Peter Moskos on NYC’s Historic Crime Drop and the Lessons for Today

Summary

Summary of "Peter Moskos on NYC’s Historic Crime Drop and the Lessons for Today" – The Gist

Release Date: August 8, 2025 | Host: Mike Pesca | Produced by Peach Fish Productions

In this compelling episode of "The Gist," host Mike Pesca explores the remarkable decline in crime rates in New York City over the past few decades. Featuring an insightful interview with Peter Moskos, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and author of "Back from the Brink: Inside the NYPD and New York City’s Extraordinary 1990s Crime Drop," the discussion delves into the factors that contributed to this historic crime reduction and the lessons that can be applied today.

---

Introduction: A Surprising Decline in Crime

Mike Pesca opens the episode by presenting striking statistics:

“There are 14% fewer homicides in the first half of 2025 than in the first half of 2019.”
(01:00)

He underscores that this decline isn't limited to homicides alone but extends to various other crimes, including aggravated assaults, gun assaults, sexual assault, domestic violence, robbery, and carjacking. Pesca emphasizes the importance of understanding the underlying reasons for this positive trend.

Understanding the Crime Drop

Peter Moskos provides context by referencing an NPR report that attributes the crime drop to:

“A reinvestment in communities from both the government and private sources.”
(02:26)

He elaborates that during the pandemic, disruptions led to increased opportunities for crime, particularly among young men who were either unemployed or lacked structure and engagement:

“Young men, we're talking about bored young men, we're talking about men who maybe didn't even have jobs, but the problem was they didn't even have schools to go to.”
(03:44)

Moskos posits that addressing these immediate conditions—through effective policing and community programs—played a significant role in reducing crime rates.

Historical Context and "Back from the Brink"

Moskos introduces his book, "Back from the Brink," which meticulously chronicles NYC's crime reduction in the 1990s through a blend of statistics and oral histories with key figures in law enforcement and politics:

“Peter Moskos... talks to many New York City police officers, architects of policing programs, politicians[,] examining the changes in police leadership and how that led to an extraordinary drop in crime.”
(03:44)

He highlights the transformation within the NYPD, emphasizing data-driven strategies and leadership changes that were pivotal in the crime decline.

Implementation of CompStat

A central theme in the discussion is the introduction of CompStat, a data-driven policing strategy led by figures like Jack Maple and William Bratton:

“CompStat... was about collecting accurate, timely data.”
(15:40)

Moskos explains how CompStat revolutionized policing by shifting from reactive to proactive strategies, allowing the NYPD to allocate resources more effectively based on real-time crime data.

Leadership and Policy Changes

Under Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Police Commissioner William Bratton, the NYPD adopted a mission-focused approach to crime reduction:

“In '94, Bratton comes on and says... we are going to focus on crime, fear of crime and disorder.”
(17:40)

Moskos credits this leadership for setting clear objectives and fostering an environment where innovative policing tactics could thrive, ultimately leading to substantial reductions in crime without increasing police brutality or corruption.

Policing Strategies and Community Impact

The conversation delves into specific policing tactics, such as targeting repeat violent offenders and enhancing community relations. Moskos asserts that effective policing does not necessarily lead to increased complaints of abuse:

“During the time murder was declining, complaints of police abuse were also declining.”
(25:07)

He emphasizes the balance between maintaining public safety and respecting community relations, highlighting that thoughtful, data-driven policing can achieve both.

Addressing Critiques and Challenges

Pesca and Moskos tackle common critiques of aggressive policing, including concerns about mass incarceration and racial disparities. Moskos argues that while there are trade-offs, the strategies employed were crucial in reducing violent crime:

“Arrests went up more in the '80s under Dinkins and community policing than it did in the '90s under Bratton and Broken Windows.”
(25:00)

He acknowledges that aggressive policing may sometimes lead to unintended consequences but maintains that the overall benefits in crime reduction were significant.

Effectiveness of Policies Beyond NYC

Moskos counters the argument that the crime drop was part of a random national trend by pointing out that other cities did not experience similar declines:

“In a lot of those cities, it barely dropped. And it just didn't drop like it dropped in New York.”
(25:45)

He attributes NYC's unique success to its strategic and data-driven approach, which was not widely replicated elsewhere.

Lessons for Today: Sustaining Crime Reduction

Reflecting on more recent trends, Moskos discusses the resurgence of violence in 2020 and attributes it to the absence of effective policing strategies:

“When stop and frisk went away, the murder rate would go back up. And it didn't under de Blasio. It didn't. Then it did in 2020.”
(36:34)

He advocates for maintaining and adapting successful strategies to continue combating crime effectively.

