Title: Strategies for Reducing Homicide: The Comprehensive Homicide Initiative in Richmond, California .
Series: BJA Monograph
Authors: James J. Fyfe, Ph.D., John S. Goldkamp, Ph.D., and Michael D.
White
Crime and Justice Research Institute 
Published: December 1997
Subject: Program evaluation, homicide
35 pages
73,000 bytes

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800-688-4252.

U.S. Department of Justice
Office of Justice Programs
Bureau of Justice Assistance

Strategies for Reducing Homicide: The Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative in Richmond, California

--------------------------------

U.S. Department of Justice
Office of Justice Programs
810 Seventh Street NW.
Washington, DC 20531

Janet Reno
Attorney General
U.S. Department of Justice

Raymond C. Fisher
Associate Attorney General

Laurie Robinson
Assistant Attorney General

Nancy E. Gist
Director, Bureau of Justice Assistance

U.S. Department of Justice Response Center
1-800-421-6770

Bureau of Justice Assistance Clearinghouse
1-800-688-4252


Bureau of Justice Assistance
World Wide Web Home Page
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/BJA

This document was prepared by the Crime and Justice Research Institute,
under grant number 96-DD-BX-0091, awarded by the Bureau of Justice
Assistance, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. The
opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this
document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the
official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.

--------------------------------

The Bureau of Justice Assistance is a component of the Office of Justice
Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the
National Institute of Justice, the Office of Juvenile Justice and
Delinquency Prevention, and the Office for Victims of Crime.

--------------------------------

Strategies for Reducing Homicide: The Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative in Richmond, California

by James J. Fyfe, Ph.D., John S. Goldkamp, Ph.D., and Michael D. White
Crime and Justice Research Institute

Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction  
The Changing Nature of Homicide in the United States 

Chapter 2 Homicide in Richmond, California  

Chapter 3 Changing the Conventional Wisdom About Homicide  
A New Approach in Richmond 

Chapter 4 Forming the Richmond Homicide Strategy  
Community-Based Nonenforcement Strategies 
Investigative and Enforcement Strategies 

Chapter 5 Measuring the Impact of the Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative in Richmond  

Goal 1: Encouraging Collaboration Among the Richmond Police
Department, the Richmond Public Works Department, and the Richmond 
Housing Authority 

Goal 2: Using the Police Athletic League Computer Center To Provide
Skills Training, Summer Employment, and a Youth Academy for
Richmond Youth and Adults 

Goal 3: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Richmond Public Schools 

Goal 4: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Contra Costa County Probation Department To
Develop a Probation-Officer-on-Campus Program 

Goal 5: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Juvenile Court To Develop a Youth Court Program 

Goal 6: Encouraging Collaboration Among the Richmond Police
Department, the Battered Women's Alternatives, and the Rape Crisis 
Coalition To Reduce Domestic Violence 

Goal 7: Developing an Intensified Team Approach to Obtaining
Information Concerning High-Profile Homicides 

Goal 8: Obtaining the Assistance of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in
Reviewing Cold, Unsolved Homicide Cases

Goal 9: Obtaining the Assistance of the Drug Enforcement
Administration, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the California
Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement in Targeting Violence-Prone members of
the Drug Culture

Goal 10: Improving Information Sharing and Technology

Goal 11: Assigning an Evidence Specialist to the Richmond Police
Department's Detective Bureau  

Conclusion

Appendix A Bibliography

 Appendix B Sources for Further Information

--------------------------------

Chapter 1

Introduction

In 1995, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) in the Office of Justice
Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, funded the Comprehensive
Homicide Initiative to pilot the application of multifaceted strategies to
reduce homicide in local communities. The strategies, which were based
on the recommendations of participants in a murder summit convened in
1995 by the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP),
incorporated prevention, intervention, enforcement, and prosecution
components, with police executives serving as leaders of the process. The
cities of Richmond, Virginia, and Richmond, California, were selected as
the first two demonstration sites. 

The Comprehensive Homicide Initiative was designed to be carried out in
two phases--planning and implementation--that could be fully documented
and ultimately replicated in other jurisdictions. During the planning phase,
the sites crafted a process to examine local homicide-related problems and
then developed a multifaceted strategy to address them. To receive
funding for the implementation phase, sites were required to submit to
BJA for approval an implementation plan reflecting the spirit and
substance of the IACP recommendations. 

This BJA monograph describes the implementation strategy developed
and set in motion in Richmond, California, the first site to reach the
implementation stage. Based on an interim report submitted to BJA in July
1997 by the Crime and Justice Research Institute (CJRI), the findings
reported in this monograph represent an important first step in the process
of documenting and critically assessing the impact of the Comprehensive
Homicide Initiative. In preparing their findings, the authors of this report
conducted site visits, reviewed project materials, and participated in BJA-
sponsored meetings to review and critique Richmond's implementation
strategy. 

Richmond's early experiences will provide critical information that
succeeding implementation sites can use to make their homicide strategies
more effective. To be successful, the sites that follow Richmond will need
to know how well core homicide prevention strategies have worked in a
community facing challenges similar to their own.

The Changing Nature of Homicide in the United States

Despite recent decreases in rates of reported crime and victimization in the
United States, violent crime, homicide in particular, remains unacceptably
high in many jurisdictions. The 1995 IACP report from the murder
summit, Murder in America, cited Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
data generally showing higher rates of homicide nationwide over the past
three decades, particularly in core urban areas, with increases in stranger
homicides and in drug-, gun-, and gang-related homicides. Although the
largest numbers of homicides occur in the Nation's largest cities, sizes of
urban population and per capita crime rates do not necessarily correlate. In
1994, for example, New York, the largest city in the United States,
produced the largest number of homicides (1,561) but one of the lowest
rates per 100,000 population (21.1). In contrast, New Orleans generated
the highest homicide rate that year at 86.4 per 100,000 population. At the
State level, homicide rates typically are higher in the South and West than
in the East and Midwest. 

Murder in America discusses murder as the extreme end of a violence
continuum that comprises different types of confrontation with different
characteristics which occur in different areas of a city and affect different
segments of a problem-oriented population. The report includes 39
recommendations for reducing homicide. In general, the recommendations
focus on developing communitywide strategies involving law
enforcement, community, government, legislative, education, and training
initiatives. Multidimensional and multidisciplinary, the recommendations
call for greater cooperative problem solving among agencies,
organizations, and the community and for recognizing the need for both
short-term solutions and longer term goals to address the root causes of
violence.

