I want talks about crime in Minnesota hidden and attempts to compare it with other states and other cities he runs into a very serious problem of describing what is crying. For example, the act of burglary in the state of California is not directly comparable to the act of burglary in the state of Minnesota. And that is a consistent problem throughout the United States. In 1930 in an attempt to solve that problem and attempt to develop some crime descriptions that were comparable the Chiefs or the place of the larger cities developed what they call the barometer crimes or what's now called the barometer crimes or those seven crimes with sneaked a criteria, which says the fact that they are reportable they are something of a nature and they generally produce Witnesses who are willing to report and discuss the issue those descriptive crimes were put together. And those are the crimes that we use when we compare Minnesota with Wisconsin North Dakota South Dakota and Saint Paul or Minneapolis with neighboring cities. Those descriptors supercede state law so that you will find at times are in Conflict what the statute says none unless they provide a base from which we can look at crime rate in Minnesota and compared to neighboring states. If we do that in Minnesota that if we compare our crime rate that is the rate of cryo crimes per 100,000 population. And if we look at the breakdown of violent crimes and property crimes, we will find that in Minnesota. We have a serious crime problem when we compare ourselves with, North, Dakota, South, Dakota, Wisconsin and Iowa. if we compare ourselves with The National Crime picture then Minnesota is a relatively safe state. We have not yet had to issue. Public Notices to conventioneers that they should not leave their hotels and should not walk on the streets of st. Paul Minneapolis or to Lewis. We have not yet had to resort to escorting are people who live in elderly high-rises to and from the business community. And then that conducts Minnesota Saint Paul Minneapolis Duluth. The largest cities are far safer than St. Louis, Missouri. Atlanta, Georgia Kansas City, Missouri and Chicago or most largest cities in the United States where you if you go to a convention or if you remember the elderly population, you will have been informed and not to leave your hotels not to go out in the streets without escort or if you've followed the recent the general discussion of the elderly problems in the United States, you will discover that they're moving towards an escort service. The crime concerns are of national significance. In a recent poll the issue of crime on the streets was second only to the National economy. If the national economy turns around and it appears that it's going to major issue facing the people in the United States will be crime on a street and that put the smack dab where we were in 1968 when the then president said we need to do something about crime on the streets and we generated what we call this a street sac and other words since 1968 to 1975. We have accomplished absolutely nothing in terms of the perception of crime on the streets for the people of Minnesota and the people that's country. That crime on the streets is a political issue in Minnesota is readily apparent by the renewed efforts on the part of the Minnesota Legislature in developing a program, which is comprehensive and which hopefully it was successfully passed what at least stop some of the rising incidence of crime and change the perception of crime for minnesotans. The impetus for the current program in the legislature comes from three people Senator when Borden from Brainerd representing the rural people and their concerns Senator David shaft from wherever he's from Suburban Ramsey County David's here. That's why I said that And my cell from another city. Since our first announcement of our concerns, we've been joined by the house and very active and they on the house side is representative Ken Nelson from Minneapolis Representative Steve Novak from Ramsey County and represented Randy Kelly from the east side of Saint Paul. So there is a beginning of a building of mutual concerns between the House and Senate and generally when that happens good legislation is produced. There is as a result of the efforts of those legislators the beginning of a crying package that legislation ranges all the way from looking at the employment problems for the Youth to the determinate sentencing bill. And I would just like to run through some of the things that were looking at determinate sentencing is drafted as I understand. It has the author's necessary both in the house and the Senate and will be reduced very shortly. We discussed perhaps introducing at this week. We are draft. I do have drafted a bill which will reduce the age of the adult offender from 18 to 50. And that the thrust of that bill is to take the the offender from 15 to 18 out from under the juvenile closed judication process. Do they open the score of the openness of the district court? I would like I'm going to discuss that very briefly a little bit later on in my presentation. We are we have some legislation which will license law enforcement officers. What we're trying to do is there is is solve some of the problems we have in our junior colleges nratv eyes, in terms of the law enforcement curriculum that they're providing was really no placement possibility because of some of the structures we have in our our laws for the entrance into the law enforcement for profession, but we hope to do there is is set up a creek and car at Cricket on the can be taught in it is being taught in junior colleges in the 4-year colleges an ATV eyes and successfully completing that course will give you a license to practice law enforcement in Minnesota. We are introducing legislation which other the auspices of the Attorney General's office will provide an informant fun for local police departments. That was originally a proposition that came from the organized crime commission studies of 2 years ago was drafted and was unsuccessful in the last session. There is still a day desperate need on a part of local Law Enforcement Officers for money to buy information. We are looking at and I believe I have legislation on my desk. Now that just came from the revisers office which separates the county attorney's office into two sections criminal and civil under our proposition. The Civil responsibilities of the county attorney will be accomplished by an attorney