Conclusion: The Importance of Evidence-Based Policing

Peter Moskos emphasizes the necessity of evidence-based policing and strong leadership to sustain public safety:

“Policing remains incredibly popular in the highest crime areas because people generally would prefer to be stopped by police, hopefully treated with a certain amount of dignity and respect.”
(27:16)

Mike Pesca wraps up the episode by highlighting the critical insights from Moskos's research, underscoring the intricate balance between effective law enforcement and community relations.

Notable Quotes:

• Peter Moskos:

  “We are going to focus on crime, fear of crime and disorder.”
  (17:40)

• Peter Moskos:

  “During the time murder was declining, complaints of police abuse were also declining.”
  (25:07)

• Peter Moskos:

  “Policing remains incredibly popular in the highest crime areas because people generally would prefer to be stopped by police, hopefully treated with a certain amount of dignity and respect.”
  (27:16)

---

This episode of "The Gist" offers a thorough examination of New York City's successful strategies in reducing crime, highlighting the importance of data-driven approaches, effective leadership, and balanced community relations. Peter Moskos's insights provide valuable lessons for contemporary discussions on public safety and policing.

Transcript

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It's Friday, August 9, 2025 from Peach Fish Productions, it's the gist. I'm Mike Pesca. I don't know if you've seen but the homicide stats mostly from select cities, but a lot of them are great. Well, that seems odd to say that homicide is great, but I'll read some. There are 14% fewer homicides in the studies that they've done in the first half of 2025 than there were in the first half of 2019. So this is comparing the current state of crime to where we were pre pandemic. And it's even better. Some other crimes aggravated assault down 5% gun assaults down 4% sexual assault, which sometimes isn't included in these surveys for a number of reasons, down 28% domestic violence down 8 robbery down 30 carjacking down 3. Although there are some other statistics that show that carjacking actually hasn't gone down. But it's pretty amazing. And so of course the question is why? And we're going to get to the whys. Not the whys of this last period of years, but the whys of a.

[Peter Moscos]

Generation ago, because that is when we.

[Mike Pesca]

Can actually understand it. But into the mall we rush to understand that, and we should as best we can. So I will read from one explanation. This was on NPR. Murders are falling dramatically in many U.S. cities after a surge in 2020 and 2021. Crime analysts say a reinvestment in communities.

[Peter Moscos]

From both the government and private sources.

[Mike Pesca]

After the disruption of the pandemic is a key reason that makes it seem like community programs. And that report, if you listen to it, had some good seeming programs in Detroit bring down crimes. A reinvestment in communities. I'm not exactly sure what that means. Here's what as best we know, and there are many, many factors, but here's why crime spiked and is coming down. During the pandemic, people didn't have jobs and it wasn't that they were poor, it's that they were home with nothing to do. Or then during lockdown, they weren't home, they were out in the street with nothing to do. And we're talking about young men, we're talking about bored young men, we're talking about men who maybe didn't even have jobs, but the problem was they didn't even have schools to go to. And into this situation, more crimes occur, more people without anything to do, without focus, without another place to be, start shooting each other. We don't know if this is the best explanation, but it's a really good explanation. I'll read to you from a recent report. Crime scholars theorize that pandemic related changes in people's daily activity and emotional and economic stress level changes in police practices.

[Peter Moscos]

A rupture of public trust in law.

[Mike Pesca]

