March of Dropping Dimes

Kids are often punished for texting in school, but Suffolk police are now asking them to make an exception when it comes to anonymously reporting crimes committed by classmates in what is shaping up to be another tool to fight the “stop snitching” sentiment on the streets.

Inspired by a 100-student melee at Wyandanch High School last October that resulted in 13 arrests, Suffolk County Legis. Wayne Horsley (D-Babylon) proposed legislation to create the Text-A-Tip program, which was signed into law last December. Instead of calling the Crime Stoppers 1-800-220-TIPS hotline, the standard contact to call in leads on unsolved crimes, tipsters can send a text message to cops at CRIMES, or 274637, with “SCPD” in the body of the text. But instead of the $2,000 reward that is usually offered for unsolved murders, tips via text will earn the tipster up to $500 upon the suspect’s conviction.

“Texting a tip to law enforcement is a rapid and silent method of communication that may make tipsters more comfortable when reporting crimes, violence, or drug trafficking,” Horsley said in a statement after introducing the bill. “It is a low cost, inclusive crime-fighting tool that connects with the millennial generation,” he added. Since its inception in mid-April, more than 55 tips have been texted in, but no arrests have been made with the information, according to a police spokeswoman.

The program was modeled after a similar one recently put into effect by the New York Police Department. Suffolk’s program is geared toward combating the heroin epidemic among Long Island’s youth. Similar programs have also been enacted in Boston, Cincinnati, Charleston, Seattle, Fresno, San Diego, Tampa and Kansas City, Mo., where texts have lead to hit-and-run arrests, illegal gun confiscations and solved homicide investigations, Horsley said.
Nassau police say they are also exploring a texting program, and an informational anti-drug poster campaign in schools and communities is underway as well. The posters also publicize existing programs that can be handy for parents, like the anonymous drug analysis program.

“If adults find drugs in their kids’ rooms and are uncertain what it is, they can deliver it to a local precinct and we will conduct an analysis of it and let them know what kind of drug it is,” says Detective Lt. Kevin Smith, lead spokesman for Nassau Police. “We have embarked on this program because of the recent surge in heroin.”

If Suffolk’s texting program is any guide, Nassau should not have difficulty generating tips because it worked as soon as Suffolk started publicizing it on posters at schools countywide. “It’s kind of being kept quiet because nobody really wants to be known to be the one to rat people out, especially if it’s a friend,” says Ashley Slepian, 17, a senior at Half Hollow Hills  West High School, where she says several of her classmates have texted tips to police. And despite it being an affluent district, the reward is still a motivator. “I think it will get a rise out of the kids, especially if it’s offering cash,” she adds.

Some student tipsters’ motives may be suspect, one criminal defense attorney says. “You’re dealing with a segment of the population that may not have a level of maturity to deal with the circumstances that involve anonymous tips and rewards,” says Marc Gann, a partner at the Mineola-based Collins, McDonald & Gann. He also took issue with the possibility of students’ texting tips on classmates that they simply don’t like and the inability of a defendant to face their anonymous accuser in court.

Police counter that arrests aren’t made on a tip alone, but that the tips are used to gather additional, independent information in order to get probable cause for an arrest.

There are about 200 overdoses annually in Suffolk, which comes out to about four per week, as of 2007, the last year that such figures were available, according to Detective Sgt. Timothy Gozaloff of the Narcotics Section with Suffolk police. About 30 percent of those involve heroin mixed with other drugs and about 10 percent involve heroin alone, but overdoses overall are on the rise, he added. The ages of the overdose victims were not available.

“These are regular kids doing it, not some guy in an alleyway,” said Gozaloff, referring to heroin’s resurgence, at a drug awareness lecture in Manorville on April 20. “It could be anyone.”

And now that a cell phone is a weapon, anyone can join the fight against this scourge.