Coatesville officials say targeted arrest program reduced homicides this summer

One man, 47, was charged with 15 counts of drug trafficking. Another, 37, was charged with dealing firearms. A third, 42, was charged with dealing drugs.

These are just three of the 40 people that the Chester County District Attorney's Office said they removed from Coatesville streets this summer in a three-month reinstitution of Operation Silent Night, an aggressive law enforcement collaboration that targeted those most likely to kill or be killed, District Attorney Thomas P. Hogan said Tuesday.

"There are names and faces in this list who have been problems for Coatesville going back more than a decade," said Kevin Dykes, chief of Chester County Detectives. "And there are some new young guys getting into the life of drugs and violence."

The result, according to Hogan, was only one homicide in June, July, and August — as violent crime rates in other areas increased.

For comparison, police in Chester, Delaware County — another suburban city (although one with about 20,000 more residents than Coatesville and a higher crime rate) — said Tuesday that they had logged 10 homicides in that same time span. Chester Police Capt. James Chubb said they do not do targeted arrests, to his knowledge.

The Chester County District Attorney's Office and Coatesville police worked together in the Coatesville sweep and announced the results Tuesday in a news release.

Hogan has engaged Operation Silent Night before, both in 2012 and 2013. Since then, violent crime in Coatesville has been largely "under control," Hogan said. But after a 2016 summer in which two double homicides occurred in the area, Hogan said law enforcement decided to reinstate the program.

Prosecutors and police worked to come up with a list of those most likely to kill or be killed, as officials have learned that the same criteria often applies to both categories.

In making this list, authorities took into account a wide variety of factors, Hogan said.

One factor was current activity: whether an individual was involved in the drug game, known to rob drug dealers, or known to carry guns.

Another was prior violence, not only whether someone had prior convictions but also whether they had a history of domestic violence, had protection from abuse orders filed against them, or got into fights in school that were reported in the juvenile system, Hogan said.

Ten years ago, Hogan said, one of the people arrested in this year's Operation Silent Night rammed a bike cop into a concrete wall while trying to flee from police. Hogan said he could not disclose which individual that was, since the incident was a prior offense.

In creating their list, law enforcement also looked for charges that "seemed to disappear," Hogan said, because "that is a pretty good signal they're getting to the witnesses." Another factor was involvement in street gangs and removal from traditional schooling.

"If you add up all of that stuff," Hogan said, "you are going to get a recipe for people who are going to be involved in homicides."

The proactive targeting of  high-level drug offenders, often through undercover work, likely made the biggest impact on the number of homicides in Coatesville, said  city police Detective Sgt. Brandon Harris. There was no increase in the number of police officers on the streets, Harris said, just in the tactics used.

"It's just being out there," Harris said, "being more visible," something the Police Department tries to do all year long, not just in the summer.

Across the country, other areas have tried an array of similar tactics to stem violence.

In Wilmington, which has been ranked among the most violent cities in the United States, new Police Chief Robert Tracy — formerly a crime strategist for the City of Chicago — has vowed to use data-driven strategies to target those likely to commit serious crimes. In Chicago, law enforcement keeps a "heat list" that targets individuals most likely to be violent, using undisclosed variables. And in Richmond, a Bay Area city in California with a history of gun violence,  officials saw success with "Operation Peacemaker," a fellowship that paired mentors with young suspected offenders who were paid stipends if they maintained good behavior.

The American Civil Liberties Union has come out against some data-driven policing tactics that assess a person's likelihood of violence, saying such policies can lead to discrimination.

Hogan created "Operation Silent Night" in 2012 to focus on Chester County's only city, which has a crime rate of around 33 percent and a poverty rate of more than 35 percent.

In 2016, there were five homicides in Coatesville in May through September, according to police. In the past, there have been homicide-free summers in the area, most recently in 2015, when just one homicide occurred in the entire calendar year.

A former steel city hurt by the industry's decline in the 1970s and '80s, and again by the 2008 recession, Coatesville is the poorest municipality in the state's most affluent county. With a median household income of $34,716, Coatesville has struggled to revitalize economically, with many shuttered storefronts occupying its streets.

But Harris said he has seen the city change during his 17-year tenure with the department.

"For the better," Harris said. "There were a lot more street-level dealers when I got here."

Hogan said programs such as Operation Silent Night also help authorities gather intelligence about what is occurring in the city's streets, intelligence that can come in handy in future operations.

In the summer, Harris said, police always prepare for an increase in crime. No school, hotter weather, and longer days lead to more people being out on the streets and more crime occurring, he said.

Authorities say the county's efforts have helped to curb some of that summertime unruliness.

"Operation Silent Night gives us the resources and focus to arrest these defendants for drugs and weapons offenses before they kill somebody," Police Chief Jack Laufer said, "and maybe before an innocent child gets hit in the crossfire."