and secure in our communities.  These are some expectations that we should adopt to ensure the leaders within the City of Lakewood are accountable for their policies and focused on keeping our community safe:

Lakewood residents have a right to know, and need to know, how laws are being enforced in the city.  We clearly have ordinances against street-side panhandling that are not being enforced.  The City needs share the news and let us know who is making the decisions which laws are enforced and which ones are not enforced. 

The LPD Annual Reports should be complete and consistent year to year. A good standard for reporting would be the NIBRS categorization with annual crime figures from all Group A and B offenses. 

The City needs to explain why they believe a group that has roots in defending criminals and social justice should be advising Lakewood on how to handle crime in our community especially in light of other cities having failed undertaking similar soft-on-crime policies.

The City needs to be forthright with us concerning which violations are turned over to social services (diverted via LEAD protocols, referrals to the Navigation Center, etc.), and how the determination is made to divert versus prosecute.  Annual figures for offenses that are deferred can be included in the LPD Annual Report.

For offenders who are diverted into social help programs, tough standards and accountability expectations within these programs need to be met. If the individuals fail to meet their requirements, they need to be held accountable for their offenses within the justice system.

We should expect LPD fully complies with ICE detainer requests. 

We need to know if the City has the resources (staffing, equipment, etc.) to sufficiently enforce ordinances.  If we don’t have the necessary resources, the City needs to actively secure what is needed to protect the citizens of our community.

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