Enforcement and the suspension or reduction of social supports and programs likely influence the trend. And that's from the Council on Criminal justice. And I think that that's a broad picture. Some of those factors may have accounted for more, some of those factors may have had less of an impact. But I think that is the best way to think about what's going on now, which is fantastic. However, it will take years to disaggregate the different trends and once we do, it's important to pay attention to what worked. Which brings me to my interview today. The name of the book is Back from the brink, inside the NYPD and New York City's extraordinary 1990s crime drop. And in it, Peter Moscos, who teaches at the John Jay College of Criminal justice, talks to many, many, many New York City police officers, architects of policing programs, politicians, and through statistics and oral history, found out and examines the changes in police leadership and how that led to an extraordinary drop in crime. Moscos is an interesting guy. He's a former Baltimore city police officer. He then went to Harvard and Princeton. You know, the classic Baltimore cop to Harvard pipeline. And now his life experience takes him to us. THE Gist right across from me for this interview for his book Back from the Brink. Peter Moscos up next as summer winds down, I'm all about refreshing my wardrobe and what I like to call my staple pieces for the season ahead. And I didn't know they were called staple pieces, but then I found out what they were. Quince helps me do that. Quint styles are so versatile, I find myself reaching for them again and again. I want to mostly focus on linen pants. Linen shorts? Really? Oh, am I a Beau Brummel, a man about town in my linen Quince shorts? They're half the cost of similar brands. I take it on faith I don't even look to similar brands. So good are the Quint's shorts and Quints only works with factories that use safe, ethical and responsible manufacturing processes and premium fabrics and finishes. They make sure their shorts are not too short but not too long, but definitely linen. And you know what? The je ne sais quoi of these shorts have convinced me to look into towels. Towels, which Quince is also pioneering throughout. Another one I got a boy who's going to college and he needs luggage. Let's quince it up, I say. Elevate your fall wardrobe essentials with quince. Go to quints.com/the gist for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's quincy.com/the gist to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com the gist hims can't control snoring or blanket stealing. Appropriation, they sometimes call it. But what about when it comes to performance? They've got you covered. Unlike your spouse who's stolen the blanket. Take control of ED with personalized treatments made with proven ingredients prescribed by licensed providers, 100% online. Because ED can make you feel out of control, out in the cold. So if your blanket's been stolen, HIMS lets you get control back with personalized treatment options, including daily meds that support more spontaneous moments. It's pretty simple. It's easy to treat ed. You just have to do it. And that's what HIMS is for. You can access personalized prescription treatment options. I'll throw out some specific examples. Hardmints Sex Rx plus Climax Control HIMS offers access to those options and trusted generics. So if you Want to feel like yourself again, you go to hims. Think of it as a digital front door that gets you back to your old self with simple 100% online access. Think of hims as your digital front door that gets you back to your old self. To get simple online access to personalized affordable care for ed, hair loss, weight loss and more, visit hims.com the gist that's hims.com the gist for your free online visit hims.com the gist actual price will depend on product and subscription price plan. Featured products includes compounded drug products which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety, effectiveness or quality. Prescription requires the website for details, restrictions and important safety information.

[Peter Moscos]

So if you hear me talk on the show about any subject more than others, it's policing, homicide. I talk a lot about politics, but I'm very into safety and the opposite of chaos. And maybe it's because I'm a New Yorker. I remember what it was like to be a New Yorker in the 1990s and things were not good. And I've read about the 1970s and things were ridiculous. Very important that we know that things are a lot better now. And this is a direct rebuttal to the idea of we can't reform. Reform never works. In fact, New York City is, is one of the sites of the greatest policing reform. I would say one of the greatest examples of government reform you will ever find. And it's all chronicled in Peter Moscos, his new book, Back from the brink inside the NYPD in New York City's extraordinary 1990 crime drop. Peter, welcome to the Gist.

It's great to be here. Thanks for having me.

So before, like I say, the 70s, I'm fascinated by the 70s. Up on my shelf shelf you'll see Prince of the City and the trial of the first ever policeman who went on trial. And I can't believe, but I keep reading it and your book had a bunch of statistics, just some of the statistics to contrast. During the 1970s when I was alive to now. Do you know off the top of your head you want to take murders, you want to take discharging of police weapons. That's one that always blows my mind.

In the early 70s, cops shot literally hundreds of people in 1971 and 1972 killed over. I don't have to know the number off the top of my head if.

It was 70 or 130. It was a lot. Yeah, you know, now it's like 10.

Now it's him. But I'M even talking about not even connecting with anyone. I don't know when they started that. But just discharging their firearms. Well, no, thousands.

Nobody kept track too. So I work. I was a Baltimore city police officer.

Briefly and worked with a guy who came on the job in 1968, says Before Tennessee vs. Garner.

And he said, Pete, I used. This is stop or I'll shoot Era. Yeah, fleeing felon, you can shoot them. And he said, pete, I shot at a lot of people. He said, I never hit anybody. Yeah, but he said the best thing was there was no paperwork. All we had to do is go and buy more ammo.

That was the big disincentive.

Yeah, but that changed. And it's at New York City was.

On the cutting edge of that because.

They said, why don't we actually keep track of how many people cops shoot? Hadn't been done before. Right. It had been done here.

Every now and then there'd be a study or something, but consistently so we.

Have shooting data that, for that, that.

Goes back to 1971.

