Hide the Crime!

This was always the intent - LAPD is just leading the pack:

• Do you ever wonder where and when Los Angeles police officers have responded to crimes, made arrests or used force against civilians?

  For over a decade you could have looked at the LAPD’s online crime map and gotten an idea of what the department was doing in your neighborhood at any given time.

  While other areas of L.A. County still regularly update crime data on the website, the LAPD has stopped uploading information and is refusing to release its data.

  LAist requested the LAPD’s COMPSTAT data in May in an attempt to verify claims by city officials about crime and police activities in specific neighborhoods. Those records include locations of crimes, police use of force and a number of other categories the LAPD tracks and reports on periodically.

  The LAPD denied that request on Oct. 30.

The reasoning behind this concealing of the data?

• The LAPD said it would be against the public interest to release the data, which is preliminary and “has the potential to lead to misguided public policy discussions or unjustified public panic.”

Sure, because data collected by a government agency using taxpayer dollars needs to be concealed from the voters who (in most cases) know EXACTLY what the information would show.