--------------------------------

Chapter 2

Homicide in Richmond, California

Richmond, California, is to San Francisco as Newark is to New York, as
Gary is to Chicago, and as Camden is to Philadelphia: a blue-collar
adjunct to a larger and more prosperous city and its suburbs. Richmond's
problem-oriented population of slightly more than 92,000 is ethnically
diverse--42 percent black, 33 percent white, 14 percent Hispanic, and 11
percent Asian. 

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, before the Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative was implemented, Richmond suffered the economic setbacks and
increases in drug-related violence common to many urban jurisdictions
during that period. Along with this violence came a dramatic increase in
homicides. As shown in figure 1, the number of homicides reported in the
city from 1985 to 1987 held steady at around 20. In 1988, however, the
year the Richmond Police Department considers the beginning of a period
of increased drug- and gang-related violence, the number jumped to 32. In
1991, Richmond police recorded 62 homicides (67.2 per 100,000), a rate
300 percent higher than that for 1985 (21.7 per 100,000), and more than 7
times the 1991 nationwide rate of 9.5 per 100,000. More recently,
homicides in Richmond have decreased, with 27 homicides reported for
1995 and 34 reported for 1996.

Just before BJA initiated the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative in 1995,
the Richmond Police Department extensively analyzed the nature of
homicides in Richmond during the years of 1985 to 1996. As figure 1
shows, the increase in homicides was attributable to gun killings, which
rose from 10 in 1985 to a high of 52 in 1991, with an annual average of 38
thereafter.

The police department's study found that the nature of homicide in
Richmond had changed in significant ways. Dramatic changes were found
in the kinds of homicides being committed. Richmond's homicides became
more of a "street problem," and many, according to the police, were
driveby shootings. From 1985 to 1989, about half of Richmond's
homicides (61 of 131) occurred outdoors, while from 1990 to 1994 more
than two-thirds (172 of 251) occurred outdoors. 

Figure 2 shows that increasingly large numbers of homicides in Richmond
are classified as drug related. From 1985 to 1989, drug- and gang-related
homicides accounted for 44 percent of all cases, while homicides
stemming from domestic violence accounted for 15 percent. In the 5
succeeding years, 1990 to 1994, drug- and gang-related violence
comprised fully 72 percent of all homicides reported. African-Americans,
males, and individuals under 30 years of age are significantly
overrepresented among the victims of these homicides (78 percent, 83
percent, and 64 percent, respectively).

Prior to its involvement in the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative, the
Richmond Police Department had taken several steps toward addressing
the city's homicide problem. In 1992, it transferred officers from staff and
specialized units to patrol, and, in 1994, it initiated and entered into new
cooperative agreements with Federal and State enforcement agencies as
well as with neighboring police departments. By 1995 the department was
fully involved in its version of community-oriented policing, and realizing
that the enforcement model by itself did not appreciably reduce violence
or address wider quality-of-life issues. Part of this operation involved
establishing small substations in targeted areas of the city. Staff at these
substations included local volunteers who contributed to community
policing in important ways such as informally counseling youth and
helping them with their schoolwork. 

The Richmond Police Department already was rethinking its strategy
toward violent crime when it received an award from BJA to begin the
planning phase of the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative. In 1993,
Richmond had joined with several neighboring cities in the East Bay area
of Northern California to form the East Bay Public Safety Corridor
Partnership, an initiative designed to improve the flow of crime-related
information and cooperation between police and other government
agencies. 

A number of cooperative efforts grew out of this association, including the
development of a uniform domestic violence and battered women
protocol, as well as a process to create an inner-city computer network.
Members of the partnership also created a strategy to interrupt any gun
trafficking closely associated with area violence. The strategy employed a
gun expert who had developed a protocol to define and identify "junk
guns," instituted local policies that prohibited gun dealers from selling
junk guns, required that trigger locks be sold with all guns, and prohibited
gun shops from operating within 1,000 feet of schools. (For more
information on this innovative partnership, see Bureau of Justice
Assistance, East Bay Public Safety Corridor Partnership: A Voluntary
Regional Collaboration in Northern California, Monograph, June 1997,
NCJ 165695.)

--------------------------------

Chapter 3

Changing the Conventional Wisdom About Homicide

In recent decades, conventional police wisdom treated homicide as a crime
relatively immune from police suppression efforts. Homicide was regarded
as a product of forces over which the police had little control. Absent was
the ability to change social and economic conditions and the psychology
of groups most prone to lethal violence. Traditional reasoning concluded
that there was little the police could do to combat homicide. As a
consequence, police efforts to deal with homicide generally consisted of
enhancing strategies and techniques used in case-by-case, after-the-fact 
investigation. 

Recently, however, two trends emerged to change this complacent view.
One was the large increase in the mid-1980s in the number of homicides in
the United States. Virtually every analysis showed that this increased
violence took its highest toll among young people in core, inner-city
neighborhoods. These neighborhoods, traditionally marked by greater
levels of violence than other communities, became killing fields in which
drug-, gun-, and gang-related homicides proliferated. 

The second important development was the movement to community and
problem-oriented policing. Instead of treating their work as a series of
unconnected episodes exclusively of their own domain, police agencies
placed individual incidents into a larger context. By taking this approach,
they hoped to identify and address the causes of violence and to involve
the community in crime prevention. This movement pushed nearly all
police departments and law enforcement agencies to reconsider their
operating procedures and strategies and helped to change the prevailing
vision of what police could accomplish.

A New Approach in Richmond

One of the most significant findings from the first phase of the
Comprehensive Homicide Initiative was that the police in Richmond,
California, came to see homicides as part of a larger and more general
problem of violence. This important change in perspective was congruent
with increasing recognition that the manner in which police and others
categorized police problems had been too narrow, constricting the range of
approaches available to address them. This broadening conceptualization
of police problems and of the strategies and institutions that could be
involved in addressing these problems was reflected in the
recommendations of the 1995 IACP murder summit and began to take
hold with the advent of community and problem-oriented policing.[1]

The view of homicide as part of a more general violence problem
developed even though the demarcation between homicides and other
serious but nonfatal assaults had become clearer. When Wolfgang (1958)
studied homicides, he reported that many were outcomes of violence not
specifically intended to cause death. Some bar fight stabbings proved fatal,
for example, but others did not. Since that time, the nature of violence has
changed. There is now little ambiguity between homicides and nonfatal
assaults. When homicides are committed by emptying high-capacity
pistols and automatic weapons into victims' bodies, the offenders' intent is
unmistakable. Thus, the new view of homicide as part of a larger web of
violence comes at a time when there is more reason than ever to
distinguish between homicide and other types of violence. The distinctions
that might be drawn, however, are irrelevant to--or even impede--effective
homicide strategies.

