Here is an article in the PD about a recent teen thug caught by police after stolen van and robbery, etc. etc. The kid had a gun and was lucky the officers didnt kill him when he fled police.

The article says he lives on west 6th--is this one of our own local punks that anyone recognizes? If so, does anyone have any more crimes they believe he is a suspect in that they want to talk to the detective about? Now that he is in custody, it would be a good time to make sure people speak up and bring him to all the justice he may deserve.

If he is one of our local thugs, nice to see he will be off the streets for a while.

READ ARTICLE BELOW:

West Side teen accused of robbery, pointing gun at police
Posted by Donna J. Miller December 28, 2007 06:46AM

UPDATED:

About two hours earlier, a Cleveland police officer fired at a
robbery suspect at West 50th Street and Bridge Avenue. No one was hit.

The incident began at West 50th and Clark Avenue, where a patrol
officer saw a silver Dodge Intrepid that matched the description of a
car that had been used during an armed robbery.

The officer attempted to stop the Intrepid, but the driver refused
to pull over. There was a five-block chase before three suspects jumped
out of the car and ran.

Officers chased after them. A 17-year-old, who had been driving, pointed a handgun at an officer, Lt. Thomas Stacho said.

"The officer then opened fire at the suspect," he said.

The teen, later identified as Gabriel Rios, was captured a short time later. The other two suspects escaped.

The Intrepid was reported stolen from West 90th Street a half hour after Rios was arrested.

Rios, of West 6th Street, has a lengthy record at Cuyahoga County
Juvenile Court, including aggravated menacing, domestic violence and
multiple counts of receiving stolen property, trespassing, criminal
damaging, breaking and entering, theft and having criminal tools.

the name sounds familiar--i'll check with others in my block club. either way, at least this thug will be off the streets for a while. nice to see justice served once in a while!

That is one of our regulars. He is involved in half of the crimes committed here and his name (as well as his cohorts) and address have been given to the POLICE, PROSECUTOR and COUNCILMAN CIMPERMAN as far back as 8 Months ago. A list of crimes he was involved in was sent with them as well.

Please remember this the next community meeting they speak at and tell you that the criminals are not from around here.

Keep your eyes out, several groups of thugs and drug dealers are fighting over Tremont Pointe. One of these groups wears Tan colored Jackets and carry guns, the others are more dispersed and harder to recognise.

These groups had a gun fight on December 20th in the W6th alley, where our boy Marco Rios lives. This was involving another local drug dealer and car thief that lives in the alley.

Please note that because you may live a few blocks away from this problem, does not mean that it does not or will not effect you. Please vote responsibly when these low income projects are proposed, it affects us all.

W

This probably will be a court watch case, and interested neighbors can attend the sentencing or write the judge and let him or her know that this kid is a troublemaker in the neighborhood.

Contact Colleen Reali, our Second District prosecuter at the Cleveland city prosecutor's office (not county), or one of the community organizers at TWDC to find out about court watch on this case.

Instead of spending time compiling a list of names and alleged crimes for the councilman and police - which isn't enough evidence to get anyone arrested or put in jail - take a morning or afternoon off work and attend this kid's sentencing hearing. He got caught red-handed; sentencing is the time when anecdotal stories are worth something.

Sandy Smith

Are you nuts?

Do you really believe that letting the police and other people in a position to make a difference is a WASTE OF TIME!? (though inconvienient when denying the problem)

Perhaps you are one of those people who doesnt want to know what is going on and just jump on the band wagon when the cops get lucky and call yourself a proactive citizen. That is REACTIVE. What we do is put ourselves out there and point out the source of the problems so that the problem is known.

If this information is used to question suspects that are caught doing other types of crime, you can accomplish a lot. We all work very hard to get the information we get to keep the neighborhood involved and aware of the situation on our streets. This takes many hours and I can tell you in no uncertain terms, endangers our lives. This is where we live, not a social club.

We refuse to to turn our heads to what is happening outside our windows.

W

Do the police ever plant "bait cars" in an area where car theft is high? This would be one way to get these creeps off the street and it has worked in other cities!

I've never heard of such a thing in Cleveland. Other police departments do it regularly, but I think that may be beyond CPD's resources here.

