2015 St. Anthony PD Annual Report

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2015 Annual Report • Police Department • St. Anthony Village, Minnesota 13 | Page VI. Investigation Review PREPARED BY CAPTAIN DOMINIC COTRONEO The police department is an arm of city government, and in most instances, the most visible part of local government. This is in fact the case in the communities we serve. With this privilege, comes great responsibility to be transparent and accessible to the people we serve. The transparency of the department, allows it to gain and build the trust necessary to deliver police services. The patrol division is at the forefront of earning the public’s trust, in the way they interact daily with residents and businesses in our communities. This trust carries over and is maintained by the investigations unit in the way cases are followed up on and results communicated back to the people involved. The trust shown in the department, by our residents and businesses, is especially important in today’s environment, with so much negative media attention on police officers around the country. It also has a reassuring effect on the officers in the performance of their duties. The investigations unit is small, in comparison to the patrol unit, but still handles hundreds of cases, and clears a good percentage of them by arrest. The unit is comprised of one full time investigator, Detective Tim Briski, who’s a 28 year member of the police department. It also has a rotating investigator slot, which is filled by different officers throughout the year who choose to bid the rotation as a career enhancement position. The unit is driven by case clearance, as it measures to some degree, the successful outcome of criminal investigations. Officer Jack Christman The 2015 statistics for the criminal investigations unit are as follows: Total Criminal Cases: 340 Total Cases Cleared 181 Total Cases Cleared by Arrest 132 Total Cases Cleared by Other 49 CLEARANCE RATE: 53%