And then they reduced it.

They implemented policy and training that brought down those numbers without increasing crime or having more cops shot.

It actually de.

Escalated the streets a bit.

In 1971, police officers shot at at least 314 people and killed 93. And they had these squads where they were just the stakeout squads. They just lie in wait for a burglar and bang, they'd shoot him and kill him. Six out of seven times.

[Mike Pesca]

I think it was a lot.

[Peter Moscos]

It was a different era. But to jump forward two decades, in 1994, the NYPD for the first time asked how many people were shot in New York City last year and nobody knew.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And that's why I start the book in the 70s, to show the sort of both the dysfunction of the city.

And the police department to some extent.

But there was a lot of low hanging fruit. So Jack Maple, who was Bill Bratton's.

Right hand man in 1994, said he.

Was the one asking the question. And he said, how do we not know how many people were shot in the city? Well, why don't we count them? And so they did. And so we have shooting data now that goes back to 1993, but there were probably 7,000 people shot in 1990, but we don't know how many.

How many?

Probably 7,000.

[T-Mobile Customer]

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[Guest Speaker]

Wow.

[Peter Moscos]

But we don't know.

And now. And last year, how many was it?

Oh, so the three.

The stats just came out for this year.

Yeah, I mean, so they're at A record low.

I mean, since, you know, the 50s.

What are shootings down to? I kind of, I'm afraid to say the wrong number.

It's less than a thousand.

Yeah, yeah, that's what I saw recently. 500 shootings. This isn't police shooting people. There's people shooting each other. So it shows that some amount of policing works. In fact, your whole book shows this. The way you do this is through the statistics, but also oral histories. Why did you. Or at least interviews in a studs terkel fashion. Why that method?

Yeah, I mean, the bulk of the.

Book is not me speaking. I do the chapter introductions and try to get a little framework. And, you know, you have the books from the 70s. I love those movies from the 70s. 70s that showed this noir vision of New York.

Oh, yeah. And during. What was the Death Wish? You know, the whole idea was, let's shoot as many thugs as possible for sneering at you. And audiences would erupt about that because the citizenry was under assault.

People were afraid.

I mean, and not irrationally so either.

That's the other part of it.

So I started. So I. I started graduate School in.

95 when the murder plummet was just happening. In a couple years, murders were down 50% in New York. And all the experts at Harvard and other places are saying, well, that's impossible. First they said it's not happening, and then they said, it's complicated.

But the party line was, and to some extent still is, we have to.

Fix society to reduce crime. Crime is caused by the root causes, poverty, racism, unemployment, bad education, so on.

And I don't mean to be overly cavalier and dismissalist, because those things are important, of course, but we don't need to address those to reduce violence. We can just address violence. And that's what happened in New York. So I'm starting grad school going, here's this most amazing crime drop. Everybody in academia has no good answer. That's probably a good field to get.

Into if everybody's wrong. So that's when I got into. I also wanted to study something urban related because I'm a city boy.

And so that's when the city of Chicago, though.

Yeah, I grew up in Evanston, Illinois, and have lived in other cities. And yeah, I've been in New York since 2002.

And so I got into the policing field. I. And I still wanted to answer that question, why did crime go down? And people talked about these weekly meetings called CompStat, which, you know, is a big part of the story.

But this was Jack Maple, the guy you referenced, was very rakish and had a hat. And he said, let's do essentially computers and let's track the actual data. So this is called CompStat. And it was seemingly obvious, but also a revolution at the same time.

Yeah, the computer part was the G Wiz, but when we say computers, by the way, we're just talking about a.

Shift from overhead projectors to PowerPoint, basically.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah, yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

It was not. It was not really computer based. It was about collecting accurate, timely data.

And that hadn't been done.

But how does that stop people from shooting each other? That's the other part. So I had this idea to write.

A book about the crime drop.

I did my first interview 11 years ago now.

So it's been a long process.

But I quickly realized, why am I going to paraphrase these cops when they're very articulate, they can tell the story.

Better than I can.

Why am I going to tone it down, let them do the. The speaking? So the book is entirely first person.

Narrative weaved together of. It's mostly, almost exclusively cops. There are a few others in there, some business improvement district leaders, prosecutors, a couple professors.

But it's cops telling the police side.

Of the story of the crime drop and how the organization changed.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And you have in the book people who were cops who were on the beat, cops who were sergeants who become chief of police, chief of detectives. I don't know how many NYPD chiefs of police are in here. Ray Kelly's in here.

