The Red Deer RCMP have a new way of policing in the community and officers have already begun to see positive results.
The crime reduction strategy has been titled Project Pinpoint because of its focus on data analysis and targeted enforcement. From April 1st to Aug. 10th, Red Deer RCMP conducted 192 checks on targeted people, places and criminal patterns, including 65 identified people on parole and/or probation and more than 20 career criminals with an active history of property crime. These strategies resulted in 121 criminal charges being laid and 80 warrants executed during that time period.
“What we want to tell people is that if you are living in Red Deer and you are on probation, on parole or on conditions, we’re going to check. If you’re not abiding by those conditions we will arrest you and we will put you back in jail,” said Insp. Gerald Grobmeier with the Red Deer RCMP.
The RCMP are also identifying individuals that are identified as being highly-involved in crime whether it be with break and enters, theft of motor vehicles and other property crime.
“We are trying to use proactive enforcement to arrest them and stop them,” said Grobmeier. “Our last area is social persons of interest and these are individuals who are involved in property crime as well. However, there is more to it – there might be mental health issues, addictions, or family or social issues. We actually reach out to those individuals proactively when they are not in crisis and link them up with agencies that can help them.”
Part of the new strategy also includes targeting prolific addresses as well as hot spots in the community.
“We have started looking at prolific addresses in Red Deer. There are certain addresses that come up a lot whether it be businesses or residential,” said Grobmeier. “We are looking at both criminal and non-criminal instances.
“In our hot spot targeting we are looking at theft of motor vehicles, home and garage break and enters and business break and enters. What we are doing is identifying those areas in the City that are coming up more than others. Once we have those areas identified, those areas are then assigned to different units and we conduct target controls in those areas.”
Grobmeier added Project Pinpoint is not just a temporary project.
“This is the way we do business in Red Deer now,” he said.
Insp. Heidi Wild, acting commander for the Red Deer RCMP, said property crimes in the City continue to be a priority for the RCMP.
“We’re aggressively targeting prolific career criminals with our new crime reduction strategy,” she said. “Our focus is on career criminals with an active history of property crime; one piece of that strategy includes actively checking on those who are required to follow court-imposed conditions, and sending them back to jail when they aren’t complying.”
Mayor Tara Veer said community safety continues to be top of mind for local government.
“Community safety and crime reduction is a priority for our public and a priority for City council,” she said. “Project Pinpoint is just one example of where we’ve made enforcement progress as a result of implementing the Annual Policing Plan. We still have work to do; however, the updated policing priorities enable us to become even more proactive in identifying and addressing citizens’ safety concerns, and the APP highlights where we’ve been able to reduce crime and where we need to focus our enforcement efforts in the upcoming year.”
efawcett@reddeerexpress.com
