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Crackdown nets results in Youngstown
By Peter Milliken
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
YOUNGSTOWN
The city’s gun interdiction program seized nine guns Wednesday, making it the biggest day since the program began in early July.
Four people were arrested Wednesday in four separate locations.
To date, the program, known as V-GRIP, has seized 97 guns, primarily on the city’s South and East sides, said Lt. Kevin Mercer, the officer in charge of the effort.
V-GRIP is an acronym for the Violence Gun Reduction and Intervention Program.
About half of the firearm seizures result from traffic stops, and about half from the execution of search warrants, Mercer said.
Participating officers are “blanketing the whole city,” Mercer said. “You’ve got to start somewhere to reduce crime,” and seizing guns from criminals is a good place to start, he said, noting a vast majority of homicides are committed with firearms.
“You put that violent crime down, and then you filter out to curb the other crime. That’s what this program is designed to do — get the violence off the streets first,” Mercer said.
The gun seizures are often accompanied by seizure of drugs, ill-gotten cash, and vehicles used to commit crimes, he added.
V-GRIP is a joint crime-fighting offensive of several local police departments and state and federal officials.
In Wednesday’s first seizure, police accompanied officers of the Adult Parole Authority to the home of Corey Council, 22, in the 500 block of West Princeton Avenue shortly after noon.
There, they reported arresting Council and seizing three long guns, a handgun, a scale, marijuana and an unknown amount of cash.
After being handcuffed, Council fled from an unmarked police car, then hid in a garage and in a vacant lot in the 500 block of West Hylda Avenue, before being apprehended again in the first floor bathroom of an Idora Avenue residence, to which the occupant hadn’t admitted him, police said.
Council was charged with a parole violation, escape, burglary and two counts of improper handling of a firearm.
At 7:32 p.m., police stopped a car at Breaden and Hillman streets, after seeing the driver, Alex C. Green, 23, of Baker Street, improperly signal a turn and hearing the clicking noise of studded snow tires on the car out of season.
After a police dog searched the car, officers found marijuana, two loaded handguns, two digital scales and five pills of Altrum, an antidepressant and tranquilizer.
Green was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia, marijuana trafficking, illegal gun possession, possession of dangerous drugs, two counts of carrying a concealed weapon and the traffic offenses.
At 8:21 p.m., police went to a house in the 1600 block of Wick Avenue, from which shots had reportedly been fired.
Police said an occupant, Frank J. Karcher, 19, emerged from the house and admitted firing his .40-caliber handgun outside.
Police recovered that gun, loaded with 10 live rounds, and a .22-caliber rifle and ammunition, and they charged Karcher with discharging a gun within city limits.
At 10:27 p.m., police stopped an eastbound car they said went left of center three times within 100 yards in the 100 block of Division Street and charged the driver with that violation.
After seeing a handgun barrel sticking out from under the passenger seat, where Christopher J. Scalf had been sitting, they said they found a small bag of heroin in Scalf’s pocket.
Scalf, 23, of Buhl Court, Sharon, Pa., was charged with heroin possession and improperly handling a gun in a motor vehicle.
Although the V-GRIP program is less than two months old and statistics are still being compiled, Mercer said he noticed 600 fewer calls than usual in August for city police service, many fewer gunfire reports from the city’s automated ShotSpotter system, and an apparent decline in violent crime.
Many of the guns are being seized from people with prior felony convictions, who aren’t legally allowed to have them, Mercer said.
Twelve of the V-GRIP cases have have brought federal charges, and an additional 18 may be prosecuted in the federal court system, where potential prison terms are longer, he said.
Under federal sentencing guidelines, felons convicted of having guns can get up to 10 years in prison, but state law limits the prison time to one to five years, he noted.
V-GRIP officers meet weekly with Mark Hockensmith, an assistant Mahoning County prosecutor, and Dave Toepfer, the Youngstown-based assistant U.S. attorney, to decide which felon-with-gun cases will be prosecuted under state charges and which ones will be federally prosecuted, Mercer said.