NCJ Number
177270
Date Published
1999
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This analysis of the reasons for the marked decline in youth violence in Boston between 1990 and 1996 argues that a group of ministers, the Ten-Point Coalition, has had a crucial role through changing the way the police and Boston's inner-city community relate to each other.
Abstract
Boston's homicide rate has had the steepest decline in the country. The city experienced its record high of 152 homicides in 1990 as a result of the developing crack market, together with turf-based gangs and gang violence. The initial response of Boston police agencies to these problems was inadequate. Two scandals in 1989 alerted the community to the highly aggressive and reportedly indiscriminate policing tactics. The New York Police Department's Bill Bratton became police commissioner in 1993 and brought a new philosophy and spirit of innovation to the Boston Police Department. The department began actively using community policing tactics, looked for improved methods to manage gang violence, and made interagency collaboration to address youth violence. Religious organizations began working together in 1992 as a result of the murder of a youth in a drive-by gang shooting; the creation of the Ten-Point Coalition marked the official beginning of the black religious community's organized involvement in the issue of youth violence. Today the black community and law enforcement are no longer at odds with one another. The Coalition has created an umbrella of legitimacy for law enforcement; this umbrella enables the police to do their job in a way that is in the best interests of the larger community and youth without an inordinate fear of public criticism. The Boston experience makes it clear that the police need the cooperation of community leaders in the struggle against crime.