Third in a series

Re “Azran’s 1988 Very Different from Azran’s 2016”

Down to his last three days before retirement, acting Asst. Police Chief Allen Azran explained how his first days in Culver City in 1988 are powerfully distinct from his final ones.

Seated behind a computer at his desk on the second floor of the Police Station, Mr. Azran may have looked sedentary. But his mind was roaming, ceaselessly, across the landscape of the thousands of miles that spanned his career.

Like a prizefighter warming up in the ring, Mr. Azran periodically fired knockout punches as he sought to accent specific words and trends.

“Crime is much lower today than it was in 1988,” he said.

“Certain crimes may be more consistent with a larger population and more traffic.”

“But serious crimes, violent crimes, like robbery – which is one of the most significant crimes because robbery is where somebody uses force or fear to take something from somebody else – that crime is draaa-matically lower.”

“There was a time when we averaged 20 to 30 robberies a month. Now we consistently average under 10.”

Many contemporary cases are known as “Estes robberies,” named for a shoplifter who used violence to attempt to escape.

Mr. Azran credits “the education of our officers, awareness of crime stats, without a doubt the pro-active nature of the police work we do. Culver City P.D. is well-known for their pro-active approach to police work.

“As a result, if you are looking to commit a crime, you avoid Culver City because you know the police work that is done here.”

“I know this purely through experience in my career. There have been times throughout my career, and many officers will say the same thing, they will stop someone and find guns or drugs that will result in an arrest. And the man will say something like, ‘I knew I shouldn’t have come through Culver City.’”

(To be continued)