Most important, the adoption of problem-oriented policing has marked a
return to a principle defined by Sir Robert Peel, the "father" of modern
policing (see Miller, 1977; Lane, 1980). According to Peel, good policing
was identifiable more by the existence of stable public order and the
absence of police business rather than by police success in solving crimes
and coping with disorder. While problem-oriented policing acknowledges
the importance of aggressive police crime-solving efforts, it has placed a
premium on Peel's preventive ideal and on police ingenuity in short-
circuiting problems before they grow into violent incidents involving
homicide.

This changed view of successful policing is at the core of the questions
raised by BJA's Comprehensive Homicide Initiative. How can these
perspectives affect homicide investigation, one of the most isolated and
reactive of all police activities? No matter how estranged from their
communities some police agencies are, the constant presence on the streets
of patrol officers, narcotics investigators, and vice officers has caused
these personnel to enjoy a great deal of contact with ordinary members of
the public and noncriminal justice officials and agencies. This has not
been true of homicide investigators, the police officers who heretofore
were tasked with almost exclusive responsibility for police homicide-
related activities.

Within their departments, homicide investigators have operated almost as
independent agents, responding on an ad hoc basis to cases called to their
attention but generally doing little to anticipate or prevent such problems.
As their caseloads have risen over the past decade, homicide investigators'
contacts with the community and other official institutions generally have
been limited to cultivation of informants and interaction with victims,
witnesses, suspects, prosecutors, and coroners. Their expertise has
involved interrogation, deduction, and detection and preservation of
evidence. By experience and inclination, they are among the least likely
candidates among police professionals for outreach programs such as
community-oriented policing.

An important proposition underlying the Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative asks whether the lessons and methods of community and
problem-oriented policing--as highlighted by the IACP murder summit--
can be applied to homicide investigation and prevention. Putting homicide
into the context of the problem of violence generally has broadened
thinking about which police officers have a responsibility to "do
something" about homicide, how they may do it, and whether and how
they should enroll the community in their efforts. 

--------------------------------


Chapter 4

Forming the Richmond Homicide Strategy

After a year of planning, the Richmond Police Department produced a
Comprehensive Homicide Initiative implementation strategy that provided
a coordinated focus for all programs and practices designed to address
homicide in Richmond. The strategy grouped activities to be supported by
BJA funding into two broad categories: community-based nonenforcement
strategies and investigative and enforcement strategies. Richmond's plan
emphasized the need to focus on longer term prevention as well as
strengthening local law enforcement agencies' ability to respond to and
investigate homicides immediately after they occur.

Community-Based Nonenforcement

Strategies

The Richmond Police Department identified the following
nonenforcement strategies, which focus heavily on youth and prevention:

o Collaborating with the community, the Richmond Public Works
Department, and the Housing Authority in a crime reduction planning
process emphasizing aesthetics and community pride.

o Using the Richmond Police Athletic League Computer Center to provide
job skills training to Richmond youth and adults.

o Collaborating with the Richmond public schools to enlist officers in an
adopt-an-elementary-school program and to develop a middle school
mentoring program involving Drug Abuse Resistance Education
(D.A.R.E.) officers and high school students.

o Collaborating with the Contra Costa County Probation Department to
develop a probation-officer-on-campus program for high schools.

o Collaborating with the juvenile justice system to develop a youth court
program.

o Collaborating with the Battered Women's Alternatives (BWA) and the
Rape Crisis Coalition to support programs and practices to reduce
domestic violence.

Investigative and Enforcement Strategies

To make its homicide prevention efforts more effective, the Richmond
Police Department proposed to strengthen traditional investigative and
enforcement functions by taking the following actions: 

o Developing an intensified team approach to obtain information on high-
profile homicides.

o Obtaining the assistance of the FBI in reviewing old, unsolved ("cold")
homicide cases.

o Obtaining the assistance of the Drug Enforcement Administration, the
FBI, and the California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement in targeting
violence-prone members of the drug culture.

o Assigning an evidence specialist to the Richmond Police Department's
detective bureau.

o Improving information sharing and technology.

The process through which the Richmond Police Department identified
and refined these goals included a variety of community input as well as
agency staff input. The department sponsored two Community Violence
Reduction Summits, during which members of the community and various
agencies of government discussed violence-related problems in the
community and possible solutions. An important objective of the police
department at these summits was to solicit ideas from the community on
how to address the reluctance of some residents to provide information on
homicide cases or serve as witnesses in court. 

In addition, the police department conducted a survey of community
residents living in an area targeted for violence reduction efforts called the
Iron Triangle. The groundbreaking survey revealed that about 72 percent
of Iron Triangle residents indicated that they or someone they knew had
been a victim of a violent crime. When asked to indicate the reasons
violent crimes were occurring in the community, residents mentioned
drugs and social/economic conditions most frequently. To the question
"What do you think police can do to reduce violent crime in the
community?" residents most commonly answered that more police were
needed and that police needed to spend more time with citizens and
juveniles. Nearly one-third of the residents stated that the community
should be more involved and most replied that they felt safer since the
implementation of community policing in Richmond. As many as 70
percent indicated that they would participate in programs designed to
reduce violence in the community.

--------------------------------

Chapter 5

Measuring the Impact of the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative in
Richmond

With the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative, BJA sought to fund a
demonstration of the kinds of multifaceted strategies for homicide
reduction reflected in the IACP murder summit recommendations. Of
critical importance was creating a process to document and assess the
implementation and impact of these strategies and sharing this information
with other demonstration sites. 

As part of its planning process, the Richmond Police Department
established 11 measurable goals for the initiative in 2 broad categories.
The first set of goals assesses the initiative's process in each program or
plan of action by determining, for example, the number of persons
contacted, the number of class hours, or the number of documents
obtained or disseminated. The second set looks at outcomes for each
activity, including (1) measuring the frequency of crime and violence; (2)
evaluating actual street conditions through onsite assessments of the
presence, number, and nature of street users; (3) measuring the presence,
persistence, number, and nature of deleterious conditions and nuisances on
streets and public places (for example, abandoned buildings and vehicles,
graffiti, and broken glass); and (4) surveying citizens' perceptions of
violence in the community, the conditions that generate it, and the efforts
of police and other institutions to address homicide and other violent
criminal acts. 

