NEWBERRY — In an effort to build better community relationships, representatives from City and County law enforcement agencies along with Piedmont Technical College criminal justice instructors joined forces for a “Policing Matters” roundtable session at PTC last week.
One topic of discussion was the role a community plays in assisting law enforcement. City Police Chief Roy McClurkin said when fighting crime you’ve got to have the community backing you, and while the community plays a role in helping solve crimes, they can also cause difficulties with effective policing.
“One of the big things that’s hindering us these days is the fact that nobody wants to get involved. We can have a crime where there are 100 people involved, and you might get one person who actually wants to be involved in what you’re doing based on them not wanting to be called a snitch or something like that,” he said.
McClurkin noted that crime effects everybody, not just the victim of the crime, but society as a whole. He said when the community partners with law enforcement they are helping officers solve and keep crimes from occurring.
Sheriff Lee Foster encouraged everyone to say something if they see something going on in their communities.
“We have to understand that it’s your community. If somebody’s house gets shot up it could be yours next time,” he said.
When it comes to changes, Foster said technology has effected how law enforcement and the community communicates.
“Everybody’s got a cell phone, when I first started we didn’t have walkie-talkies, had to ride to a payphone in order to make a call or we had to stop at somebodies house or store. We communicate through cell phone or 144 characters in text message, we’ve got to do better with that and we’re working on it,” he said.
Josh Lindsay, PTC dean of Business, said community policing is all about building a partnership. A good illustration of that, according to Lindsay is the Andy Griffith Show.
This led to the follow up question of why wouldn’t the community get involved? A common response from those in attendance: fear.
Corporal Yolanda Williams, with the City of Newberry Police Department, said a common issue they face is with social media.
“People rely on Facebook so much now from shootings to videos, people put everything on Facebook, but that’s not solving anything. That video isn’t helping us because when we get ready to come to you it’s ‘I didn’t see anything,’ but you just put it on Facebook and that’s what we get,” she said.
Foster said while people may be afraid to get involved there are other ways to communicate information, including Crimestoppers which remains anonymous. He said we have become an impersonal society that says ‘if it didn’t happen to me it doesn’t effect me,’ when, as McClurkin said, it does effect you.
“Because it is your community, in policing we’ve gotten that way where we drive to the scene of something, talk to that person, take their report, leave and never come back in that area,” he said.
For members of the community some of the most pressing concerns brought up included drugs, break-ins, guns, gang and workplace violence and invasion of privacy.
Drugs, gangs, burglaries and guns, Foster said, are all interconnected with crack cocaine and marijuana being a common issue.
“Violent gangs generally try to control the sale of that,’ Foster said. “Guns are a commodity, I’ve never seen the price of a gun go down, a valuable commodity. A lot of the times they steal the guns in order to trade for drugs and guns go to the gangs.”
In regards to workplace shootings, Foster said they are commonly associated with mental health issues more so than alcohol and drugs.
Williams also addressed the unique issues she faces as a female police officer during the session. Being born and raised in Newberry she said she doesn’t see any issues.
“It’s not as hard to deal with because some I went to school with, some of the kids I know by the parents. I do have problems when it comes to having to make a charge or do my job and people think ‘oh she knows me, I can get a slap on the wrist’ it doesn’t work like that,” she said. “I tell people ‘when you go to somebody’s job you go to work’ when I come to this job I go to work, I don’t care if I know you as a family member because I have locked those up or a friend in the street. If you do wrong my job is to make you do right so that’s how you get the respect.”
Williams added she wouldn’t trade her job for anything and instead chooses to focus on the positives.
“When I take this uniform off I’m still the same person when I put it on, I treat you the same way you treat me,” she said.
