On the night of his 20th birthday in December 2012, Darren and Cassandra were robbed at gunpoint in the alley behind the Colony Arms building. Darren knew the gunman — he was a resident of the building, a member of the same gang mentioned above. The gunman pointed his shotgun at Cassandra’s pregnant stomach — at Darren’s soon-to-be-born son — and threatened to shoot if they didn’t give him their money. Cassandra was screaming hysterically, and the gunman and Darren were both warning her to be quiet.[7] Eventually, he took their money (twenty dollars) and crept away down the alley. Darren and Cassandra then entered the back door of Colony Arms and coincidentally saw two of Detroit’s finest loitering on the back stairs. Cassandra, still hysterical, told them what had just happened. The policemen told her to calm down and step back. One officer took Cassandra’s name, but, as Cassandra told us, “He ain’t even write down what I told him he look like ... or that I knew he was going to the next building 'cause he had people there.” The cops said that they would handle it, then Cassandra watched as the two cops exited the building, got in their car, and drove away. Carissa, their six-year-old daughter, watched the robbery through the window in their living room window. She was confused and scared when her parents returned, and together they waited more than two hours for the police to contact them. At nearly midnight, they received a knock on the door from a different policeman, who came to follow up on Cassandra’s call. By this point, predictably, the gunman was gone, and the officer told them that he was sorry, that there was nothing to be done. The crime had taken place in view of several of their neighbors' windows; however, none of these residents were interviewed about the robbery by the late-arrived policeman. As is typical, the policeman did not give Cassandra any kind of incident report, making it difficult to track police activity related to this crime.[8]

II

Who was arrested in the raid?

Do-Wrong is the nickname of an unemployed 25-year-old male notorious around Colony Arms for his discretion and sense of humor. He is hesitant to give his government name to anyone; several close friends admitted that for years they have known him simply as “Do-Wrong.” Though he is not a resident of Colony Arms, Do-Wrong is a familiar presence around the building; Colony Arms is one of the residences where he makes some money as an entrepreneur. He sells cigarettes. “Only Newports ... I can't make no money on anything but Newports.” The price ranges from fifty cents to a dollar per cigarette, depending on the the number of cigarettes being bought and the buyer's relationship with him. Do-Wrong uses the money he earns from this hustle and other odd jobs (“construction, painting ... anything”) he works in order to support his daughter. On the day of the November raid, Do-Wrong was hanging out with some friends in their apartment when cops came through the front door. They ran everyone's name and eventually arrested him on a court holding for a months-old moving violation. He spent two days in county jail and was released without having to pay the outstanding fine.

The official justification given for the raid was that there were more than six hundred calls from the Colony Arms Building to the police in 2013 alone. However, it is clear from conversations with residents that the poor response by the police to these calls gave rise to more calls, as crime continued unchecked, so the justification for the raid was also evidence of the poor policing which, in part, gave birth to it. As KP told us, “If a criminal knows he gonna be able to get away with something ... if the police gonna take an hour ... then he’s gonna do it. Why wouldn’t you do it if you know you’re not getting caught?”

Commissioner Craig claimed that the raid was a response to the pervasive crime in Colony Arms and that the operation was successful: “There are people with outstanding warrants. Some felony suspects. A parolee for carjacking who was armed with a gun when we made contact with him this morning. This has ... been a great operation.”[9] However, despite this vague claim, DPD has yet to publicly release the names or statistics of the arrests made during the raid. Our conversations with residents indicate two main problems with the raid’s relation with this crime: (1) those arrested in the raid, for the most part, had nothing to do with the calls made to police, and (2) almost everyone arrested was released within three days.

The vast majority of those arrested in the raid were charged with low-level misdemeanor crimes or were brought in on old court writs. Marco told us, “Any person with any little amount of weed on them, just they little personal weed, they was arrested [during the raid] and they made them all seem like real big criminals. That ain’t got shit to do with what’s going on here with people that really do be hurting other people.” Marco told us a story that was echoed by many residents we interviewed. Gio, one of Colony Arms' notorious drug dealers, was arrested in the raid. “They got Gio, yeah — on some tickets, dog. On some parking tickets, dog," Marco explained. None of Gio’s drugs or guns were found, and, though Gio was a provocateur of many of the 600 calls to police, he remained at large for all of 2013. “That nigga was back on Monday, doing what Gio do.”

Dre told us about the arrests made during the raid: “Most of the real criminals got away. All they really got was some petty … parking tickets, traffic violations, writs, different things like that .... Only real way to get them real [criminals] is to catch them slipping ... the only way to do that is to respond to calls .... [The police] just don’t be on they job.”