Goal 1: Encouraging Collaboration Among the Richmond Police
Department, the Richmond Public Works Department, and the Richmond
Housing Authority

This broad goal suggests (and may have been originally conceived as) an
effort to increase communication and cooperation among officials from
different government agencies through a variety of interrelated activities.
The Richmond Police Department's original Violence Reduction Summit
and community survey, however, revealed considerable interest in crime
reduction planning among the public. The department has since worked
hard to channel that interest into meaningful contributions.

Violence Summits. To date, the Richmond Police Department has
convened two Community Violence Reduction Summits. The first
summit, held in March 1996, helped define a basic course of action for the
department's strategies. The second, held in March 1997 and cosponsored
by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People,
enlisted citizens to volunteer in the department's efforts to reduce
homicides and solicited ideas on how the department could overcome
residents' reluctance to serve as witnesses and share information about
crimes in their neighborhoods.

Process measures for this goal include:

o Requests to the Richmond Police Department from members of the
community for followup activities related to the subject matter of the two
Violence Reduction Summits, including police meetings with community
groups and discussions of problems and strategies.

o Participation in violence reduction activities by an expanded array of
government agencies, community institutions, civic groups, and citizens.

o The number of participants in violence reduction activities.

o Changes in police strategies and programs attributable to information
provided to the Richmond Police Department by summit participants.

Outcome measures could include:

o Percentage of violent crime cases in which members of the community
provide information or serve as witnesses.

o Number of items of information concerning crime subsequently
provided by community members.

o Arrests on charges of witness intimidation, illustrating the willingness of
community members to "take a stand."

o Testimony in trials or pretrial proceedings subsequently provided by
community members.

o Convictions attributable to information or testimony from community
members.

Gun Programs. In addition to its cooperation with other communities in
the East Bay Public Safety Corridor Partnership to control the illegal use
of guns, the Richmond Police Department attempted to take guns out of
violent environments by operating two closely related programs: gun
buybacks and gun rewards.

The Richmond Police Department's first Violence Reduction Summit
produced a recommendation, since adopted, to begin a police-operated gun
buyback program in which citizens receive "no-questions-asked" cash
payments for guns. More recently, the department initiated a program
encouraging citizens to provide information anonymously about illegal
guns. If this information results in an arrest and seizure of weapons, the
citizens providing the information are eligible for a $100 reward. The
program was inaugurated with assistance from the local media, which
prominently covered the first citizens providing information. One citizen
call led police to several automatic weapons hidden by youth on the roof
of a local school.

Like many gun reward programs around the country, Richmond's program
faces challenges involving the constitutionality of police actions in
response to anonymous tips about illegal weapons. Although it is
important for police to solicit information about illegal guns, they cannot
search people or private places on the basis of uncorroborated tips from
people with questionable or unknown reliability. Richmond's strategy
requires officers to use any information provided as a basis for
surveillance and confirmation of the information. Only with this
independent confirmation is it appropriate for Richmond officers to search
individuals on the street for weapons or to apply for search warrants.

Outcome measures for Richmond's gun reward and buyback programs
could include:

o Number of guns taken out of circulation.

o Weapons seized as a result of information provided by community
members.

o Amount of money paid out in rewards for citizen information.

o Number of citizen contacts or tips not yielding useful information.

o Number of gun arrests from information provided through the gun
reward program.

o Number and percentage of such cases dismissed on successful motions
to suppress.

o Absence of evidence of retaliation against persons providing information
to the gun reward program.

Model Lease Agreement. In cooperation with the Richmond city attorney
and the Richmond Housing Authority, the Richmond Police Department
developed a model lease agreement, which facilitated code enforcement,
renovation of buildings, temporary relocation of residents, removal of
abandoned autos, and a variety of measures to address the "broken
windows" syndrome of public housing and the crime-related behaviors
associated with them. The model lease requires tenants to avoid
involvement with drugs and crime on penalty of eviction and has been
adapted for use in private rentals as well. The agreement allows police
officers to seek restraining orders, based on convincing evidence, against
residents involved in drug-related criminal activity. Violation of a
restraining order results in eviction.

Process measures for this program include:

o Number of model lease agreements executed in public housing.

o Number of private landlords adopting model lease agreements.

o Number of private lease agreements executed.

o Number of evictions obtained through lease agreements.

o Number of renovation projects in relevant housing areas and the total
sum spent on improvements.

o Number of abandoned autos removed.

o Number of code violations recorded.

Outcome measures could include:

o Number of complaints of crime and/or public nuisances in and around
premises subject to model lease agreements.

o Number of arrests of tenants who are parties to lease agreements.

o Results of surveys of street conditions in and around premises subject to
lease agreements.

o Results of surveys of citizen perceptions of street conditions and safety
in and around premises subject to lease agreements.

o Improvements in street and neighborhood conditions attributable to
model lease provisions.

Restraining Orders. Preventing drug dealers and gang members from
frequenting public housing developments and sensitive street and
neighborhood locations is a priority for the Richmond Police Department.
Officers have already begun working directly with the city attorney to
obtain court restraining orders against these individuals, but the
department may have overestimated its ability to obtain and use such
orders. The police prefer to seek restraining orders on the basis of
evidence, with or without conviction, that subjects are drug dealers or
gang members. The city attorney, however, would like to require a
documented history of crime problems, including arrests, before seeking a
restraining order. In response, the Richmond Police Department has
established criteria for determining gang affiliation, and the courts recently
upheld the constitutionality of both the restraining order process and the
gang affiliation criteria. 

Working in conjunction with the Richmond Housing Authority, the
department's drug elimination officers have issued 139 citations, made 74
arrests, towed 33 vehicles, written 71 reports, and excluded one drug
dealer from a public housing development. These officers' investigations
and reports have resulted in 15 requests for evictions and four requests for
counseling. Although the Richmond Police Department's temporary
restraining order process survived its first legal challenge, additional court
challenges are likely. If a more exacting standard is required, use of such
restraining orders will be narrowed considerably, making them a much
less effective tool to combat gang activity and drug dealing in or near
public housing.

Process measures for this program include:

o Number of restraining orders obtained.

o Number of restraining orders executed.

o Number of persons arrested for violating restraining orders.

