Heather Curtis
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON — (WMAL) D.C. Police, Metro Transit Police, the Office of the Attorney General and the U.S. Attorney’s Office formed a new Robbery Intervention Task Force to stem a 5 percent increase in robberies in the District from 2014 to 2015. This is part of Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Safer Stronger legislative package.
“We can and must do better so that every DC neighborhood is safer. One robbery is one too many,” Bowser said at a press conference Wednesday in Eastern Market, an area hit particularly hard by robberies.
The task force will focus on quickly stopping robbers before they go on sprees, robbing multiple people in a short period of time. That will involve officers having real time access to closed circuit TV cameras, video from Metro and information coming into the department.
“Last year it was the run by snatch of a cell phone type of robbery. But what we’re seeing now is a small group that will commit robbery after robbery after robbery, four, five, six in a night,” said D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier.
The effort will also use criminal research specialists to identify robbery patterns.
Since many people rob others at Metro stations or on trains and then continue their sprees on the streets, D.C. Police will work closely with Metro and even have one of their officers embedded with Metro Police to aide in the collaboration.
The OAG and USAO will work with both police agencies to gather evidence, identify suspects and make sure they have everything they need to prosecute criminals and get them off the streets.
Attorney General Carl Racine says there are currently more than 300 robbery defendants in court. To date, there have been 45 robberies in the District.