There are other things they can also do to prevent crime, such as intellegence gathering. I knew someone in Pittsburgh years ago that pissed someone else off. That someone else told Pittsburgh police he was selling weed. The Pittsburgh police then either used some kind of video surveilance or kept some kind of night watch on his property. Once they gathered "probable cause", and in Pittsburgh, I don't think that is much, they raided his apartment and busted him with a couple ounces and baggies and a scale. Now I don't know for sure, but my hunch is that if you called the Cleveland police to tell them someone was selling weed, they probably wouldn't go to the same lengths as the Pittsburgh police. There isn't a whole lot you can do because the CPD doesn't have many resources plus the culture of the CPD also needs to be changed to zero tolerance.

I have found that some officers can be very engaging if you actually physically flag one down on the street or even at Civilization (yes..) if you have observed concerning activity. In fact, it has been more effective than calling the 2nd District a few times that I have done both. Some local officers that I've met patrolling in the past year have shown some genuine interest in our neighborhood and in the plight of its residents.

the culture of the CPD needs to be changed to at least pRETEnd they give a rat's a$$

there are some good cops out there that care, and there are those that don't. i think we should make an effort to be ambassodors of our neighborhood to all cops we come into contact with--not to come across as whiney or entitled, but responsible citizens with concern for the interests of our community and city (which they live in too). we need to make this neighborhood be a place they feel welcomed and appreciated. believe me, it is more rewarding for them to get good feedback and feel appreciated than to patrol around other areas in second district where they are taunted and insulted. we need to make this an area they genuinely LIKE and want to protect.

i wasn't suggesting taunting and insulting, latke. it does seem the *good feedback* doesn't get us anywhere - 2nd district cops still seem reticent to do their JOB.

its my understanding that the new commander realizes there are numerous and longstanding complaints about 2nd district cops and he is willing to do something about it if people call him with information (incident, day, time, badge number).

its not about badgering cops, its about asking them to do their JOB.

please don't put words in my mouth, thank you.

CPD Statement

Today's PD metro section has an article on why Cleveland Police Department doesn't care if street people break into vacant houses and trash them.

"Police spokesman Lt. Thomas Stachko said he has not seen reports or complaints of empty house squatters. But if that's the trend, he said, it's better than people freezing to death on a street corner. Why not let them be? he said"

This is the attitude from the highest levels of CPD that is murdering this city. Police officers can't wait to kill home rule and move out of the city, presumably to somewhere where the cops give a damn.

if you want to see what happens to vacant houses when the street people move in, go look at 1422 through 1430 Fairfield. Just don't go at night. You can sit back and watch the parade of drug activity. ODOT bought all of these houses for the new inner belt and then abandoned them. Thesquatters have cut out all copper, and partially stripped the aluminum siding, and the city does nothing.

I would agree that Stacho's coments are very alarming. It is no secret his West Park home is for sale. It's a bad sign when the CPD's mouthpiece is openly planning on moving out of the city. If the leaders of the CPD are setting the example for the rest of the force, those of us invested in the city are in trouble. It's clear that Stacho has no long term plans for the city or it's safety. I'm all for people not freezing, but if he can't see what the obvious ramifications of there being no priority by the police--let alone a PUBLIC statement that there will be no enforcement--I am worried as well. The periodical rooms of many of Cleveland's fine public libary branches are well populated by the most well read of our homeless. Word that the vacant homes are no open territory will travel fast among that community. We have Stacho's ignorant comment to thank for that. As taxpayers and property owners, we should have nothing short of outrage regarding CPD Spokesman Lt. Thomas Stacho and his opinion. I don't know if his positions is a union protected one, but I would urge Mayor Jackson to invite Lt. Stacho to permenantly move to the suburbs ASAP!  

the squatting issue and stripping houses--though already enormous--will become an increasingly bigger issue as more homes are forclosed on in more desirable areas. i know folks in surprising areas of the county that have witnessed these crimes right next door.
one of the worst implications of this is that once the houses are stripped and vandalized, the house will not sell for crap and it loses a huge fraction of its sale price--which also means lower comps for nearby homeowners and lower tax revenue for the gov. it makes it harder for respectable homes to sell nearby, and asking prices drop. it has terrible economic impact on the block, the city, and the county! we need real leadership to target these crimes and these criminals, as this issue is reaching epidemic proportions in this county.

lassy: you must've misread my post--it was addressed at the general audience, not you individually.

the fact is: the police need to be held accountable when they don't do their job.

We had an empty house near us with constant squatter/drug traffic. A neighbor called police when he witnessed male on female violence right outside the door which culminated in the male dragging the female into the house. We watched while CPD drove up, idled outside the house without getting out of their car, and then drove away.

