6 Feb 13
Most big, metro police departments currently do not respond to electronic burglar-alarms on unoccupied property, particularly during high-activity periods like holiday weekends. The PD will eventually send an unsworn “community-service” officer to take a report, but will not dispatch a beat-car to the location when the alarm comes in.
Now, cash-strapped Chicago is taking the next step. The PD has announced that, in addition to the foregoing, they will not dispatch officers to:
“… criminal damage to property, vehicle thefts, garage burglaries, nor other crimes where suspects are (probably) no longer at the scene, and victims are (probably) not in immediate danger”
Beleaguered city residents, who are virtually prohibited from owning guns and who simultaneously pay property taxes through the nose, are less than thrilled with this recent announcement, as you might imagine!
The obvious consequence is that, when calling 911, you’re now going to have to aggressively “sell” them on the idea of actually sending officers. You’ll have to sincerely persuade them that someone will die if they don’t come. For its part, the PD will do its level-best to talk you out of it, insisting they can do the whole thing over the phone! The PD apparently sees its role more as generating good statistics, and less as actually protecting and serving real people.
I suspect this represents a trend that will be quickly followed by other big, broke departments. The dwindling numbers of oppressed city-dwellers who actually pay taxes are, as always, getting less and less of what they pay more and more for.
Of course, local liberal politicians, comfortable from behind their army of heavily-armed, taxpayer-provided bodyguards, insist it is all “… for your own good.”
“Long ago, we sold our vote to no man. Now, people have abdicated their duties as citizens. Once, people were bribed with military command, civil office, legions. Now, anxious dupes hope for just two things… bread and circuses!”
Juvenal, 100AD
/John
