new Orleans Police are taking desperate steps to tackle their rising murder rate amid a severe shortage of staff – including hiring civilians to send them to crime scenes to collect evidence.
Citizens will also replace at least some of the policemen currently on administrative duty so that officers can go back to the mean streets of the Big Easy – now America’s murder capital, Fox News reported on Sunday,
“The goal is for our officers to feel safe so that they can make our citizens and visitors feel safe,” New Orleans Superintendent of Police Sean Ferguson said at a news conference last week.
The top cop said that around 50 to 75 would be enlisted to answer a few short calls – and even hire citizen experts to monitor the phones and perform administrative duties. That would also be trained to do some detective work.
“As we take calls over the phone, there may be some evidence that needs to be collected with that call,” Ferguson said. “We’ll have civilian investigators going out and collecting that evidence, rather than having an officer go there and collect that evidence.”
The move comes after New Orleans recently passed St. Louis as the nation’s murder capital, with a 78% spike in homicides as of September 11 this year and a 121% increase in 2019, the network reported.
The department, which lost 150 policemen from its ranks last year, is urging previous police applicants who were rejected to give it another try.
“My message to you,” said Ferguson, “to those of you” [who] May have been disqualified in the past, I urge you to resubmit your application as some of our recruitment criteria have changed.”