Putting The Brakes on Crime

By Richard Woodbury/Tulsa

As dusk fell on Tulsa's bustling Memorial Drive, Mike Hall, 14, was playing cop -- but the blue-and-white Gran Fury police car he was sitting in was no toy. The driver, patrolman Rick Coleman, had just hauled over a truck for driving without lights. As Coleman climbed out to question the trucker, his passenger couldn't resist temptation. He flicked on the car's red spotlight and played the beam up and down the side of a darkened warehouse.

Luckily for Hall, Coleman missed the antics. The kid and the cop are buddies, but Mike is also an auto thief who was sentenced to an indeterminate period of probation last year after he and a friend hot-wired an Olds Cutlass and led police on a mile-long chase. For 10 months Mike rode long hours in the cruiser with Coleman as part of an experiment to reform young delinquents. The theory behind the program is that cops can be strong role models for the youths, who get to view crime from the victims' perspective, a shock that courts and reformatories cannot provide.

The Youth Intervention Program was launched by the police department to combat a wave of auto thefts in Tulsa, where 7,599 vehicles were stolen in 1990 alone, many by juveniles. By limiting the plan largely to 12- to 14-year- olds, officials hope to reach kids they can still straighten out. The youths and their parents sign contracts with the county juvenile bureau, committing the offenders to patrol shifts. In 14 months, six youths have made it through an average of 150 hours of patrols to complete their probation, and one of them has gone on to enroll in the Job Corps. Hall finished his tour in July and last week entered the eighth grade.

The nightly drama of Tulsa's mean streets is a sobering experience for these kids. In his twice-weekly adventures, Hall answered burglary and assault calls, watched Coleman wrestle a fugitive in a convenience store and remove a dead body from a house, and stood by as police broke up family fights. He drove to the station house with shoplifters and drunks handcuffed in the front seat and prowled darkened roads on the lookout for molesters. "I guess I didn't know how bad the other side of crime is," he says.

The hours in a police cruiser also build a special camaraderie. "He's cool, he's O.K.," said Mike of his police partner as Coleman, pistol drawn, checked out the open door of a warehouse where a burglar alarm was ringing. "He's like a kid brother," says Coleman. "There's nothing we won't talk about -- drugs, booze, sex -- and if he gets in trouble, he'll have to deal with me."

The Tulsa program has had its failures. One 14-year-old who did a five-month stint riding with the cops later viciously attacked and robbed a motorist in a parking lot. Police blamed a lack of concern and discipline at home. "This program's a shot in the arm," says patrolman Greg Ball, "but it's only one part of the puzzle." Other officers agree -- but they are also convinced that reforming a teenager is easier and far cheaper for society than dealing with a hardened criminal of 20.