Outcome measures could include:

o Number of complaints of crime and public nuisances in and around
locations from which individuals have been barred.

o Results of surveys of street conditions in and around locations from
which individuals have been barred.

o Results of surveys of citizen perceptions of street conditions and safety
in and around locations from which individuals have been barred.

Citizen's Guide to the Drug Problem. In July 1996, the Richmond Police
Department prepared and began distributing a citizen's guide to fighting
drug trafficking and drug houses. The guide, How to Eliminate Drug
Dealing, Drug Sales, and Public Nuisances, is an extensive resource
manual on neighborhood drug and crime prevention that will give
community groups a resource to link their efforts to police strategies. The
manual's topics include:

o The business/public nuisance of drugs.

o How do I know if a drug house is active in my neighborhood?

o Whose responsibility is it to get rid of a drug house?

o How do I get rid of a drug house?

o Goodbye drug house.

o How to settle your dispute.

o Inaction by property owners.

It is difficult to measure the manual's direct impact on reducing
neighborhood drug dealing activities. The guide's effectiveness as an
information resource, however, can be evaluated through interviews with
key members of the community and through process and outcome
measures such as those presented below. 

Process measures include:

o Number of inquiries about and requests for the guide.

o Number of guides disseminated.

o Knowledge of the guide within the community. 

o Number of neighborhood groups using the guide.

As dissemination of the guide grows, outcome measures could include:

o Number of persons or community groups implementing procedures
outlined in the guide.

o Number and types of actions taken and results produced.

Crime Prevention Course. A related crime reduction effort sponsored by
the Richmond Police Department is a crime prevention course taught by
the department's officers for members of the public. The course offers
participants an indepth look at effective crime prevention, including an
overview of crime prevention programs in California; a discussion of
physical hardware and lighting; and a review of prevention strategies such
as environmental design, security surveys, codes, ordinances, procedures,
and implementation of formal crime prevention strategies.

Like the citizens' guide to eliminating drug dealing, the benefits of this
strategy are hard to measure directly, but the Richmond Police Department
hopes the course will play an important role in improving citizens' ability
to protect themselves and their neighborhoods from crime, particularly in
high-crime areas. The program's contribution could best be understood
through process measures such as:

o Number of courses taught and hours devoted to the program by the
department and the community.

o Number and attendance of participants.

o Surveys of participants before and after the course.

Goal 2: Using the Police Athletic League Computer Center To Provide
Skills Training, Summer Employment, and a Youth Academy for
Richmond Youth and Adults

The traditional notion of a Police Athletic League (PAL) facility involves
a gymnasium, sweat, and lots of noisy youth engaged in boxing or
basketball under the guiding hand of volunteer police officers. The
Richmond Police Department has transformed this model by focusing
PAL services on preparing young people for meaningful employment and
extending PAL job training to Richmond's adult community. 

In a small strip mall across the street from Richmond's only middle school
is the heart of PAL's success in Richmond: a thriving and very innovative
computer training center used by at least 500 youth a month. The center,
funded with both public and private money (including a major
contribution from baseball player Willie McGee, whose roots are in
Richmond), has 50 computers, an extensive software library, a network, a
Web page, Internet access, and the tools necessary to teach computer
diagnostics, service, and repair. The center also sponsors a mobile
computer training center--a converted recreational vehicle donated by a
local corporation that roves throughout the city. 

Youth come to the PAL computer center to learn to use the center's word
processing, database, and communications capabilities; to use the
computers to do their homework; or simply to spend productive time in a
safe haven. The center is open to all ages, and adults also participate in the
various courses of instruction offered. The Richmond Police Department
has identified the computer center as a resource in its Comprehensive
Homicide Initiative plan and has directed Richmond's Employment and
Training Department to refer youth to the center who have requested
assistance in obtaining computer training. California Governor Pete
Wilson has visited the center in recognition of its innovative role in the
community.

Process measures to assess the center's contribution to reductions in crime,
violence, and homicide should emphasize the investment of training in
youth (and adults) in constructive, employable skills. These measures
might include:

o Number of children and adults using the computer center for both formal
and informal training.

o Number of hours of formal training delivered.

o Number of hours spent by children and adults in learning at their own
pace for vocational or recreational purposes.

Measures of the center's impact could include:

o Success of youth in school and in avoiding delinquency.

o Lower dropout rates at schools in the Richmond area.

o Jobs obtained by the center's participants.

Summer Jobs. Cutbacks in government-funded summer jobs for youth has
prompted the Richmond Police Department to work with other institutions
to obtain employment commitments from local private employers. Police
staff reported that the department obtained 1,100 such commitments for
the summer of 1997.

The program's process measure could be the number of Richmond Police
Department contacts with potential employees. Outcome criteria could
include the number of jobs made available for placement, the number of
youth placed in jobs, the number of hours those youth work, and the
attitudes of youth placed in employment.

Youth Academy. In October 1996, the Richmond Police Department
joined with the San Pablo Police Department and the El Cerrito Police
Department to establish and operate a youth academy. The academy
provides a constructive, educational experience for local youth while
increasing their interest in policing and community service careers. The
academy, which is open to youngsters aged 14 to 20, teaches alternatives
to life on the street and offers an introduction to the methods and
technologies of policing. Academy students wear uniforms and are graded
simply on attendance. Because the program is designed to provide its
participants with both substantive knowledge and a successful experience,
students who attend regularly cannot fail. Among the subjects studied in
the academy's first class were community-oriented policing, criminal law,
firearms safety, patrol, defensive tactics, crime scene investigation, jail
operations, investigation, barricade/hostage situations, traffic, and drug
and alcohol awareness.

Admission to the program is selective and is based on the applicants'
desire and need. Screening includes an application and interview process
in which interested youth are asked to describe their personal goals, gang
affiliations, academic records, and histories of drug or alcohol use. Their
responses are rated for presentation, communication skill, self-confidence,
decisionmaking, and parental support. 

Process measures for the academy could include:

o Number of applications received.

o Number of participants who enroll in and complete courses.

o Number of contact hours produced.

o Attitudes of participants and graduates about the program and its
content.

Outcome measures could include:

o Number of successful participants.

o Participant dropout and arrest rates.

o Participant grades and positive attitudes.

Goal 3: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Richmond Public Schools 

An important goal in Richmond's Comprehensive Homicide Initiative
recognizes the critical role of the education system in preventing the
involvement of youth in drug, gang, and gun activity that too often leads
to violent crime, including homicide. The Richmond Police Department's
strategy under this goal of collaboration focuses on two activities:
enlisting officers in an adopt-an-elementary-school program and
developing a middle school mentoring program involving D.A.R.E.
officers and high school students.

