Behind The Headlines: Strickland on crime
Memphis is pricing license-plate reading cameras for the local interstate system and working out who would use, operate and maintain such a system.
“Until last spring, cameras with license readers on the interstate were illegal,” Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland said on the WKNO Channel 10 program “Behind The Headlines.”
“We got a law changed to allow that,” he said. “It’s cost. We have thousands of cameras out now – the SkyCop cameras. All police vehicles have license plate readers.”
The technology allows the camera to scan a license plate and determine if there are any warrants on the owner of the car or if it is reported stolen.
And it would be the latest move in the use of cameras specifically as a crime fighting tool.
In the past 11 years, Memphis has installed more than 2,100 cameras and related technologies across the city at a cost of more than $10 million for the purchase and installation.
An investigation by The Daily Memphian found the deterrent effect of the cameras so far has been questionable given the rising rate of violent crime in the city.
The investigation included a detailed analysis of 74,000 MPD crime reports so far this year showing fewer than 3% of the police investigations mentioned the use of cameras or evidence from cameras.
Strickland talked about the new group of cameras being explored when asked about what the city is doing specifically to end reckless high-speed driving on the city’s interstate system.
The city is also seeking a permanent Tennessee Highway Patrol presence in the city that would include state troopers taking over enforcement of the city’s interstate system, which is considered a state police jurisdiction.
THP leaders and Strickland talked last month in Nashville as part of a longer conversation about turning over jurisdiction to the state.
Those talks included a commitment to bring the number of state troopers in the city from the current 12 to 16 starting next summer with the possibility of even more state troopers within the city beyond then.
A new Highway Patrol headquarters building is also in the Tennessee Department of Safety’s budget request as Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee puts together a budget proposal he will take to the Tennessee General Assembly next year.
On the broader issue of violent crime in the city, Strickland said he hopes the Memphis City Council will revisit its decision to cancel a ballot question in 2020 that proposed allowing Memphis Police officers to live outside Shelby County – a loosening of the current residency policy that requires all city employees to live within the county.
“It may first start with a private behind-the-scenes push before it’s public,” he said. “The council’s vote not to allow the public to vote on wider residency has not aged well. We see what has happened to crime. … We need help.”
The City Council that ended its term of office at the end of 2019 voted to put the broader residency requirement to city voters as one of its last acts. It was to go on the November 2020 ballot.
But before that, the current council, which took office in January 2020, voted to rescind the referendum. Strickland vetoed that move and the council overrode his veto, meaning the referendum question never went on the same ballot as the 2020 presidential general election.
A majority of the current council voted to set a goal of increasing Memphis Police ranks to a goal of 2,500 with some in that majority saying they agree with Strickland that the police force should be larger.
But they argue those police officers should at least live in Shelby County if not in the city where they work.
“That’s what they say,” Strickland said. “But that’s an example of the challenge that we face with crime overall.”
He said as mayor he fields questions about the city’s approach to crime more than council members and other elected officials who also have responsibility for parts of the criminal justice system.
“I totally welcome that. But y’all never go to the council after a crime and say, ‘Do you regret limiting our police force?’” Strickland said. “And that’s what it was – it was limiting our police force.”
Strickland also complained of “weak state laws” from the legislature.
“State law allows easy and widespread access to guns while it does not punish the wrongful use of those guns,” he said. “I shoot a gun at you. It doesn’t hit you. No mandatory jail time. That’s a weak state law.”
In recent months, Strickland has repeatedly said “201 Poplar” – the Walter Bailey Criminal Justice Center – is “a revolving door.”
He extended that description in the BTH interview to Memphis-Shelby County Juvenile Court.
“No one goes to the county government, which is 100% responsible for juvenile justice,” Strickland said of calling for more funding of juvenile court. “Juvenile crime has skyrocketed over the last six, seven years.”
He also attributed that specific crime increase to a 2012 memorandum of agreement county government, the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office and juvenile court entered into with the U.S. Justice Department.
The agreement was to correct Justice Department findings that the court’s treatment of Black juveniles was disproportionately harsher than it was for white juveniles at the court for the same offenses.
The agreement was also aimed at remedying due process violations and issues at juvenile court documented by Justice Department investigators.
“I’m not disagreeing with the consent decree,” Strickland said of the memorandum. “But if you are not going to take more into custody and you are going to push people away from court, juvenile court needs more money to intervene with these young people who are doing bad things and no longer coming into court.”
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Behind The Headlines Jim Strickland license readers violent crime police residency referendum Memphis-Shelby County Juvenile CourtBill Dries on demand
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Bill Dries
Bill Dries covers city and county government and politics. He is a native Memphian and has been a reporter for almost 50 years covering a wide variety of stories from the 1977 death of Elvis Presley and the 1978 police and fire strikes to numerous political campaigns, every county mayor and every Memphis Mayor starting with Wyeth Chandler.
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