By Ashley M. Casey
Staff Writer
While the Baldwinsville Police Department has filed more than 150 charges in the first two months of the year, Baldwinsville Police Chief Michael Lefancheck said it’s too early to tell if the high arrest statistics point to a trend.
Lefancheck noted at the Feb. 16 village board of trustees meeting that his officers “have been very busy and are doing a great job.” As of Feb. 21, arrests made by the Baldwinsville Police Department had resulted in 151 charges.
“Last year at this point in time, we had lodged 43,” Lefancheck said.
The 151st charge of 2016 was filed Aug. 1, Lefancheck said, but it’s not that the department has made 151 arrests.
“Sometimes one person might take up five or six of the offenses,” he said.
For example, Lefancheck said, one offender has racked up multiple charges related to a domestic dispute. Most recently, the person was charged with two counts of tampering with a witness, violating an order of protection and stalking. Lefancheck said the offender was arrested on similar charges the preceding week and in January as well.
“He’s a guy that’s not getting the message,” he said.
Lefancheck said the types of crimes his officers have seen in the first two months of this year “really run the gamut.” In addition to domestic disputes, BPD officers have made arrests for welfare fraud, petit larceny and identity theft. The department has also charged people involved in incidents such as a drug deal gone bad and a knife fight.
“I think it’s just a strange convolution where we’ve had a lot of incidents occur together,” Lefancheck said. “A lot of times this is spread across the year.”
The chief could not point to any specific factors in the spike in arrests. He said his officers have not reported any change in the makeup of the community, and he is reluctant to credit the relatively mild winter weather with the “short burst of incidents.”
“Traditionally, there is less activity in the wintertime, but it could be cyclical,” Lefancheck said,
It is hard to tell if the spike in stats is just a fluke or a red flag, but Lefancheck said the BPD is keeping an eye on the data.
“If it’s still going on in August, it might be a different conversation,” Lefancheck said.
