Patch of Blue

The crime rate in downtown Miami reached critical proportions last December. Robberies had almost doubled since the previous December. Police Chief Walter Headley was "fed up." The day after Christmas, he simply "called in all my commanding officers and told them to change some things. I said we should use dogs to accompany men on the beat. And I said I wanted the force in high-crime areas to carry shotguns. And I said I wanted to concentrate men in these high-crime areas, and that I wanted them to use the stop-and-frisk law more." Word of his crackdown reached the press, and suddenly he found he had struck a deep, responsive chord throughout the U.S. He received, by his count, 8,000 letters and telegrams. Only 22 were disapproving.

The "concentration" meant that 50 extra patrolmen, plus extra cars and motorcycles, were assigned to high-crime areas. Officers cruised in squads of three --in uniform, but without caps and in unmarked cars during the highest crime hours. But would that be enough? The answer was yes, at first. In January, the city's robbery rate dropped 45%, from 299 to 163. In the high-crime areas, the rate went down 62%.

Against Abuse. There were problems, of course. High-crime areas in Miami mean Negro slums, and there were rumbles of discontent from militant Negroes who felt that the crackdown was discriminatory. But Negro merchants were generally pleased, and civil rights leaders worked to cool the hotter tempers. Said one of Chief Headley's top men: "If Miami Beach police crack down, do you say they are anti-Jewish?" Agrees Headley: "Any commanding officer would put his troops where the action is."

There have been incidents--particularly growing out of the increased stop-and-frisk activity. One 17-year-old Negro was allegedly stripped to his underwear and dangled by his heels from a bridge by two policemen who accused him of carrying a knife. Headley acted fast; both were dismissed the next day and last week were indicted by a federal grand jury. "These men abused their authority," says Headley, "and I won't stand for that."

Those who question his success point out that he is only doing what other police forces have tried. The major difference, they say, is the amount of publicity he received. Headley does not entirely disagree, notes that the publicity may well have been an important factor in the initial month's drop. Indeed, he does not claim to have found the panacea to his city's and the nation's ever-increasing crime problem.

His solution, in fact, seems to be little more than an emergency patch of blue, though it is at least that. Last week he gave out the figures for February, and they seem to bear out the point. The number of robberies had bobbed back up from 163 to 207. But the rate did not go up in the crackdown areas; all the increase was in previously low-crime areas. Headley thinks that means that the crackdown has driven some criminals into new territory. The obvious conclusion: intensified police work can make a dent in crime but it is no substitute for sufficient numbers of policemen in a well-run department.

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