East Valley police departments team up to fight youth violence over fall break

PHOENIX — Teens hoping to get up to some trouble in the East Valley during fall break should be careful.

Police officers from various departments are teaming up to slice underage crime rates through a new initiative called Operation Safe Fall.

It’s similar to a summertime youth violence crackdown the Mesa Police Department launched from May 23 to July 31.

“We’re partnering with Gilbert and Queen Creek ourselves,” Mesa Police Chief Ken Cost told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s The Mike Broomhead Show on Wednesday. “We all have that focus. It’s a similar focus that we have with Safe Summer.”

The summer operation was a resounding success, he added. Through the operation, officers issued 76 citations for curfew violations to teenagers.

“Curfew leads to violence,” Cost said. “Teens out after hours, they’re not doing anything great. They’re going to parties, they’re bringing guns to parties.”

How will Operation Safe Fall work?

“We know that fall break is time off,” Cost said. “Time off could equal issues on the weekends and at night and late at night.”

To make sure teens are following the law while they’re out of school, the various police departments are boosting their amount of patrols.

“We’re all putting extra patrols out for enforcement of … party-related calls and juvenile curfew and alcohol,” Cost said. “All the same type of categories for teen violence.”

The increased amount of patrols through Operation Safe Fall will help the Mesa, Gilbert and Queen Creek police departments proactively deter youth violence, he added.

“We’re all out there doing that together,” Cost said.

There’s already a successful precedent for this model. Preliminary crime data suggested that teen violence incidents fell since Operation Safe Summer.

Now, Cost hopes to catch lightning in a bottle twice.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Mesa Police Department (@mesaazpd)

Why are Valley police departments focusing on youth violence?

Leaders across the three police departments hope this Operation Safe Fall crackdown will give local families a safe and crime-free holiday season.

It’s an especially potent desire in the wake of a series of threats rattling schools across the Valley.

In Phoenix, a teenage boy was arrested for allegedly making mass shooting threats against a dozen local schools.

Over in the West Valley, Surprise Police arrested four elementary school students for threatening a peer.