HTA-0621: San Jose Police Chief Chris Moore

Metadata

Summary

Henry interviews San Jose Police Chief Chris Moore, a cop since 1982 with a law degree, Fulbright fellowship, and White House experience.

Full Transcript

00:00
San Jose Police Chief Chris Moore has been a cop since 1982. He has a law degree. He was a Fulbright fellow. He worked at the White House. And he is now the police chief of San Jose. Thank you very much for coming in and joining us. Let's start with the hard news today. There's been a report of another homicide in San Jose gang related. Are gang related crimes increased and doesn't have anything to do with budget cuts?

00:25
Henry, first of all, let's say it's a tragedy any time you have a homicide, but when you have a 16-year-old like we had last night, it's just unacceptable.

00:32
We have a really good Mayor's Gang Prevention Task Force that focuses on these issues, but the truth of the matter is we've had fewer homicides this year than we did last, but again, that's still too many.

00:42
We're a very safe city, one of the safest, largest cities in America, but again, we have to stop these youth-related homicides. It's just unacceptable.

00:50
there has been there have been cutbacks major major cutbacks for your department i mean when we look

00:55
at it uh it's down by a fifth in terms of personnel since the peak you 185 fewer people since last

01:01
summer the helicopter is mostly grounded except once a week how's that affecting uh law enforcement

01:06
in your city henry uh it's always difficult when you lose that number of resources in a city our

01:12
size but the truth matters we have some of the best police officers men and women that work in

01:16
in this business. Having said that, there are things that we just don't do anymore. And honestly,

01:20
members of the public sometimes don't like it. It's a cutback in service. We went to a verified

01:24
response policy. A lot of 98.5% of the alarms that came in for burglaries were false. And that's

01:30
just not an efficient use of resources. And I know we got a little bit of pushback. But the stats are

01:34
what they are, is that we are able to catch more burglars because we're not responding to those

01:38
types of calls. What about gang enforcement? We have focused on gang enforcement, similar to what

01:42
we did last summer, that's where our attention needs to be on violent crime and on gang crime.

01:46
Do you have as many people working in that area now as you did before?

01:49
As we did as we did last summer. It's never going to be the same because we're down, like you said,

01:52
over 22 percent. But with the resources we do have, most of our effort is focused on gang violence

01:58
prevention. Another issue that's going on in the city is the homeless encampments. There are some

02:04
60 of them. And I understand that for various legal reasons, they can't necessarily be cleaned out.

02:09
And for various, perhaps, budget reasons, they can't be literally cleaned.

02:14
That is, the city water department can't come in and clean those areas up.

02:17
Neighbors are infuriated, I understand.

02:18
Let me give a little bit of clarity to that particular situation.

02:21
The homeless encampments in the creeks have been around for many, many years.

02:24
That's not new in the environment.

02:26
The economy we're in today, more folks without housing, without jobs,

02:30
finding themselves into places like the creeks and under overpasses.

02:33
That's not new.

02:34
What's a little different is this year and for the last several years,

02:37
we've worked with the Santa Clara Valley Water District in a partnership

02:40
maintain the waterways, keep the flood control channels clear, and move people into better housing.

02:45
It's a societal issue. It's really not a law enforcement issue, but what we've done is, starting next week,

02:50
we have a new partnership and a healthier partnership, I think, with the Water District and our Environmental Services

02:55
and our Housing Department.

02:56
To do what?

02:57
To get some of the folks that get them services, get them out into permanent or at least transitional housing.

03:00
But as you say, that's not a law enforcement issue.

03:02
It is not, but part of the thing is when you're down in the creeks there, some of the folks that have been working in the creek,

03:06
I'm talking about from the Water District, have been threatened.

03:09
It is appropriate for us to be in the creeks working with those services to make sure those folks are safe.

03:14
But the truth of the matter is it's a societal problem.

03:16
It's not going to go away overnight.

03:17
It's going to take a lot of resources, but I think we're on a much better path than we were.

03:20
So we've been looking at gang-related homicides.

03:23
What percentage of the homicides this year have been gang-related?

03:26
So as of last night, this is our 16th homicide.

03:29
Seven of those 16 have been gang-related.

03:31
And again, if you look at other major cities, that's a very small number.

03:35
But again, if you're a family member of that 16-year-old, that's not acceptable.

03:38
What happened last night, do you know?

03:40
Yeah, well, we don't have all the details just yet, but we did get a call just before midnight over at King and Virginia,

03:44
and that's an area that has been known, has been plagued with a number of gang-related incidents and homicides in the past.

03:50
We responded there.

03:51
We did find two individuals down.

03:52
One, the 16-year-old, was deceased at the scene, and the other was transported to a local hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

03:59
Again, we're working through.

04:00
We have leads.

04:01
Our detectives are some of the finest in the business, and they're going to find out who did this.

04:05
San Jose Police Chief Chris Moore, thank you so much for coming in.

04:08
It's great to talk to you, a formidable fellow.

04:10
Thank you.

04:11
Henry, thank you.

04:11
Marty, Isabel, back to you.