Yeah. Although, I mean, it's a lot of them.

Timothy's in here.

People loved to be in the book.

I had no problem, by and large, getting people. Ray Kelly was actually a bit hard to get.

But by and large, people are very.

Proud of this story and they feel that it hasn't been told properly and.

To some extent they want credit for it, but they're vested in the city and to watch.

They were amazed to see murders cut in half and cut in half again.

And so, yeah, the book ends in the late 90s. I actually, I couldn't pass over 2001.

In an oral history and say, oh, oh, and then that happened. So I have a hard end before then because I think, by and large, the crime drop story is done by that point.

But let the cops tell the story. And I do try and get. Look, there are a lot of people.

Who aren't in the book. You know, you have to be selective.

There's nothing in the book is by accident.

So I do try and have different ranks and have people from high crime districts and low crime districts, you know, people you've heard of and people you.

Haven'T, to sort of just flesh out.

This overall picture of what it was like to be a cop back then.

But even if you count, accurately count the crimes, how does that make you or help you? I understand how it helps you, but how does that lead to stopping the crime?

Partly, it seems so obvious now, but again, the first thing was a mission statement.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

In 94, Bratton comes on and says.

We are going to focus on crime. Fear of crime and disorder.

That hadn't been done before. It was a. Before that, it was about avoiding corruption. And this goes back to the serpent.

Era and scandals and the Presidential Commission on crime in 1968.

But it was before that it was corruption, it was brutality, it was race riots. And then you make three robbery arrests.

For every 10 robberies and you're fine.

Nobody, I don't want to say nobody.

Cared about crime, but the organization didn't care about crime.

And so now they said, we're going to focus on this. Okay, where are the shootings happening and when are they happening? Well, when they're happening is not 9 to 5, Monday through Friday when all.

The detectives are working.

So why don't we have detectives work on weekends and nights? Well, you know, that's not very popular at first.

Right.

So a lot of it was, you know, redeploying when people were working and where they were working and also saying the goal is not. I don't care how many arrests you.

Make if it doesn't reduce crime.

Oh, you arrested three people for robbery. Well, did the robbery stop? No. Well, then you didn't arrest the right person. Go out there and find who's out who's doing the robberies, Talk to people after they're arrested, interview them. If someone's stealing subway tokens, you remember those. Go back and figure out where are they selling them. Well, let's go get them, too.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

So it was much more of a, you know, holistic approach to crime reduction, but at some point saying, they're not that many criminals out there. Let's go get them.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

What were the inclinations of these police before they. Because I find that even if you don't have a computer and even if you don't have analysis from people who've studied it, the actual foot soldiers in these battles are often pretty wise. They might have some ideas that count as folk wisdom, but they also kind of, if you could somehow tap into their inclinations you'd be doing a good thing. So what do some of these officers, who especially go back towards the era of the 70s, what were they getting Right by instinct, they, by and large they do know.

They know the criminals by name, date of birth and their previous crimes.

They're not.

Crime doesn't happen in the abstract.

It's hyperlocal. And you see the same people up.

To the same no good every day. Now sometimes you have cause to arrest.

Them, sometimes you don't, but you if you're there long enough. The basic beat cop has that sense of who the people are, who's up.

To no good, who's sometimes up to no good, who are the hangers on.

And who are the people who are victimized so that they already knew, but.

They need the support of the organization.

And some of it. And this is, you know, it's hard.

To write a thrilling narrative like Back from the Brink is, if I do say so myself.

But it's hard to write about paperwork.

In an interesting way.

Like one of the thing was if you made arrests, you were off the street for sometimes 12, sometimes 20, sometimes literally 30 hours for the booking. And so part of the reason I.

Talk about a little bit of the.

Non police side like Bryant park is today. Bryant park has less police than it.

Did back in the, in the 80s and a lot less crime.

Like it's win win.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

They're not arresting anyone because it's no longer dangerous.

Right. Like when you say less crime, what would the crime be? Someone stealing someone else's macaroni salad during a screening, an outdoor screening during the summer.

I imagine there's a purse snatching here and there. Y but it used to be a.

Shooting gallery, which doesn't mean people shooting each other is heroin use left and right, just people strung out. It was unbelievable. I talked to my uncle who passed away when I used to work across from Bryant park when I was hosting a show called the Bryant Park Project and was like, really?

[Mike Pesca]

It's safe to go there?

