Crime Story

I often essay about the extent of crime now in Germany, and the inability of the police to get ahead.  Today, Focus carried a short piece concerning Hamburg and their police.

The head of the Confederation of German Criminal investigators (Jan Reinecke) spoke to the issue of manpower for German police and basically said: "We are at the end".....meaning there simply isn't enough manpower to do the job.  He points out that it's across the board...robbery, organized crime, capital crime, etc. 

The sophistication involved?  In some ways, the crime element has skipped a generation and gotten into various things that you just didn't expect.  It's like bringing up the ATM machines which are blown up daily around Germany now.  A decade ago, they were non-existent.  Various gangs have the technique down and you could easily rake in a million a year with three guys hitting the ATMs.

In my local area, the fake-cop routine is now down to a daily event.  In my local area from a couple of days ago...guy shows up at a door showing a badge and saying he was there to 'audit' or check the fire alarm within the house.  Something set off the German occupant and they denied them entry.  Regular cops don't ever perform fire alarm checks.  Other than the regular cops writing up the fake-cop report, it'll just get filed.  Next week, the same trick will be used again.

I noticed out of local news this morning....some 85-year old German had a phone call from the fake-police....telling her that her money in the bank was going to be compromised.  So they instructed her to go down, and remove the 32,000 Euro and a 'special' policeman would come by her house to protect her money.  A bank clerk asked enough questions to finally get it out of the old gal....that she was being compromised.  Cops can file the report and write up an article for the paper, but getting at the gangs that do this kind of work is near impossible.

Three expensive vehicles were stolen in the Wiesbaden area over the past couple of nights.  One of them....ended up being spotted while the guy was refueling on the east side of Dresden (heading into Poland).  Cops gave pursuit and ended finding it abandoned near-by in a forest.  The guy got away.  Other than writing the report.....there is little to expect on identifying the guy involved, or finding the two other vehicles.

All of this leads me to the opinion that German trust in law enforcement is slowly eroding. Everyone is hyped up to build more security into their houses and their lives.  There just isn't enough manpower to remedy this situation....even with the 10,000 extra cops that the CDU/SPD coalition promised up in the last six months.  And the sophistication of criminals now in Germany is requiring an entirely different view of prevention.