Seniors blame Metro for inadequate protection

Karen Zekan

Friday, Aug. 15, 1997 | 9:34 a.m.

The Nevada Seniors Coalition has accused Metro Police of not prioritizing residential crimes and crimes against seniors at a time when the department says it is expanding its manpower to keep pace with burglaries and larcenies.

About 50 seniors -- among them elderly burglary victims -- attended the coalition's monthly meeting Thursday at the Showboat hotel-casino.

Some spoke of the fear they live with that burglars who broke in once will come back, others of officers who do little more than take a report, and feeling like no one cares about seniors.

"It's not a problem of the people doing the work at Metro," said Ken Mahal, president of the Nevada Seniors Coalition. "It's that there's no priority. We are taxpayers and we want our proportional share of law enforcement."

Metro currently has approximately 1,600 officers handling its share of jurisdictional calls in a valley with a population topping 1 million.

Previously, any one detective assigned to the property crimes section had to handle a mixed bag of auto burglaries, shoplifting, business break-ins and residential burglaries.

Detectives can specialize

Lt. Tom Lozich said his recent reorganization allows his detectives to specialize and therefore better attack specific crimes.

Ten detectives now form the burglary detail, splitting a case load that averages 1,000 burglaries a month, including business, auto and residential.

Six detectives handle all retail and residential theft that come through the larceny detail, which averages about 2,200 such crimes a month.

The bond issue approved last fall will see a property tax increase pay for 450 more Metro officers over the next four years. Of them, 11 more detectives will be added to the investigative services division this fall, and 28 more detectives again next year, Lozich said.

"A top priority for us is putting the bulk of my detectives on burglaries," Lozich said. "Personally, I'd like to see 20 more detectives working up here. If more burglary detectives is what the community wants, we're here to meet their demands.

"You hear about near-rapid growth and how we are continually playing catch-up. When someone calls Metro, no prints are taken or ID can't come out, it's because everyone is so jammed up."

He added that, while the police department's job is to protect both life and property, violent crimes where life is in jeopardy -- murders, armed robberies, rapes -- take priority over crimes involving property.

That's no help for an elderly woman living in a condo near the Boulevard Mall, who is eager to move back to California.

What's stopping her is a mischievous thief who she claims has been breaking into her home repeatedly over the last three years. He tampers with her air conditioning and heating units, rips her clothes, has broken a sentimental radio and stolen all the files beginning with "B" -- the first letter of her last name -- from her file drawer.

He breaks in when she's away. The damage has prevented her from selling her condo, said the woman who requested her name not be used for fear of further retribution.

"People think I'm crazy when I tell them, but this is really going on," she said. "The worst part, though, is that the police do nothing. I know it sounds strange, the things that have gone on, but the police do nothing more than take a report. They won't even take fingerprints off a file cabinet."

Another woman in the audience Thursday, who gets around with a walker, spoke of the terror she still lives with three years after a burglar stole her jewelry, VCR, and other possessions and then eluded police.

"They don't care about our rights, because we're seniors," said Gordon Miklethun, who has spent thousands of dollars on private investigators and attorneys trying to find his son's killer in a 1986 case Metro has yet to close.

Leon Simon, a lawyer and former prosecutor, told the coalition that changing the justice system to answer their complaints can only come by organizing themselves the way Mothers Against Drunk Drivers did to make authorities and legislators change the drunken driving laws.

Simon spoke of the newly installed statutes on the books increasing the penalties for those who victimize seniors, yet said that law enforcement still makes murders, armed robberies and forcible rapes their top priorities.

"It's a political thing"

"Crimes that are politically popular (DUI, domestic violence) get the attention and the resources that are left over," Simon said. "It's a political thing."

"We're not trying to isolate seniors," Lozich said. "We're trying to give equal protection to everyone the best we can. In our hearts, we have a special place for seniors."

Lozich has lived in Las Vegas for 30 years. His father and mother-in-law live here as well -- two examples, he said, "of people I don't want anything to happen to."

"I can't help but get defensive about this unit," Lozich said. "I hate to hear that people are unhappy with how we are dealing with the problems when we are doing all we can and have made strides."

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