43
Village sees rise in crime by teens
The use of heroin is on the upswing among teens, the police chiefs say.
NEW MIDDLETOWN — This village is a great place to live – but police say a few bad eggs are causing trouble.
A group of 10 to 15 juveniles in this community of 2,100 has been giving police headaches since mid-August with a rash of property and drug offenses including:
UAn August breaking and entering of four garages and 15 vehicles. One juvenile has been arrested, and charges are pending.
UAn August arrest of four juveniles and one 18-year-old for marijuana possession and receiving stolen property.
UAn August arrest of a juvenile for possession of marijuana while in a parked car at Welker Park.
UAn arrest last week of two juveniles in a burglary at a Main Street apartment complex. They are in Mahoning County’s Martin P. Joyce Juvenile Justice Center.
Police Chief Vince D’Egidio could not provide a statistical breakdown, but he has observed about a 30 percent increase in breaking and entering into cars, vandalism and drug offenses over this period in the village, which comprises one square mile.
Other crimes on the rise are illegal tobacco possession by juveniles and shoplifting. He said some local merchants have reacted by posting signs limiting the number of youths in a store at one time.
The youths — all boys — range from 13 to 16 and tend to be from homes where there is a single mother who works and leaves them unsupervised, he said.
The offenses are not violent, and New Middletown remains a safe community, D’Egidio said, but he urged residents to take some simple measures to protect themselves.
“The public has to be aware that even though this is New Middletown, they have to lock their doors and cars,” the chief added. He said they shouldn’t leave valuables such as iPods, global positioning systems, cell phones or purses in their cars. Residents should also not be shy about calling police when they see something questionable.
Just recently, a resident thwarted a break-in by calling police to report suspicious activity. Even notifying police about unusual gatherings of youths is important.
“We call that a clue,” said Sgt. Ken Goist, a village police officer who is school resource officer at Springfield Local Schools. He noted that a bunch of kids behind a building could mean a drug deal, a kid getting beat up or a vandalism. So he urges residents to call and not make the common mistake of waiting until the next day to notify police. Witnesses can remain anonymous, he added.
He said that after the village business hours of 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., residents should use the police numbers — not the regular village number, although a recording on this number will instruct them whom to call. Police numbers are (330) 740-2370 and (330) 542-2234. If there is an emergency, they should call 911.
Police here have arrested some of the offenders repeatedly. But Goist said the county JJC is overwhelmed and doesn’t have the facilities to house youths who commit misdemeanors.
This means that most youths are turned back over to their parents with fines, unmonitored house arrest or probation, and they become a problem again.
He lauded neighboring Springfield Township Juvenile Diversion Program, which has accepted some village youths, but added none of the programs work for youths who don’t want to be rehabilitated.
Fueling the problem is the increasing popularity of heroin in this area. D’Egidio said the drug is cheap, readily available and popular with youths who don’t understand how addictive it is.
In nearby Springfield Township, which shares a school system with New Middletown, Police Chief Matthew Mohn said he has not seen any recent spike in juvenile crime.
He said, however, that he has noticed a steady increase in all categories of crime over the last few years in this 36-mile-square township with 6,054 residents.
Juvenile arrests have, in fact, declined to 19 so far this year from 39 and 34 in 2007 and 2006, respectively, for the first eight months of those years.
He credits the township’s two-year-old juvenile diversion program run by Aimee Schweers, which diverts first-time juvenile offenders from the courts into alternative programs.
The number of youths referred into the program also declined from 31 at this time last year to 22 so far in 2008. Statistics provided by Mohn for 2006, 2007 and 2008 do not show a large increase in juvenile offenses, and in most categories show a decrease.
Mohn said, however, there is an overall increase in the number of calls, from 2,500 annual police calls when he took over in 2000, to nearly 7,000 now.
Mohn said that last Friday, however, Springfield police charged four girls, age 11 to 15, for unruliness at the Springfield High School football game after a fight there, which he said was an unusual occurrence.
He agreed that heroin use is on the upswing and said law enforcement authorities had predicted this.
He said that U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents have told him that the THC levels in marijuana are also higher today, making the drug more addictive. THC, according to the American Heritage Dictionary, is the primary intoxicant in marijuana.