Twenty-three Richmond police officers are assigned to the Richmond
Police Department's Adopt-a-School program. These officers meet
regularly with teachers, conduct D.A.R.E. programs, and develop reading
and mentoring programs for middle schools. In addition, they conduct
truancy roundups after which youth are returned to the school system
through a special program designed to deal with students who are
frequently truant and at risk of dropping out of school. The truancy
program is nonpunitive, with an emphasis on returning truants to school
and involving their parents. Continued violations can result in youth being
referred to the city's probation department for review and placement. 

The police department's school liaison officers conduct the truancy
roundups because they are most familiar with the area's truant youth
population. This police role may appear inconsistent with the "officer
friendly" approach that characterizes the rest of the program's operations;
however, it is perfectly consistent with the department's crime prevention
mission. In Richmond, as elsewhere, a considerable number of crimes
(including violent and property offenses) are attributable to youth who
have chosen not to go to school. Over the long term, truancy reduces the
prospects that city youngsters will become involved in legitimate
educational and employment opportunities and increases the likelihood
that they will form criminal contacts and lifestyles.

Process measures for the Richmond Police Department's adopt-a-school
and mentoring programs could include:

o Number of schools and officers participating in the programs.

o Number and nature of officer contacts with students, teachers, and
parents.

Measures of the programs' impact could include:

o Crime, truancy, and dropout rates among students in participating
schools compared to those of students in other local schools.

o Surveys of physical conditions in and around participating schools.

o Interviews of teachers, students, police officers, and families on the
value and impact of the programs.

o Surveys of citizen perceptions of street conditions and safety in and
around participating schools.

Goal 4: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Contra Costa County Probation Department To
Develop a Probation-Officer-on-Campus Program

The Contra Costa County Probation Department assigns resident juvenile
probation officers to two of Richmond's four mainstream high schools.
The Richmond Police Department works with these probation officers on
a regular basis to address crimes that may occur on school property. The
probation officers check daily on probationers' school attendance and
monitor their activities in an attempt to keep them in school. The
Richmond Police Department pays their officers overtime to accompany 
unarmed probation officers when they make after-hours visits to clients in
dangerous neighborhoods.

Measures to assess the program's implementation could include:

o Surveys of student, teacher, and parent perceptions of the program's
effectiveness.

o Number of contacts involving police officers, probation officers,
probationers, teachers, and parents.

Outcome measures could include:

o Crime, truancy, grades, and dropout rates among probationers at
participating schools.

o Surveys of citizen perceptions of street conditions and safety in and
around participating schools.

Goal 5: Encouraging Collaboration Between the Richmond Police
Department and the Juvenile Court To Develop a Youth Court Program

Richmond's Youth Court, an afterschool program supported by the
Richmond Police Department and working with the area's juvenile court
system, represents one of the department's most important collaborative
efforts to divert youth from serious crime. In the Youth Court, prosecutors
and public defenders train youth participants to present minor cases to
juries of teenagers' peers and a juvenile court judge. The program's
rationale is that it is an effective vehicle for the communication of positive
peer pressure on minor offenders before they evolve into serious criminals.
In addition, the Youth Court experience of "judging" a peer offers an
important educational and constructive experience in decisionmaking and
individual responsibility. 

The court meets once a month and hands down sentences that typically
consist of community service. The Richmond Police Department identifies
cases for trial and administers court logistics. During implementation of its
Comprehensive Homicide Initiative, the department will assign an officer
to the program and increase the number of cases the court hears from 15 to
20 each year.

Process measures to assess the program's implementation could include:

o Number and types of cases heard.

o Number of youngsters participating in the program as jurors, court
actors, and "defendants."

o Surveys of court officials, students, teachers, and parents concerning
their perceptions of the program's effectiveness.

Measures of the program's impact could include:

o The kinds of decisions made in Youth Court dispositions.

o Crime, truancy, and dropout rates among both juror and defendant
participants as well as student "prosecutors" and "attorneys."

Goal 6: Encouraging Collaboration Among the Richmond Police
Department, the Battered Women's Alternatives, and the Rape Crisis
Coalition To Reduce Domestic Violence

Over the past decade, victim advocates and criminal justice agencies
seeking to improve procedures and practices have focused considerable
public attention on domestic violence. Through these efforts, domestic
violence is now viewed as a criminal rather than private matter. 

Recent studies have focused on the impact of domestic violence on
children, documenting that it breeds acceptance of using forcible criminal
means to resolve differences and can ultimately contribute to their
willingness to be involved in street violence. Rates of violent crime and
personal victimization appear to be declining nationwide, but domestic
violence has not shown comparable decreases. The reduction in
nondomestic homicides may in fact be displacing some violence in the
home. Hidden in recent overall decreases in New York City's homicides,
for example, is an increase in domestic murders. A recently completed
study of a community policing program in Jersey City also found that as
nondomestic violent crime decreased over time, domestic violence
increased (Braga, 1997).

The Richmond Police Department's Comprehensive Homicide Initiative
implementation strategy proposes to deal with the problem of domestic
violence in several ways. Consistent with prevailing police practice, the
department has in place a policy statement that:

o Distinguishes between criminal domestic violence and simple domestic
disputes.

o Mandates arrests in cases of felony violence.

o Mandates official action in misdemeanor cases but leaves the decision of
whether to arrest or to issue citations up to the discretion of officers, with
instructions to base their decisions on their assessments of the likelihood
of continued violence.

o Instructs officers to remove from victims' premises any cited defendants
who do not reside there.

o Authorizes police to make temporary (48- to 72-hour) seizures of
firearms in cases where officers perceive a threat of renewed violence.

o Mandates the reporting of all domestic calls and provides for monthly
summary reports to the California Attorney General.

o Provides officers with instructions on various types of protective orders
and related duties and arrest powers.

o Instructs officers on obtaining emergency protective orders in cases of
apparent immediate danger.

In addition, a May 1996 departmental order closed an important loophole.
In recent years, tragedies have occurred around the United States because
of delayed, inaccurate, or totally absent recording and implementation of
domestic violence restraining orders and orders of protection. This
departmental order assigns responsibility for the prompt entry of new
orders into a central recording system where they can be accessed quickly
and reliably by officers in the field when responding to domestic disputes.

