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Weed and Seed effort gets results in Warren
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Results of the city’s first year of the federal Weed and Seed program suggest that the program is working, but it also shows that there are limits to what police can do, Capt. Joseph Marhulik said.
“The police do their part. We arrested hookers, but what do you do to rehabilitate them to get them off of drugs, get them to stop hooking?” Marhulik said.
“That’s where the community needs to get involved. That’s where the churches need to get involved.”
Weed and Seed is targeted at the southwestern part of the city and downtown. Also working in Warren this year was the federal V-GRIP program.
Many agencies assisted Warren police, including the U.S. Marshals Service and other federal officials, probation officers, and the Trumbull Ashtabula Group Law Enforcement Task Force.
Marhulik, the police department coordinator of the Weed and Seed program, prepared a listing of the drugs and guns taken off the street since April and arrests associated with the program.
For example, 50 weapons were recovered, a fact that may have prevented numerous gun crimes, Marhulik said.
Police records show that the city has recorded four homicides so far this year and has not had one since May 9, when Rahman Warfield, 34, of McKinley Street Northeast and Steven S. Faison, 24, of Duke Avenue Southeast were found shot to death at Warfield’s house.
Karenda A. Hutsenpiller, 21, of Fifth Street Southwest was charged with the crimes and awaits trial.
The city recorded nine homicides in 2009 and six in 2008.
The first homicide of 2010 occurred Jan. 20, when Michael A. Travis, 30, originally from Detroit, was killed in the rear parking lot of a multitenant house on Washington Street Northeast.
Drug dealing and prostitution there were rampant at the time, one neighbor said. The crime remains unsolved.
The second homicide occurred April 5 when DeShondre Crenshaw, 18, of Columbus and Niles fatally shot Scott C. Harvey, 25, of Akron in the parking lot of the Kenmore Apartments behind the Warren Plaza on Elm Road Northeast.
Harvey, a college student, was visiting the city at the time. Crenshaw will be sentenced Nov. 24. Earlier, he pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter.
Among the arrests made since Weed and Seed kicked off in April with an undercover sting on “johns” are crack-cocaine possession, 17; marijuana possession, 14; driving under suspension, 30; traffic citations, 84; walking along the highways, 6; and loud music, 6.
The Ohio State Highway Patrol made 250 traffic stops outside of the Weed and Seed neighborhoods when it conducted high-visibility enforcement Sept. 30 through Oct. 2, making 83 arrests, giving 98 vehicle-defect warnings and writing 120 warning citations. It also gave out 33 seat-belt tickets.
Forty-five junk, abandoned and unregistered vehicles were tagged in the Weed and Seed areas. That gave the owners three days to remove them or be towed.
Search warrants also were executed on Buckeye Street, Porter Street, Scott Street, Jefferson Street, Woodbine Avenue, Union Street and Mercer Street, resulting in confiscation of numerous types of drugs and cash.