CORPUS CHRISTI Texas - Corpus Christi police said this summer has been the worst in the city’s history for graffiti vandalism.
It has become so bad that the graffiti task force met Monday to discuss some new ways to combat the problem.
Police said some 20 to 30 serial offenders are responsible for the bulk of the graffiti people see around the city.
Police have come up with a plan of action but they’ll need the support of the Nueces County District Attorney’s Office.
“The fact that they can actually post bond just shows that it is a defining characteristic of our criminal justice system,” CCPD Commander Mark Schauer said.
Schauer said he’s had it with the graffiti problem in the city and he’s tired of taggers being able to post bond so easily.
“Unless you’re accused of a capital crime, you’ll probably stay in jail, but other crimes you usually make a bond and if you do, you go back out,” Schauer said.
However, Schauer also said once the taggers get out and back on the streets, they’re at it again, which is why he called a meeting Monday morning with the graffiti task force to discuss possible ways to keep taggers in jail.
“We have to keep working with the district attorney’s office to make sure that if we have a serial offender, that we can look at getting their bonds increased and also work with the district attorney’s office to ask for special hearings,” Schauer said.
The special hearings would be at the judge’s discretion for repeat offenders to discuss whether they should be let out of jail or not.
Schauer said another possibility is 24-hour monitoring of suspects.
“Whether they can wear perhaps a monitor or have some special curfew that we can enforce,” Schauer said.
Schauer also said he plans to rely more on the efforts of a new hire in the probation department who will focus on monitoring repeat offenders.
“This one individual, this one probation officer that’s assigned to the police department, we’re hoping to give him 15 of our more serial offenders,” Schauer said.
Schauer is hoping by getting the 30 or so vandals off the street, the city will be a lot cleaner.
“When we actually do make the arrest and take down the graffiti and remove it, it pops back up again,” Schauer said.
Schauer said he hopes to meet with the district attorney soon to see if and when this plan can be implemented.
The police department said the task force will be getting a second graffiti truck coming in August and they’ll also add two more employees.
Grant money will pay for some of this, including police overtime to patrol for taggers
Via:www.kristv.com
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