My friend lives on Duck Island and empty homes there were being pillaged. Neighbors made numerous calls to CPD. One nice day a few months ago, they were all outside and watched a CPD cruiser sit at the end of the street and the officers watched vagrants carry fixtures out of a house. The CPD did absolutely nothing. When the small group of neighbors approached the CPD cruiser and asked why they did nothing, the officers threatened the neighbors with disorderly conduct charges.

I can understand why officers don't want to work in Cleveland. I wouldn't. BUT - they have no right to pull a pay check while they worsen our crime situation with their apathy.

Shooting on West 14th.

From cleveland.com>

Officers are also looking for D'Anthony Harris of Covert Avenue. He is
accused of shooting a car repairman about 9 last night (january 6) in the 3700
block of West 14th Street. He was driving a white 1997 Chevrolet Tahoe
with license plate EFP 1395. Lt. Thomas Stacho said Harris and the
victim, who was shot in the buttocks, had argued over a car repair.

we're repeatedly told our area is low on violent crime compared to the other areas of Cleveland. Recent 2006 statistics disprove this. In fact, the Second district suffered an 82% increase in violent crime in 2007. Check it out:

http://www.cleveland.com/pdgraphics/interactive/crime07_Pct_change_VIOLENT/

2nd district homicides increased 82% in 2007. crime stats on cleveland.com give you an excellent district by district comparison and show we are at the highest percentage of increase and number of incidents. don't believe it when they tell you this area is not bad.

http://www.cleveland.com/crime/

worth a look....

Lets not exagerate . . . District 2 doesn't just cover TREMONT! Most of the crime is outside of TREMONT borders.

Tremont is quite a small area. If you utilize the same type of crime mapping and map all crimes from Brayton to University Dr and from W 14th to W 5th, I'm sure that at least property crimes/ # of residents within the borders I just mentioned would be comparable to property crime rates in the surrounding areas. Violent crimes would be lower of course. The main quality of life issues are all the home break ins and the car thieves.

"2nd district homicides increased 82% in 2007. crime stats on
cleveland.com give you an excellent district by district comparison and
show we are at the highest percentage of increase and number of
incidents. don't believe it when they tell you this area is not bad."

http://www.cleveland.com/crime/

Looks like you're wrong again! HOMOCIDES have increased by 82% in District 2 - it doesn't say that ALL CRIME has increased.

You like to compare apples to watermelons!

on the statistics, second district includes the crappiest areas on the west side. it includes all along lorain, clark, denison, etc.. some of those areas are definitely places that i would believe are getting worse with crime.
yeah i'd definitely believe crime is up in second district, but those stats are misleading if you are trying to apply them to the southside/tremont area, which is just a tiny nook of the whole district.

Never did I say the 82% increase was in Tremont alone. And in fact, the Second District is similarly sized to other districts.

Additionally, I immediately corrected myself to state the 82% figure related to homicides.

Dubious, jacksplat, gotcha!, goodlatkas you need to read more carefully. Try to not read with a preset notion, it distorts what the writer is trying to say.

If you bother to take the time to reference the statistics the plain dealer reporters Gabriel Baird & Jo Ellen Corrigan have compiled (and I doubt they have erroneously accounted the data - that would jeopardize their jobs) you would see the Second District is not doing well fighting crime. We have the highest rates of increases AND the lowest rates of decreases. The 2006 statistics do not show us to be the safest area with the lowest incidence of crime.

The fact that you *believe* these incidents to occur primarily outside the little haven of Tremont does not make Tremont a safer place. The statistics speak to the fact that the Second District needs to step up its efforts, as we are one of the worst areas in the city. Its not high math to conclude that if deterence is low (via marginal policing efforts) that crime will increase. Even the dumbest criminal can figure that one out. Its also true  many of the crimes committed here are committed by outsiders....hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Why would they come here?

 I believe Commander Sulzer is sincere in his effort to improve our Second District police force. However, if people do not report incidents and badge numbers of officers offering inadequate service I doubt he will be effective. Additionally, residents continuing to espouse the notion that complaining will only worsen the officers' behavior will also render Cmdr Sulzer's efforts ineffective. We need to act as a community and demand accountability from police officers. Its their job.

 Commander Sulzer requests complaints be directed to him at 216.623.5200

There's also the Office of Professional Standards ............664-2944 or 664-2948