Other complaints involve fights, vandalism and graffiti. There's an especially strong focus on the elimination of threats to property and trade. I have heard major mobilizations involving three or four police cars, all to apprehend a single graffiti writer loose in a city park. Similarly, any confrontations between young people and storekeepers are met with rapid response. The only exception seems to be for kids caught shoplifting in the Stonestown mall, upscale offenders who are left to cool their heels in the security room until the afternoon rush has ended.
Most mobilizations are anticlimactic and result in questioning or a call to disperse.
Youth activity is random and reactive, involving small groups that form within temporary assemblies of kids, taking the slow way home, reacting to similar opportunities along the route. Police movement often follows a similar pattern, but it is highly coordinated into a paramilitary network of people and tools linked by wireless technology. While youth move through space on foot and by bus, cops race around in their cars. One would think this gives the police an overwhelming advantage, but in fact they seem completely intimidated by the constantly changing configurations of young people around the city. Most of these involve children that have not returned home after school, and most seem to be cleared quickly when the subjects are found in their own neighborhoods.