Evesham Township crime fighting turns to hotspot management

A South Jersey Community is trying a new way to fight crime.  

Evesham Township in Burlington County is mapping where the most crimes are reported, and on random days focusing intense police patrols on the so-called “Hot Spots.”

Sergeant Joseph Friel says on the campaign’s first day, officers concentrated on the township’s business corridor.

“So when a criminal comes to this area they can’t drive through that area without seeing a police car stopping somebody, a police officer talking to somebody and hopefully they say we don’t want to commit a crime in Evesham, we don’t want to shoplift in Evesham we’re going to go somewhere else, and also with the high visibility hopefully it cuts down on the traffic collisions,” said Friel.

Sergeant Friel says the department more than doubled the number of patrol cars in that area.

“We’re trying to get a five percent reduction in traffic collisions in the hotspot, we’re trying to get a 10 percent increase in the total DWI arrests, a five percent increase in motor vehicle summonses a five percent reduction in property crimes, a five percent increase in the number of criminal arrests,” he said.

Friel adds the program is not directly connected to a smash and grab robbery at a high-end jewelry store a week ago, but contends if it were up and running then, the robbers would have had more trouble pulling off the crime.