who is hired by the county board's the criminal prosecutor will run at large and be responsible it from time to time to hit the constituents with in his district. It's our belief that doing that will produce a more vigorous effort on the part of the county attorney's to pursue the crime statutes in our session in the early part of this year. We did change some laws on the theft statute under the theft statutes dealing with identification of property worth continue to move in that direction using the operation identification program as a as the base for our legislative effort in that area as you know operation identify. Operation identification provides a discrete identifier for every person in this room. It's a file that can be kept in fragmented basis. It's a local effort. It requires no fun waiting on the part of the state and yet it from its each one of you to identify your property no matter if it's recovered in St. Paul Minneapolis, California or Florida because of the discrete identifier that you will have on that property. It's an excellent throw by a program. That is unfortunate more people do not participate in it. There is a discussion underway that legislation has not been drafted for but there's a discussion which talks about crime redefinition. There is a concern on the part of some legislators that the acts that we described as being criminal in nature are not definitive enough. We will be working on that. Although I suspect that something that's in Terminator in that this very difficult task to take on We have drafted a bill which will change the complexion of the governor's crime commission tying it more closely to the legislative process so that we can begin to use that as one of our research arms and looking at the issues that crime raisins in the state of Minnesota. There is one section in the governor's crime Commission of extreme importance to State planning and do state programs. And that's the statistical analysis Center which is charged with the responsibility of about the audit Trail for all of the things that go on and in the Criminal Justice System, including law enforcement the corrections and the courts. Activities we have a proposal to decriminalize certain traffic offenses. We are going to move out of the Criminal Justice System all parking warrants handling those administratively using the annual renewal license plates or the driver's license about that. Will that's a couple of things that frees up responsibility for the law enforcement officer those tickets. It also provides a neat way to raise revenue with no fuss. I've been working with Bill Kennedy from the Hennepin County Public Defender's office. And he we have drafted a position paper which also will decriminalized some of the moving traffic violations. That statute is a difficult one to draft but I talked to a counselor last night. It is in the revisers office will shortly be coming out of the end of the road in a bill form. That program is designed to do a couple of things we're going to do and we're going to have some problems with that of course, but what we want to do is use the administrative procedures to handle the the traffic that in fractions that are not serious in nature. We're talkin about the parking the turns the stop signs and so on we still plan on leaving in the criminal section the DWI the dar's in the Dass. We also feel that by going in this direction. We're going to free up officer time and free up court time. Both of those are important. If you look at what the what we have planned for the judicial branch of government of this state, we do have legislative it legislation which provides tax incentive to homeowners for Sight Harding for for spending some of their money to make their homes more resistant to the intrusion of the burger. There is a pilot program under some Community Development funds going on now in the city of st. Paul in the Lexington Hamlin area, which we will be looking at To see if it's an effective way to go where you do get a return for your investment through the tax programs if we talked about organized crime in Minnesota in the sense of organized crime as weak as we look at the mafia, then we can talk about cheese because if there's any organized crime in Minnesota there into the cheese business. We are already in our studies under the with the organized crime commission two years ago could not detect any of the traditional family patterns in Minnesota. And I think it's consistent with what the intelligence effort of the law enforcement community in Minnesota was able to produce We know that if we drop away from the mafia kinds of organized crime that we can begin to detect patterns in Minnesota of organization. We are at we have information which suggests that you can order a truckload of vacuum cleaners in Chicago and we can find those for you in Minnesota and see that prompt delivery is made we are aware that that's a large burglaries in Minnesota are sent by are to either Chicago or to Denver. There is some evidence that the prostitution program is organized in a ring of studies involving Saint Paul Minneapolis. Oakclaire Chicago Chicago. I'm sorry about that Demoine on down to Kansas City and Out West to to the where the weather is warmer during this time of the year Phoenix and Generally Denver there is that pattern it at the end the girls travel at circuit tonight. I suspect that a merchandising program of some sort. We also looked at the issue of a grand jury is to it to investigate organized crime in that category of pattern crime, which moves around the state of Minnesota. We believe that there should be a grand jury under the attorney general which organized in one County would be able to follow the evidence to whatever wherever it led them till they reach their final conclusion. We think that grand jury should be organized under the Attorney General's office state of, Minnesota. There's a question that I'm That Kind of opinion of what I think about forming a metropolitan wide investigative unit and interesting lay there is a metropolitan investigative unit. Now, it's at work everyday. It's very informal but I think very infected and it's the investigators who work for the various the local law enforcement agencies who have formed on their own investigative consoles who Moved intelligence kinds of information that is infirmary information relating to patterns of activity which moved from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and to the actors who