The Richmond Police Department plans to supplement these basic policies
with a program of line-up, or roll-call, training for officers to be led by the
director of the legal program at the BWA program based in Richmond.
The training involves discussion of effective intervention techniques (for
example, victim dynamics, first response, on-scene contacts, children and
other victims, and followup investigations), understanding other cultures,
legal requirements, and resources available in the community to victims of
domestic violence. The department has high expectations for this program
and intends to work with the BWA and Rape Crisis Coalition programs to
establish a method to gather statistical data to show increased reports,
arrests, and prosecutions due to more effective police response to domestic
violence disputes.

Measures of the program's implementation could include:

o Number of roll-call training programs developed.

o Number of roll-call training contact hours related to domestic violence
procedures.

o Number of officers completing the training.

Measures of the program's impact could include:

o Number of domestic reports filed by officers.

o Number of arrests for domestic violence.

o Number and success of prosecutions.

o Number of firearms and other weapons seized at the site of incidents.

o Number of defendants removed from the premises of incidents.

o Number of arrests for violating protective orders.

o Number of requests for temporary restraining orders after incidents.

o Number of women referred to supportive services after incidents.

Goal 7: Developing an Intensified Team Approach to Obtaining
Information Concerning High-Profile Homicides

This goal prescribes a two-stage process for focusing on high-profile
homicides. In the first stage, homicide cases are systematically identified
that could be closed through a quick and intense attempt to gather
information on them. In the second stage, a protocol is developed for
mobilizing such attempts whenever high-profile homicides occur. The
Richmond Police Department is in the process of writing guidelines to
define high-profile homicides. Its tentative definitions include:

o "Set-on-set" gang- or turf-related murders in which retaliatory violence
is likely and possibly preventable.

o Homicides likely to draw extraordinary public attention (e.g., random
violence, stranger violence, or multiple homicides).

For the first type of homicide, the Richmond Police Department's plans are
preventive as well as investigative. The department believes that having
up-to-date knowledge of gangs and their disputes will help to interrupt
reciprocal violence by arresting the murderers before their enemies can
strike. This approach has been shown by the department to be particularly
relevant to gang homicides occurring within the city's Iron Triangle area.

For the second type of homicide, the Richmond Police Department's
experiences suggest that high-profile homicides are more likely than other
types to lead to successful evidence collection precisely because they are
so visible and notorious. Thus, instead of draining away existing
resources, the department seeks to add extraordinary resources to these
cases while making sure it does not jeopardize its efforts in less visible
homicide cases. A recent example is the "Zimmerman" case, in which two
men attempted to carjack a woman's vehicle in the city's marina area.
When she resisted, she was shot and subsequently bled to death as she
apparently tried to drive for help. Because of its random, violent nature,
the crime and the highly traveled roadway on which it occurred drew a
great deal of public attention and generated information not typically
available to investigators. When similar cases arise in the future, the
Richmond Police Department plans to immediately mobilize, solicit, and
analyze such information.

One method the department has already employed in such cases is the
"bike flood" program. At present the department deploys 10 to 12 officers
on bicycles to problem neighborhoods for 4 hours at a time. These
officers, by interacting with residents in a nonadversarial manner, have
broken down old barriers to communication. The Richmond Police
Department believes their presence following high-profile homicides to be
an important information-gathering tool. 

Another planned tool, likely to be funded by overtime, is to mobilize the
entire detective bureau to form a bureauwide investigative team for brief,
intensive information gathering immediately following high-profile cases.
This approach was first employed following a double murder in the spring
of 1997. At that time, 14 detectives were deployed to the scene to obtain
information from possible witnesses. The detectives knocked on the doors
of 300 residents over a 2-day period and generated information that led to
two suspects.

Measures to assess the implementation of these programs could include:

o Written guidelines for mobilizing and operating the bureauwide
investigative team and its other components.

o Written guidelines for the "bike flood" program.

o Number of personnel hours devoted to such efforts.

Measures of the impact of this approach might include:

o Number of high-profile homicides.

o Number of incidents of retaliatory violence.

o Clearance and conviction rates for high-profile and gang-related
homicides and retaliatory violence.

o Arrests made during or as the result of bike patrols.

o Reported crime during bike patrol periods.

o Number and nature of citizen contacts with bike patrol officers.

Goal 8: Obtaining the Assistance of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in
Reviewing Cold, Unsolved Homicide Cases

Given recent advances in the technology of weapons, ballistics, and
fingerprint and DNA identification, "cold case" squads and investigations
into old, unsolved homicides have become widespread. The Richmond
Police Department currently operates on several fronts in this area, such
as:

o The department submits materials from old cases to the Contra Costa
County Crime Laboratory.

o The department operates under a State of California requirement that it
obtain and preserve rib cage samples from all murder victims for possible
future analysis.

o The California prison system takes blood samples from prisoners
released after serving sentences for violent crimes. The Richmond Police
Department runs periodic checks of DNA from unsolved cases against
database samples, and the department recently had its first "match," which
solved a sodomy/homicide case.

The Richmond Police Department has proposed to obtain the assistance of
the FBI in its efforts to look into such cases as part of its Comprehensive
Homicide Initiative implementation strategy. Should the program be
approved for funding, process measures would include FBI and Richmond
Police Department person hours dedicated to the program and the number
of cases reviewed. Appropriate outcome measures would include homicide
clearances, convictions, and reductions in "cold" caseloads attributable to
FBI assistance. 

Goal 9: Obtaining the Assistance of the Drug Enforcement
Administration, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the California
Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement in Targeting Violence-Prone Members
of the Drug Culture

In December 1996 and January 1997, the Richmond Police Department
participated in a drug enforcement task force formed in response to a
marked increase in drug dealing and violent crime in certain parts of the
city. The goal of the task force was to reduce street crime and drug-related
violence by targeting drug traffickers and dealers who had the greatest
propensity for violence. The task force was made up of personnel from the
Richmond Police Department, Drug Enforcement Administration, FBI,
California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement, Contra Costa County deputy
sheriff's department, and State parole department. The task force operated
for 5 weeks (December 2, 1996, to January 5, 1997), during which time it
made 113 arrests (including 108 felonies) and 33 drug seizures (valued at
over $35,000). It also seized six guns. Its strategies were traditional but
intensive, consisting of surveillance, informants, search warrants, and
buy/bust operations. Under its Comprehensive Homicide Initiative
implementation strategy, the Richmond Police Department identified
continuation of this operation as a top priority.

