City and County Police Team Up against Crime in Greenbelt East

City and county police officers and a state representative stood side by side on Monday to face a group of more than a hundred citizens who had gathered in Eleanor Roosevelt High School to discuss crime in Windsor Green and other parts of Greenbelt East.

The police have held several meetings in Greenbelt East to address residents' concerns that crime was shifting in Greenbelt, causing a spike in the East.

In the initial meeting on July 19, 2011, police shared plans for redirecting the massive effort that reduced crime in Greenbelt West to Greenbriar Condominums in Greenbelt East.

Crime in the west had fallen since Fieldstone Properties took over management of 2,877-unit rental complex, now Franklin Park, in October 2010 and worked with the police, resulting in increased evictions.

“The word on the street is don’t go through Greenbelt because the police will stop you,” said Major Amal Awad, Commander of District II with the Prince George’s County Police Department.

Showing a cooperation that is relatively new between Greenbelt city and county police, both forces teamed up in saturation patrols on Friday night. The county police focused on enforcement in Chelsea Woods and the Greenbelt Police conducted patrols in Greenbelt East, according to Officer Kelly Lawson, a spokesperson for the Greeenbelt Police.

Lawson told Patch she didn't know the last time an organized effort like this was done.

A woman from the crowd referenced the police presence on Friday night and wanted to know if that was going to happen more often. Capt. Carl Schinner of the Greenbelt Police explained to her that the police saturation teams alternate between East and West and would be back to .

He also discussed how the police had more power to help East because of what was happening in Greenbelt West.

“For years the City of Greenbelt Police Department had all its resources in the west part of town,” he said. 

Once the new management came, it was different, he explained, saying that crime was down significantly, and now the police had more resources freed up to help Greenbelt East.

Schinner pointed them to Greenbriar as an example of what could happen at Windsor Green and other parts of Greenbelt East. When crime fell in the west, Schinner said . He challenged the audience to talk to Greenbriar and find out what happens with police saturation.

Some Greenbriar residents have told him it’s night and day over there now, Schinner reported. “We’ll come back with saturation teams, just like we did over there,” he said, adding that they would see the police more often and more frequently.

Schinner said he was certain the police would team up again [county and city], but it might not be until spring. In the meantime, he said he would be sending six or seven Greenbelt police officers over a couple of times to Windsor Green.

Schinner later told Patch how the police plan had worked in Greenbriar, saying they had used different resources and went out on different nights. Sometimes the officers went in with marked cars, then they’d switch to bikes or rented vehicles. This kept the law breakers off balance and made life uncomfortable for them, Schinner explained.

The results? Schinner reported crime down 40.8 percent in Greenbelt East, from January through October of 2011, compared to the year previous for Part I offenses in the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR). Part I offenses include aggravated assault, forcible rape, murder, robbery, burglary, larceny-theft and motor vehicle theft.

This article is the first in a two-part series on crime fighting efforts in Greenbelt East. The second article will present crime reduction ideas that city and county police and a chief with the state's attorney's office shared at the meeting.