Local residents launch Neighborhood Watch Program

Twenty-eight people assembled inside the First Christian Church Saturday to hear details and become involved in a Neighborhood Watch Program that has started in the northwest section of Fort Scott.

The watch program will cover neighborhoods from Wall Street south on Judson, Crawford and Eddy streets all the way to Sixth Street.

Fort Scott Police Sgt. Craig Rice gave an example of what can happen when a resident notices something suspicious going on in his or her neighborhood.

A woman saw a teenager exit a house with paint on his pants in the days following the night of July 20, when juveniles went on a spray painting rampage, randomly defacing garages and fencing along alleys behind houses on Holbrook, Judson, Crawford and Lowman streets with graffiti.

She became suspicious and called her neighbor. The neighbor called police, who then made a visit to the house, Sgt. Craig Rice said.

They spoke to cousins of the suspects who were visiting them at the time. They said there were paint cans in the bedroom upstairs, Rice said.

From there, FSPD officers Andrew Swope and Anthony Merando began an investigation, talking with multiple juveniles. By the time it was over, police had netted six confessions in the incident, which allegedly began July 20 and continued into the early morning hours of July 21. They also solved around 20 cases of other spray painting incidents around town when the six juveniles leaked names of others involved in those crimes, Rice said.

"And this started with one person," Rice added.

The Neighborhood Watch Program utilizes resources to create a proactive community-police partnership for crime prevention and problem solving in each community. Since there cannot be a police officer on every corner, citizen involvement is essential to combat crime, according to Rice.

The program has been implemented in The Highlands apartment complex on Shepherd Street a few months ago.

Neighbors are experts who really know what is going on in your community and by cooperating with each other and the police, you can help fight crime before it begins, Rice told the audience.

John Boswell, who lives at 420 S. Judson St., said the neighbors were thinking about taking action. About two years ago, Boswell and his wife, Kathy, left town for the weekend. When they returned, neighbors informed them that police had busted a suspected methamphetamine lab in a house down the street.

For the Boswells, the turning point in deciding whether to get the program going was the spray painting incident. "There's power in people and the more people, the more power and control you have over your neighborhood," Boswell said.

Colleen Murrin, 14 S. Crawford St., visited with police about improving the safety of the neighborhood, as did the Boswells. Police suggested that the two combine forces and create an areawide neighborhood watch.

Murrin and the Boswells and others will act as captains, coordinating communications with neighbors in their designated areas. Murrin will be a captain from Third to Wall streets and the Boswells will take Third to Sixth streets.

They will keep neighbors informed on a daily or weekly basis, which will be accomplished through a quarterly newsletter. Details about the organizational structure are still being worked out, Murrin said.

"A lot of it will be to simply get to know your neighbors," Murrin, who was a victim of a burglary several months ago, said.

Murrin said many years ago, crimes started occurring in the relatively calm neighborhood while her uncle was still living. Before he died, he told her "I'm afraid the time is going to come when you're either going to have to look the other way or stand up and say, 'I want my neighborhood to be a better place,'" Murrin said. "I view this as a real positive for our community."

Ironically, the place where they met, First Christian Church, has been the victim of vandals, who climbed onto the roof and spray painted an anarchy sign and other graffiti on the metal roof.