Process measures include:

o Number of hours and personnel devoted to task force activities.

o Number of arrests and convictions attributable to task force activities.

o Number of searches.

o Seizures of drugs, weapons, and other contraband.

o Seizures of stolen property.

Outcome measures could include:

o Number of dealers and gang leaders targeted.

o Number of targeted offenders removed from the streets.

o Surveys of physical conditions in and around targeted areas.

o Surveys of citizen perceptions of street conditions and safety in and
around targeted areas.

Goal 10: Improving Information Sharing and Technology

During the first phase of the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative, the
Richmond Police Department's Homicide Unit obtained eight personal
computers capable of emulating mainframe terminals. The computers
presently operate as free-standing workstations while the department waits
for the installation of the mainframe simulation software. The department
plans to identify and acquire investigative database software and to use it
to build a network that is accessible to all Homicide Unit personnel.

Process measures for assessing the implementation of this project will
consist of the successful installation, operation, and compilation of a
useful database. Once a database is installed, measures of its usefulness
might include number of inquiries, savings in investigation time, number
of cases cleared, arrests made, and convictions obtained by using the
computer's capabilities. The true measure of the project's success,
however, will be how investigation is improved by computerization over
traditional information collection and analysis.

The Richmond Police Department is still developing an understanding of
the limits and capacities of the computer network it plans to develop.
Issues related to implementing the network will be addressed later in the
project.

Goal 11: Assigning an Evidence Specialist to the Richmond Police
Department's Detective Bureau

In the past, all Richmond Police Department evidence technicians were
assigned to the Patrol Division, a situation that created several problems.
There was little opportunity in the Patrol Division for these generalist
technicians to develop the expertise necessary to handle rapidly changing
homicide evidence technology. In addition, there was little continuity in
assignments. Consequently, connections between homicide cases that
might be apparent to people handling them on a steady basis were missed.

The department has attempted to address this situation by assigning one
evidence technician to the Homicide Unit on a continuing basis. This
technician, who is on call 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, has, according to
department staff, greatly improved evidence flow and efficiency. He also
trains technicians assigned to the Patrol Division and serves as the
department's liaison with the Contra Costa County Sheriff's technicians
and crime laboratory. Full implementation of this interdepartment and
interagency cooperation should increase the department's homicide
expertise and reduce the workload of the other technicians. 

In preparing for this new approach, the evidence specialist interviewed
current and past homicide personnel, prosecutor staff, and crime lab
technicians. The interviews pointed to the need to address evidence-related
problems, identify programs that would improve the evidence portion of
investigations, and determine how to implement the planned
improvements. In addition, the interviews uncovered five principal
problems that needed to be addressed: a lack of uniformity in evidence
collection, the need for a computer-aided design program to describe
crime scenes and the location of evidence, problems with packaging
evidence (bloody clothing and ballistic evidence), poor quality of
photographic evidence and poor crime scene searches for evidence, and a
need for monthly meetings between prosecutor staff and crime lab
technicians.

Process measures to assess the implementation of this program could
include:

o Number of cases analyzed by the evidence specialist technician.

o Number of training hours provided by the Homicide Unit evidence
specialist to other department personnel.

Measures of the program's impact could include:

o Number of times crime software is used in the courtroom.

o Additional problems identified in monthly meetings.

o Number of cases lost because of evidentiary problems.

o Number of cases cleared, arrests made, and convictions obtained because
of the enhanced expertise and efficiency of the Homicide Unit technician.

o Number of cases cleared, arrests made, and convictions obtained because
of the enhanced effectiveness and reduced workload of other department
evidence technicians.

--------------------------------

Conclusion

Although the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative in Richmond,
California, is still in its implementation stage, this pioneering community's
early experiences will help shape the next stages of the program.

The Bureau of Justice Assistance created the Comprehensive Homicide
Initiative program not to funnel large sums of money to selected sites to
start hosts of new programs but rather to catalyze local efforts focused on
homicide. In practice, this focus on homicide reduction has widened to
include a focus on violence reduction because homicide is understood in
that larger context. In Richmond, this perspective has led to a multidis-
ciplinary, multifaceted strategy that recognizes that homicide, and violence
in general, must be addressed on fronts that encompass the needs of youth
and adults in education, training, employment, and alternatives to drugs
and guns. 

Perhaps most compelling in Richmond's experience is the natural
extension of problem-oriented and community policing approaches to the
last bastion of traditional policing--the homicide unit. Under the
Comprehensive Homicide Initiative, homicide prevention and
investigation are no longer isolated from the rest of policing and
community crime problems. Richmond's initiative recognizes the critical
role of the police/community relationship, both in solving current cases
and in devising community strategies to reduce the likelihood of future
homicides.

Richmond's implementation plan has been effective because it
incorporates a wide range of goals both within and outside conventional
notions of law enforcement. However, these goals, while disparate in
substance, share a central theme--transforming the relationship between
community and police. In preparing its homicide reduction plan,
Richmond Police Department officials saw an immediate need to improve
police services and a longer term need to invest in youth who are most at
risk of becoming both perpetrators and victims of violence. 

The Comprehensive Homicide Initiative has passed an important first
hurdle in Richmond. Its early success there shows that an effective
strategy can be led by an effective police department, but not by the police
working in isolation. The involvement of other agencies and an active
community are key ingredients, without which the most inspired police
approach will not succeed.

As the Comprehensive Homicide Initiative enters a new phase in fiscal
year 1998, BJA will continue to assess the Richmond strategy as a model
of communitywide planning and will work with partners at the Federal,
State, and local levels to develop initiatives in other sites.

--------------------------------

Appendix A

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Bureau of Justice Assistance. 1997. Addressing Community Gang
Problems: A Model for Problem Solving. Monograph. Washington, DC:
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Bureau of Justice Assistance. 1997. East Bay Public Safety Corridor
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Bureau of Justice Assistance. 1995. Comprehensive Gang Initiative
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Bureau of Justice Assistance. 1995. Partnerships To Prevent Youth
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Bureau of Justice Assistance. 1995. Working as Partners With Community
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--------------------------------

Appendix B

Sources for Further Information

For more information on community efforts to combat violent crime,
contact:

Bureau of Justice Assistance
810 Seventh Street NW.
Washington, DC 20531
Phone: 202-514-6278

U.S. Department of Justice Response Center
1-800-421-6770

Bureau of Justice Assistance Clearinghouse
P.O. Box 6000
Rockville, MD 20849-6000
Phone: 1-800-688-4252