Brookside and Waldo residents express concern, frustrations on crime

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - More than 100 people filled an auditorium in Brookside Wednesday night to ask police and prosecutors what they are doing to stop what feels like an endless string of crimes.

“The car thefts have gone insane. Our family alone has had four car thefts,” resident Terry Hudson told KCTV5. “And it’s not just the cars. It’s the breaking into buildings. It’s the theft. It’s the uneasy feeling of walking at night now.”

A forum organized by the Southtown Council and various neighborhood groups began with KD sharing data backing up their concern.

Stolen auto is currently the single highest category of property crime in the metro patrol division. In 2023 and 2024, reports of stolen autos were higher in the smaller sector that encomes Brookside and Waldo than in others and there has been a spike in the last couple of months.

People said they called police about prowlers, they presented video, but they felt like nothing was being done. They also expressed frustration with response times.

They got a list of explanations for from staffing shortages to high rates of violent crime to legal challenges prosecuting. Brookside resident Teresita Petrina McCarthy left frustrated.

“It’s always the same. We don’t have help. We need more money. We can’t do anything. We prosecute whoever we can,” she said. “But if you get picked up and you’re not going to jail and you’re released without bond or just a minimal bond, why doesn’t everybody just commit crimes?”

STAFFING

Captain Justin Pinkerton, who heads the Kansas City Police Department’s recruiting efforts, said the department currently has about 1,100 officers compared to 1,450 in 2008.

“You take 25 percent of the workforce away from any organization, it’s going to detract from the product,” he told the audience.

He said the difficulty began in 2020. Typically, the department has 60 to 70 retirements each year. In 2020 and 2021, it was closer to 100.

READ MORE: ‘Actively hiring’: KD increases salary to attract new recruits

He said the department has begun to get more applicants, so they are catching up. Asked how the situation compares to other departments in the metro, he said they lost more officers than most others but they are catching up faster than most.

DISPATCH

The audience got a detailed explanation of how the dispatch system works from a member of the department who works full-time doing social services for metro patrol but also does dispatching on overtime pay.

She described how calls go from call takers to dispatchers, how they are broken into zones, and how calls “get shipped” to other zones when every officer in one zone is on a call. If all of the officers south of the river are on urgent calls, which include disturbance calls in busy entertainment districts, it could mean an officer is responding from the Northland.

“You have to realize a call taker is possibly taking over 100 calls per hour,” she said. Their highest call volume is between 3 p.m. and 11 p.m. Priority one calls are violent crimes like shootings and cuttings. Reports of stolen autos and prowlers are priority levels three or four.

READ MORE: Lawsuit settlement calls for change to Kansas City’s 911 communication center

PROSECUTION

Several times people in the audience complained about prosecution. Catch and release was a term heard.

Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker called that a misnomer.

“I can’t prosecute a case that doesn’t come to me,” she said. “Property crimes are hard to solve.”

Peters Baker’s staff directed KCTV5 to the police department’s 2023 annual report. It shows 9,063 reports of motor vehicle theft and 273 cleared.

“My file rate is mid-80s, especially in property crimes,” she said.

Her chief deputy prosecutor, Dion Sankar, addressed people bonding out of jail. State law, he said, restricts the circumstances in which a prosecutor can seek a higher bond.

“Because they’re violent or they might flee,” Sankar said. “Those are the two standards.”

Many of the stolen auto cases solved go to family court because the offenders are juveniles.

Daniel Barry, an attorney with Jackson County Family Court, explained that the juvenile system has a higher focus on treatment than punishment.

“We file a lot of property crimes but we’re also busy doing homicides, a lot of shootings, stabbings,” Barry said. “Today we had five or six stolen autos.”

SOLUTIONS

Police said they have initiated extra patrols, including officers on overtime.

They said it’s important not to let the frustration lead to indifference. Yes, a prowler call is a level four priority for dispatch, but keep calling, they said.

“We may get there, and that suspect may have already left the neighborhood,” one officer said. “But what that does is give me the benchmark of knowing when people are coming into your neighborhoods and when they’re there and then what kind of vehicle they’re driving.”

That’s advice that resonated with resident Tricia Crowder.

“What I walk away most from is it’s still important to report, even if we perceive that it’s taking too long or nothing’s happening, because that helps them down the road,” Crowder said.

Copyright 2024 KCTV. All rights reserved.