PORTLAND, Ore. (Portland Tribune) — Despite a recent series of highly publicized crimes on and along the TriMet system, agency officials say riding their buses and trains is relatively safe. As proof, they point to the 2016 TriMet Crime Report, which shows there were 1,247 reported crimes for nearly 99 million rides taken last year.
“While crime remains low on the TriMet system, one incident can have a deep impact on our agency, our city and our riders, so we remain resolute in our actions to protect the transit system,” says Harry Saporta, the transit agency’s executive director of safety and security, who is scheduled to present the report to the agency’s board of directors at its Wednesday meeting.
What Saporta couldn’t do, however, was directly compare crime statistics in 2016 to any previous year.
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Because of a change in the reporting system required by the FBI, police agencies participating in TriMet’s Transit Police collected their data differently last year than ever before. Instead of reporting individual incidents, the agencies tracked each crime within an individual incident.
As a result, although the 1,247 offenses reported in 2016 is much higher than the 407 incidents reported in 2015, it is impossible to know whether the crime rate increased, decreased or remained flat last year.
Saporta thinks the crime rate remained flat, based on conversations with Transit Police officers, including one who compiles reports based on reviewing videos of incidents on TriMet buses, trains and stations.
Direct comparisons can be made going forward, Saporta says, and TriMet will release a new report before the end of the year comparing offenses for the same months. But for now, he cannot prove the crime rate remained flat.
The new collection method is called the National Incident-Based Reporting System. Law enforcement agencies in the TriMet region adopted it this year, and all agencies in the country must use it by 2021. Saporta believes it more accurately reflects the nature of the crime on the system by reporting each offense within an incident. The data does not include noncriminal fare-evasion charges.
According to the report, in 2016, there were 287 crimes against people, 721 crimes against property, and 239 crimes against society, including such things as firearm crimes where no one was hurt. That breaks down to 58% property crimes, 23% people crimes and 19% society crimes.
Most of the crimes — 588 — happened on the rail system. The bus lines accounted for 343 crimes, while 316 happened on stations and other TriMet property.
The largest number of crimes — 346 — were larcenies, including property thefts. There were 138 assaults, 50 incidents of intimidation, and 12 sex offenses. There also were 106 motor vehicles stolen from TriMet properties.
Only 62 crimes were committed against TriMet employees. They included 27 assaults and 20 incidents of intimidation.
Public concern is high
Public concern over crime on the TriMet system is high because of a series of well-publicized confrontations and accusations that the Transit Police target low-income and minority riders, with potentially dire consequences.
The most shocking incident was the May 29 confrontation between alleged white supremacist Jeremy Christian and three Good Samaritans trying to protect two African-American girls from him. Christian faces murder, hate crime and other charges for killing two of the men and seriously wounding the third. A memorial still stands at the Hollywood MAX station to honor Ricky Best and Taliesin Myrddin Namkai-Meche, the two who died, and Micah Fletcher, the survivor.
Just over two weeks later, on June 15, Steven Klopp allegedly yelled slurs about the nationality of a PSU student from India and her parents while they were riding a MAX train downtown. Although no one was injured, Klopp allegedly spat at the student’s mother during the incident. He was arrested July 20 and charged with a hate crime.
Before those two incidents, Transit Police shot and killed a man who reportedly was threatening people in the area of a transit center near Southeast 92nd Avenue and Flavel Street. Police say Terrell Johnson threatened two officers with a knife as they were chasing him away from the station. Activists repeatedly have cited the death at meetings of the TriMet Board of Directors to argue against having armed police patrol the transit system.
Even before that, the district attorneys in TriMet’s service district announced they were reducing their criminal enforcement of some transit infractions because they disproportionately impact minorities. Prosecutors for Multnomah, Washington and Clackamas counties cited a December 2016 Portland State University study commissioned by TriMet that found African-American riders are cited for fare evasion at a higher rate than other riders. At TriMet’s request, the 2017 Oregon Legislature gave the agency more options for pursuing fare evaders administratively.
Filed under: Civic Affairs, Clackamas County, Crime, Editor's Pick, Headlines, Multnomah County, Oregon, Portland, Washington County
