Ray Kelly is leaving Bill de Blasio and the city’s next police commissioner a nice farewell gift: an anti-gang policy that’s sent teen-homicide numbers plunging.
So far this year, there have been just 43 homicides for people between the ages of 13 and 21 — less than half what it was last year at this point. Credit goes to creative policing such as Operation Crew Cut, which utilizes social media to identify gang activity as well as to apprehend perpetrators who can’t seem to avoid posting their activities on Twitter and Facebook.
These results are remarkable. And they should be embarrassing to the mayor-elect and the other Democrats who used Kelly and the cops as political piñatas during this year’s campaign, accusing them of racial profiling and the like. These slanders may have been on Kelly’s mind when — looking at the teen-homicide drop — he observed, “Lives are being saved, and a majority . . . of those lives are young, minority men.”
That’s exactly right. And it should remind us again of the dangers of imposing a federal monitor on the police.
Remember, the success against gangs didn’t happen because a monitor was directing the cops. It occurred because Kelly and his brain trust realized that more than just stop-and-frisk was needed to combat gang violence. The NYPD adapted to changing circumstances and has the success to show for it.
Does anyone really believe that the police would have this flexibility or success with a federal monitor adding yet another layer of second-guessing to the process?