moved from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, they've been very effective and I in my judgment it's the way to go it cost us nothing really in terms of a huge bureaucracy with all that administrative staff and the monkey business on top. And it does the job the county attorney's in the metropolitan area have recently received a grant from Lea at the purpose of the grand is to develop a prosecutorial. Skill I suspected might be called in the organized crime programs. They are they are developing staff which will have the skill and have the authority to go from County to County and prosecute particular kinds of crime that may well be the Forerunner of the idea that I were talking about, which is the County Attorney dedicated to the proposition of criminal prosecutions. There is no evidence. She had back on that grand. It's a recent program, but it does have the full support of the county attorney's in the seven County metropolitan area. If we look at our successes or failures in terms of structuring something at the Metropolitan level. We only really have one experience to to look back on and that was the program that was put together a few years ago to handle the drug problems in the metropolitan area. If you follow that program and you looked at the dollars that we spend on it and you look at the results of the program you would discover that it was a failure. And that failed because there was a continual problem of jurisdiction who was responsible for what and the level of competence wanted by the particular County attorneys. For example in the Ramsey County. They refuse to accept the case has developed by that Squad simply because they were not up to the standards of the Ramsey County Attorney's Office. They did have problems as I recall in in the methods. They used to collect evidence. I like to just for a minute then talk about the proposition which moves the age 18 background age age 15 for the fender the juvenile hearing as it's presently conducted in Minnesota is generally a private Affair. It's conducted in the courthouse with a hearing officer and the It's a non-public adjudication of a crime against the public. In the larger counties, we have hearing officers who do the bulk of the work for the two judges? And while we thought that the idea of luring the age from 18 to 15 was new and Unique in Minnesota and will give us a chance for another first. We discovered that it's not really that's right. That's not really true that the present time there is either law on the books or in the process of being developed in Georgia, Oklahoma, Connecticut, New York. All looking at lowering age of 18 to 50. We believe that it's important that the offenders in that category from age 15 to age 18 be identified and they're actually discussed in the full light of public review which takes place in a district court. We also recognize that by doing that we created a problem and what to do with those who are convicted and so in our legislation, we restrict the court from sentencing those persons to our adult institutions. What we're doing if you watch very carefully were fragmenting the those who are involved in criminal activity. We want to fragment so that the 14 and the 15 year old are clearly separated and that has a relationship with our school system. We want the 15 to 18 year olds had a little bit differently and not involved with the 18 and over that we can alcohol are adults. We're doing that because it's our belief that we can take a lot of the money now being spent on the tail end of the system with the with the failures and move it into the front end and begin to deal with a 10 11 and 12 year old and really and truly diver those children before they get involved with a teenage population or before they get involved with the high school. Buick it's my personal belief that we can only begin to talk about the management of crime when we can begin to talk about breaking out. The peer pressure's that are now involved in our the way. We have our Criminal Justice System developed built. I'm truly convinced. I am by looking at the number of kids that I've watched go to the system that we can do something but we have to intrude very early and as long as we're not willing to do that for not going to be able to manage crying. Babe, the evidence is overwhelming that if you wait until the person is age 18 or 20 or 25 an attempt to change you have absolutely no success. And yet down in the front end of the system way down there for those little kids are and they're very sophisticated little kids that might had we can do something and I think that's where we should change your mind. Put our money. And what I'm saying is pretty much substantiated by the statistics which demonstrate that early intrusion and diversion does in fact have some meaningful results. And finally, we're back to what my my piece of legislation and that's determinate sentence. And I have already discussed this during the interim and I really think we're Beyond weather in Minnesota is going to have determined sentencing or not. That's really not the issue anymore. Because whether we put it in the statues or B, or if we allow the that we continue to allow the Minnesota Correctional authority to administer through the prisoners. We do have determined see in Minnesota. They have a matrix system completely developed through the was developed by the money is coming from the LA program, but it's a it's a determined effort to put determinants the end of the sentence structure. If that is really what's going on, then we Face these is the very basic question is who establishes policy in the state of Minnesota for social science? Is it the responsibility of the Minnesota state legislature or is it the responsibility of some submerged administrative unit of government? People who are appointed. Buy a point of people setting policy on how we're going to handle the problems of social misbehavior. It's my judgment is the legislative responsibilities and we should address. If I let me just share with you one of my concerns about allowing. I hate ministrative agency manipulate prison populations are number of commitments to the state interest institutions have not gone up. In fact under the Community Corrections act we have diverted over 200 that would normally have went to the adult institutions. Be at the populations in our prisons are climate. From Milo of 700 or 640 and in the early 1970s to Somewhere Over 900 now. Requiring an additional