Reflection 3: Denver PD
On April 13, 2023, Sergeant Damon Bowser and Crime Analyst Samantha Diemer of the Denver Police Department attended our course to speak about policing gangs in Denver, as well as describing the roles of gang units and crime analysts within. Bowser began the presentation speaking about his role in the gang unit as the investigative supervisor, which included all gang crimes going directly to him, as well as all juvenile with handgun cases and graffiti cases. He describes how Denver initially emerged a need for a gang unit when gangs became dangerous and required a head on response, which has led to few positive outcomes, as the following question arises: Why monitor gangs if they aren’t illegal? Bowser begins describing
…show more content…
Crime Analyst Samantha Diemer explains the role of her job to be dictating resources properly and efficiently, as staffing is becoming less and less in law enforcement. Diemer talks about how her job requires the use of statistics, mapping, investigative help with social media, and other various assisting to the gang unit. Diemer describes the biggest trends of gangs currently to be the decreasing of age in those in gangs, a pattern of first-entries into the system, and the increasing involvement of females in gangs. Bowser and Diemer both educated and informed the class about the system of policing gangs in Denver, as well as the …show more content…
Research has shown that social media practices among gang members can both increase and decrease violence depending, but Bowser mentions how social media presents a unique challenge. Social media, such as Snapchat, has messages and photos that disappear, bringing to light a challenge concerning evidence and involvement portrayed through social media by gang members. Diemer and Bowser later speak about the importance of the outreach role of gang units, something that is quite unknown and inconsistent depending on the location of the unit. Bowser prioritized the importance of units using gang databases to directly outreach to families in need and further prevent gang involvement, which shows as cities often used to use them for targeted enforcement. This proves inconsistent as Bowser mentioned that during the past 8-10 years, cities have shifted to exclusively driving city and supporting outreach programs to victims and their families, instead of targeted enforcement