By John Krull
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS – When Troy Riggs talks about crime or any other subject about which he cares a lot, he punches his right index finger into the palm of his left hand hard enough at times to make his hand shake.

Riggs, Indianapolis’s public safety director, and I are on the air discussing the challenges the state’s largest city faces in making both residents and visitors feel secure.

Commentary button in JPG – no shadowThere’s a lot to discuss. In the first four months of this year, Indianapolis racked up more than 50 homicides, putting the Circle City on pace to record more than 150 in 2014. That would top last year’s mark by a wide margin – and last year was the worst for killing in Indianapolis in seven years.

If the body count in Indianapolis continues at the current rate, the city will have a higher per capita murder rate than Chicago.

Riggs acknowledges that there have been too many murders, but then, without pause, notes that even one homicide is too many.

He says that spending more money won’t necessarily solve the problem.

John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com
John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com
Public safety, Riggs says, his right index finger punching his left palm, already is “85 percent of the budget.” And putting more cops on the street might not solve it either, because many of the homicides occur behind closed doors where police won’t and can’t be.

He says that we have to realize that crimes, even violent crimes, don’t occur in isolation. There are causes for the deadly and tragic upswing, and identifying those causes is essential to solving the problem.

As he talks, his right index finger begins to pound into his left palm with the regularity of a sewing machine needle.

Violent crimes don’t come out of nowhere, Riggs says, index finger poking palm.

“We have a lot of social problems,” he says.

He talks about how communities have to be more supportive of young people who are in distress – that, while parents have the primary responsibility for their children, others around those children have a duty, too. He says that we have to intervene sooner with lesser crimes, particularly when young people commit them, because they are warning signs that trouble is brewing.

Riggs talks more quickly, the words and ideas flowing fast. Finger pokes palm again and again.

He says that he believes in and supports the Second Amendment, but that rights have to be paired with responsibilities. The penalties, both criminal and civil, for gun owners who don’t use or secure their weapons responsibly should be severe. The person who pulls the trigger should be held liable, but so should the person who left a deadly firearm just lying around.

Information is the key, Riggs says as his finger takes a big stab at his palm.

For too long, law enforcement officials in Indianapolis – and citizens – haven’t collected or assembled data about patterns of crime either quick enough or in a way that allows them to begin seeing and understanding patterns.

A data system will help with that, which will allow the police and the community to work together more effectively to combat and reduce crime.

Riggs acknowledges that a police-community partnership won’t be an easy thing. He says that he understands the image problem that too many stories of police officers behaving illegally or irresponsibly have created. He says the city’s many good police officers know they have to earn back the trust of the people they serve.

His index finger jams his palm as he says that.

As Riggs talks, I realize that there’s something different about what he’s saying, but at first I can’t identify what it is. Then it hits me.

Most of our discussions about vexing public problems seem to focus on figuring out who we can blame for the trouble we face. We seem to be more eager to point fingers than to solve the problem.

Riggs has an abundance of energy and ideas in part because he doesn’t seem to waste a lot of time and energy trying to make others look bad.

The only finger I could see him pointing was at himself.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism, host of “No Limits” WFYI 90.1 Indianapolis and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.