'We're coming after you': Gun arrests part of national initiative

A Montgomery crime sweep this week that netted 15 arrests on federal gun charges is part of a national push, spearheaded by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, to reinvigorate a Bush-era crime program that imposes stricter sentences within the federal judicial system.

"If you're a felon and you have a gun, we're coming after you," Montgomery County District Attorney Daryl Bailey said. "Chances are, we already know who you are and where you live. We're going to make sure you're caught, arrested, prosecuted and sent away for a long, long time. That's a promise."

The arrests mark a revival of sorts of Project Safe Neighborhoods, the nationwide gun and gang crime reduction program created under President George W. Bush. PSN sought to shift prosecution of local gun crimes from local to federal authorities.

According to reports, $3 billion was allocated through 2008 to support the program in all U.S. Attorney districts. The first iterations of the program recognized that federal prosecution was needed but cooperation with local authorities was vital to build a strong case against suspects.

In theory, federal prosecution can be a modern exile.

Instead of serving time in a state prison, Bailey said Thursday, you could be shipping off to South Dakota to serve your sentence. Proponents of the program say PSN is a double-edged sword, taking the most serous offenders off the streets in a way that deters further crime.

The program languished across the country and in Montgomery, U.S. Attorney Louis Franklin said Wednesday, as funding dwindled. But the Justice Department last October announced a renewed dedication to the program, and Sessions has been touting it in several states in recent months.

"I sat in Attorney General Sessions' office last Friday, and we talked about the issue of violent crime," Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said. "We know this is an issue we have to tackle."

PSN programs have been ramping up again across the country, with similar sweeps reported in Arkansas, Kentucky and California in recent weeks.

But how effective was the original program?

A 2009 Michigan State University report, funded by the Department of Justice, found a 4.1 percent drop in crime in PSN-targeted cities, though other criminologists have argued it's difficult to isolate the exact causes of crime dips.

The MSU researchers targeted Alabama specifically, though, due to the type of PSN program implemented in Montgomery and Mobile.

According to Uniform Crime Report data from 2001, both the Middle and Southern judicial districts of Alabama had homicide rates higher than the national average. Officials at the time feared "extreme prison overcrowding' in the state had resulted in lighter consequences for gun offenses.

“Indeed, officials shared data demonstrating that a significant number of homicides and gun assaults were either receiving no or minimal prison time in state prisons,” the MSU report states.

Alabama's Middle and Southern judicial districts adopted the same model as a program in Richmond, Virginia, called Project Exile. Exile combined police and prosecutorial resources in the late-1990s. Richmond gun crime rates dropped, the project was touted as a huge success and the Bush-era Justice Department merged the program in to PSN in the early aughts.

There is little research consensus on the effectiveness of Exile. The two major studies concluded drastically different outcomes: One said the homicide reduction simply followed an overall national trend of violent crime reduction, while the second reported Exile effectively sped up the decline.

Opponents of Exile attracted an ideological range of groups. While the National Rifle Association was an outspoken supporter of Exile, several gun rights groups joined forces to denounce the project as unconstitutional. Other opponents included sentencing activists, who argue mandatory minimum sentencing undermines judges and contributes to prison overcrowding.

Federal prosecution of gun crimes increased significantly after PSN’s implementation: indictments increased from 15 in 2000 to 92 in 2003 in Alabama's Middle District.. MSU’s report states the increase placed it in the “top 7 percent of districts” in the program in terms of percentage increase.

In Mobile, according to MSU's research, the prosecutions worked. From May 2002 to August 2006, total gun crime decreased on average by about 26 incidents per month. Researchers also had access to gunshot trauma admissions at the University of South Alabama hospital and found admissions decreased by about two incident per month.

Researchers focused on armed robbery, assault, and homicide trends in Montgomery. The biggest decrease was seen in aggravated assaults with a firearm, the most frequent gun crime in Montgomery at the time. Aggravated assaults dropped an average of three assaults per month, according to monthly data examined from January 2000 through December 2004.

"This translated into a reduction from approximately 309 gun assaults per year to approximately 270," the report states.

Homicides also declined slightly, but researchers described the significance level as marginal. Armed robbery cases held steady.

The MSU report calls Alabama “unique” due to the coordinated branding of PSN across the Northern, Middle and Southern judicial districts. PSN spearheaded a media campaign with billboards and a commissioned campaign with Johnnie Cochran: If "you're caught with a gun, not even I can't get you off," O.J. Simpson's attorney said in a nationwide TV commercial.

Both the Middle and Southern districts at the time reported they had concerns about handling the caseload with a limited number of ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) agents and federal prosecutors. In Montgomery, turnover at Montgomery Police Department was also cited as a key concern.

"Back then, we had a lot of money to go with the program. But the program languished after awhile," Franklin said. "We now know that in order to get programs like this back in place, doing what they're designed to do, we have to work together."

MSU's report notes a violent crime rebound was seen across the country in 2004-2006, but PSN may have helped curb the rebound in its cities.

"PSN target cities in high prosecution districts were able to resist the rebound in 2005 and witnessed a much smaller increase in 2006 than other cities," the report states.

Though the program is returning, the Bush-era level of funding is not. Cooperation and information sharing between organizations like ATF, Montgomery Police Department, Bailey's office and federal prosecutors are key to making the program work.

"We now know that in order to get programs like this back in place, we have to work together," Franklin said. "We don't have that money this time. The pitch is we think this program will successfully reduce crime in this area if we all work together."