half million dollars to be put into the correction department budget merely to feed and the house that increasing population. The reason that that's happening is that an administrative agency has changed its program. For whatever reasons and I'm not sure that I know what the reasons are. The programs have been changed and the populations have increased if we were to take the present populations and the Stillwater in the institution and lay determinate sentencing sentence length on top of that the prison population would be reduced. That says they're short sentences in the determinate sentencing building. That's true. These studies that I've read clearly demonstrate that sentence length is not a concern of the victim and it's not a concern of anyone. In fact, the only people that know how long of sentences for active crime is the guy who was in the institution and he's not aware of it until he lands there. It's not a concern there is a concern that there's there's some certainty involved in this whole process. We are as you know, beginning to build a new correctional facility, which is a house. I believe how plan to how is about 400 inmates those plans have been pretty much develop tonight's my impression that there will be something before the legislature 1977 to begin to to to to construct such an institution interesting ly in early 1970. We talked about closing both Stillwater and st. Cloud and building one secure institution. Looks like we're going to have still water in St. Cloud full build another institution and Do something with the the surface not yet knowing I think it will force the state of Minnesota to take a very hard look at offender separation. And we're going to make a judge but I suspect in the next year or two which will separate property offenders from crimes against person or offenders. We once we make that separation we can begin to deal with restitution centers and begin to to return. in an economic fashion some sort of compensation to the victims of crime to the victims of property crime It appears that at least in some of the areas in this country. Where are the offender as had to actually go out and provide restitution to the victim. There is a significant impact on his future behavior and maybe when we're all done we'll find out the economic model is the best way to go for the property of Fender. We're not there yet in Minnesota, but we're moving I think in that direction for being forced to move there because of the expanding prison population and because I think because of the concern of the legislature as a whole now, there's one disclaimer I want to add and I think it's this is fair that I do that we do have a variety of legislators involved in this and they're all I think setting down and working hard that doesn't mean that there's a carte-blanche approval of everything we're going to do there are priorities within each legislator. He's going to support the issues that he's comfortable with from his own position morality and says that he's going to be more enthusiastic about some proposals not it and I think that's understandable. That's the way it should be. If you have a position you should argue it vigorously and if you're successful like you're successful if you're not used Go away feeling bad. So there is a is there is a loose-knit group that has its own positions have an overriding concern for what we proceed to be a problem Minnesota, but the enthusiasms will Spike based on their various personal concerns for the programs in Minnesota with that. I'm through McCutchen was asked first to elaborate on the pre teenager diversion program. He alluded to in his speech for the first offender diversion for the first offender the statistical evidence resides in the in some of it resides in the head of a county office defender's office. We're following the tracking that first-time offender. We discover that the version for the first time or diversion for the early early offender demonstrates that they don't get back in the system. It's amazing. What a difference Arisen recidivism With the front end of the program and the back in the program. So when we talked about I really saying we should forget about parole is what I'm saying and take those resources and put them into the probation programs. And there is evidence that statistical evidence to demonstrate that the youth Service Bureau in St. Paul and I suspected White Bear Lake and and Ramsey County really pretty much demonstrates that if you catch those kids the first two catches a bad term, but who intrude into what they're doing very early. You can you find a Thursday or not back in the system when you compare him with those that you don't intrude into crime commission has said in effect that that the halfway houses XIV way houses in the 32nd way houses really don't work again in Minnesota. That's not new. No, California expensive study New York did an extensive study and I believe there's one study in the southern states. All the conclusions are the same Rehabilitation occurs at the point in time and an individual's life what he makes that decision. What we do in intruding into a person has been in the system 3 or 4 times is on measurable on the other hand. The early intrude does demonstrate some success years ago McCutchen proposed a bill to the legislature. That would consolidate the Saint Paul Minneapolis police forces. You said the bill wasn't too popular and someone asked him what happened to it. That's awesome. I did receive some letters from some of the patrol officers that is pretty obvious. If you look at if you design a new structures in the officers who work at smaller departments can see an opportunity for advancement for promotion for all kinds of things that would tend to be enthusiastic supporting of the supportive of the idea as you move up that rank structure you going to discover that there's more and more resistance and when you get to the Chiefs, they're very unhappy with it and It was so elegant and your lawn forsmann has a pretty strong political clout and then they were able to persuade their their officials that I was in the wrong track and although didn't hurt my re-election because it wasn't really an issue. As far as Saint Paul was concerned. I haven't developed a new enthusiasm for the program all the way to that lie that piece of legislation is in my desk, but the unless I get some sort of a mandate from the general population and I was speaking at a Citizens League breakfast meeting in St. Paul.