RPD chief at Va. Capitol to address crime at Richmond motels

http://wric.com/2017/07/12/rpd-chief-at-va-capitol-to-address-crime-at-richmond-motels/

By Evanne Armour
Published: July 12, 2017, 7:45 pm

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Police are getting too many calls to motels running rampant with crime. Now, they are trying to team up with lawmakers to help crack down on the problem.

On Wednesday, Richmond Police Chief Alfred Durham attended a Virginia Housing Commission meeting at the State Capitol. He spoke before the Neighborhood Transitions and Residential Land Use Workgroup.

He told them too much of his force is drained responding to motels that have become a hotbed for drugs and prostitution.

“What that means is there are community members that are calling 9-1-1 and there are no officers to respond,” said Durham.

Durham said it’s a problem seen in other parts of the commonwealth, too.

Richmond Inn on Midlothian Turnpike is the motel with the most calls for service in the capital city. In 2015 there were 536. In 2016 there were 483. So far this year, it’s on track to reach about 500 total again.

“These are not the folks that are going on websites and looking for hotel stays or motel stays,” said Durham. “These are local folks that come up and set up shop in these hotels.”

One woman who identified herself as a former prostitute and drug addict said something needs to be done.

“It’s a tragedy. I’m completely blessed to have made it out alive,” she told the workgroup. “The penalties definitely need to increase on the hotels. They encourage and enable the activity to continue.”

Police proposed creating legislation that would allow for localities to fine the properties for excessive calls for service, similar to false fire alarms.

But during the meeting, concerns were expressed about potential fair housing violations. They also discussed the possibility of a limit discouraging people from calling when they actually need help.

Instead, they are taking a closer look at what’s already on the books to see what they can expand or rework to target the problem.

“If we already have statutes or laws on the books that can assist us in that, we’re definitely going to accept anything they’re going to recommend,” said Durham.

Durham said the workgroup is collaboratively drafting legislation to be introduced during the next General Assembly session.

Richmond's mayoral dropouts inspire change to Virginia election law

• By GRAHAM MOOMAW Richmond Times-Dispatch

• Mar 21, 2017

Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed legislation this month that lays out a formal procedure for how local election officials handle candidates withdrawing from an election after it’s too late to have their names removed from the ballot.

Three of the eight candidates who qualified for the mayoral ballot pulled out of the race after the ballots had been printed.

“That was unprecedented,” said Richmond Registrar J. Kirk Showalter. “But then we’ve never had quite as many candidates for mayor either.”

The biggest eleventh-hour turn of events was former city councilman Jon Baliles’ decision to drop out of the race the week before the election and endorse the eventual victor, Mayor Levar Stoney, three days before Election Day. Bobby “BJ” Junes, a retired real estate consultant, dropped out of the race on Nov. 4. Former city councilman Bruce Tyler withdrew in late September.

Not all of the mayoral dropouts submitted official paperwork that would have allowed local registrars to post public notices announcing the full list of withdrawn candidates. Junes filed a formal notice well in advance of the election, and Baliles filed notice in the final hours of the campaign.

House Bill 1933, sponsored by Del. Betsy B. Carr, D-Richmond, specifies that if there’s not enough time to delete a candidate from the ballot, registrars must post a list of withdrawn candidates in every polling place and on local government websites. The revised law specifies that to be on the list, a candidate must file official notice rather than a press release or other public statement.

“Before, some assumed that just because they said it in the newspaper that we could act on that information,” Showalter said.

Carr said the idea for the bill came from a constituent concerned about people being “confused” by the mayor’s race.

“It’s simple. It’s basic,” Carr said. “And it’s a beginning step in the right direction so we have that process laid out.”

The bill passed the General Assembly by a wide margin. The House of Delegates approved it 92-5. The Senate vote was unanimous.

The amended law takes effect July 1.

Virginia House panel defeats bill to shield overdose victims from prosecution

By: K. BURNELL EVANS; Richmond Times-Dispatch

A proposal that would have shielded overdose victims from criminal prosecution when someone sought medical help to save them was struck down Wednesday in a House subcommittee over fears the move could enable drug use.

The vote to kill the bill from Del. Betsy B. Carr, D-Richmond, followed a revision made at the request of Republican delegates not swayed by emotional testimony on Monday from a father who said the measure would save the lives of people such as his son.

Ted Henifin told the House Courts of Justice Criminal subcommittee that police charged his son with a felony the first time his wife summoned emergency help after finding him unresponsive in a garage. When it happened again last October, the couple made a difficult choice, and spent the longest night of their lives watching their son to make sure he was still breathing.

“I don’t think we would (call police) again,” said Henifin, of Hampton. “The complications of the legal system … just really, really make helping support recovery ... much more challenging.”

The bill would have added to protections already in place to protect those who report overdoses from being prosecuted. Neither measure prevents police or a commonwealth’s attorney from bringing charges, but instead provides what is known as an affirmative defense against prosecution.

Del. C. Todd Gilbert, R-Shenandoah, said Wednesday that although he was sympathetic to Carr’s intent, the bill, taken alongside bids to establish safe needle exchanges and expand access to medicine that reverses drug overdoses, went too far.

“I’m starting to feel like we’re doing everything we can to encourage it to continue,” he said, of substance abuse. “I just think cumulatively we are setting ourselves up for a big failure here.”

Supporters of Carr’s proposal flooded the meeting on Monday to encourage lawmakers not to perpetuate the view of drug abuse as a moral failing, but as a disease in need of treatment that cannot be provided through the criminal justice system.

Among them was John Shinholser, president of the Richmond area McShin recovery organization, who decried Wednesday’s vote as a hate crime that would result in deaths.

When Shinholser asked the crowd on Monday whether they would rather die or go to jail, more than a dozen people who came to lobby in support of the bill raised their hands.

“I personally probably go to 30 or 40 overdose funerals a year,” he said. “By criminalizing these cases, it’s a big hurdle for those seeking help.”

He found support in Capt. Michael Zohab of the Richmond Police Department, who oversees narcotics, and Richmond Commonwealth’s Attorney Michael Herring.

“I think it makes a lot of sense,” Herring said in an interview. “If someone is able to get to the phone and report that they need help they shouldn’t have to be thinking, ‘Will I get in trouble?’ “

The proposal would not apply in instances where a search warrant was being issued or protect an overdose victim from prosecution for crimes unrelated to an overdose.

Herring said he knew of occasions in which people had faced drug-related charges after an overdose in the city of Richmond, which has seen opioid-related fatalities triple between 2010 and 2015.

“I have heard and been involved in conversations with lawyers here who say the current statute is broken and needs to be fixed,” Herring said.

The number of people in Richmond who survived overdosing on heroin alone has increased nearly 300 percent in the past three years — from 88 in 2014 to 343 during the entirety of 2016, according to police.

The city is not alone. Virginia’s public health commissioner declared a state of emergency in November over the ballooning opioid crisis.

State health officials have projected that more than 1,250 people in Virginia will be found to have died of a drug overdose in 2016. Drug overdoses surpassed car crashes as the leading cause of unnatural deaths in 2013, and the numbers have only increased, thanks in large part to a surge in opioid abuse.

Those statistics did not persuade lawmakers to adopt what proponents argued is a public health response to a public health issue.

“We’ve been up here reflecting on this and I am sympathetic to the notion that we want to save lives,” Gilbert said. “I believe in being proactive about trying to solve problems and I believe in unintended consequences.”