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Comment by rdtsc | Hacker News Reader

> Union Pacific agents have made hundreds of arrests, but less than half are booked

> charges are reduced to a misdemeanor or petty offense, and the criminal is released after paying a nominal fine

So how does that affect statics? If they are not booked, and charges are dropped to a petty offense, it would look like the crime stats are trending down and the area is improving. “Look, burglaries and serious offenses are going, our policy is working so well!”

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And when this behavior is being translated to more traditional city crime where residents typically are the ones calling the police for help, it also has the effect of demoralizing the factual reporting of such crimes (because "nothing happens anyways"), further decreasing the statistics which just become fake.

Then fast forward a few years, you end up in a situation like in San Francisco, where crime is clearly up to the roof everywhere you look, but you have local politicians saying - with confidence - that it is down instead.

I always imagine the DA people winking and nodding to each when they discuss the exciting downward trend in serious crimes due to their policy. They’d never put it “on paper”, so to speak, but they know exactly what’s going on.

The LA DA was previously DA of SF, and he was the main proponent of Prop. 47 that essentially decriminalized property crimes under $1000 so yes, he has form.

Wrong. Misdemeanors are crimes

The point is they're being treated as if they weren't, even though they are.

That's not what GP said at all

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