[Peter Moscos]

I'm like, listen, it's more than safe. It's a cliche. As safe it is.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it's, it's, it isn't that New York's nicest public bathroom? Let's not forget that.

That is true.

[Guest Speaker]

Yes.

[Peter Moscos]

Very grand, grandiose. So when the crime drop started halved and halved again, what were the actual police, what were the patrolmen saying and thinking about that?

Well, they started to see a difference.

I mean it was noticeable.

Keep in so in when Giuliani ran.

For his second term, which would have been 97. Right.

You know, the New York Times enthusiastically endorsed him.

[Mike Pesca]

Sure.

[Peter Moscos]

And dissed Ruth messenger pretty bad.

Basically. They said she's asking us not to believe, you know, to not believe our lying eyes.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

Like of course the city is better now.

It was anyone.

The Times was pretty pro Giuliani when he was mayor. Maybe not towards the end. The Times was pretty pro Giuliani for most of his loyalty.

They, you read some advance warnings in.

There about what they were saying. They weren't, they, you know, they weren't hook, line and sinker.

Right, right, right. He would pick fights with the Brooklyn.

For the right time.

A lot of people I interviewed said. And you know, he was just crazy. Not crazy, crazy.

[Guest Speaker]

Right.

[Peter Moscos]

The city was getting better.

Cops see that Times Square is improving.

That was a big enough.

Some of that, remember, started under Dinkins. You know, Giuliani would like to take credit for that.

But Dinkins signed the deal with Disney.

Dinkins hired more cops and Dinkins got rid of the squeegee men, which people forget about that.

Well, people sometimes say in defense of Dinkins, who was the mayor, who was a one term mayor, who was immediately preceded Giuliani and who Giuliani narrowly lost to in his first run for mayor. And people will, especially Giuliani critics of which he deserves. Many, they will say, well, you know, the murder rate started dropping under Dinkins and that, that always chafes because that's just another way of saying, you know, the worst year for murder in New York wasn't Dinkins. His last year it was Dinkins is what, second or third year and it was still in the 2000. So did it really start to drop in? Or are we just saying that without Dinkins, are we saying that Dinkins put all this stuff or some of this stuff or most of this stuff in motion?

He did put some of it in motion. Safe street, safe city. The hiring all those cops, the crack epidemic was the big factor. And that started receding when he was mayor. I don't give him credit for, I mean, not out of maliciousness. Yes, but he doesn't deserve credit for that.

There were more murders in his last.

Year than his first year year, for instance.

Right. And how many were turned? 2,000.

Yeah, that thing that was 1900s then it was a little bit down from the peak.

So yes, statistically the murder drop started during his term. But we're talking, you know, 3% here.

4% there, not 50.

There were, there were four years of like 10 15, 20% drops in murder.

And crime later from 94 to 98. That had never happened before ever.

So that's, that's the real crime drop. The other part is some of that crime drop that happened under Dinkins happened in the subway. And who was commissioner, who was subway transit? Police Chief Bill Bratton.

[Guest Speaker]

Right.

[Peter Moscos]

Robberies went down in the subway and.

They did not go down above ground. And that's a fabulous natural experiment.

And that was because they started going.

After turnstile jumper jumpers, open warrants, and basically enforcing the rules of the subway. And it's a separate police department, state controlled. But so it's interesting to see the differences when something happens, happens on the subway and doesn't happen in the rest of the city.

Okay, let's go through some of the common critiques of policing or over policing. You can't say that there aren't fewer people who are getting killed. But what you can say is something like, what are the costs? The costs are massive incarceration. Is that a fair critique?

Not. I mean, it's a fair critique in general.

It's important. But no, it's not a fair critique of the crime decline.

A fun fact is that arrests went.

Up more in the 1980s under Dinkins and community policing than it did in the 90s under Bratton and Broken Windows.

The arrest did increase, but they started.

Going down as well with the crime drop.

People, a lot of people were against.

This approach to crime prevention simply because it is a more aggressive form of policing.

And if you don't like policing, you're against it. The fact that it seemed to be saving a whole lot of lives was sort of an inconvenient fact.

So, you know, started to talk about.

Oh, it's a national trend. Well, no, it was easy to copy.

It did spread.

But, you know, there was a literal dog and pony show. Taking it on the road.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah, yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

So this. I'll get sidetracked by what you just said. It's a Nash natural national trend. This was always said, sure, crime dropped in New York, but it also dropped in and San Diego, Cleveland. Name your cities. And the fact is that in a lot of those cities it barely dropped. And it just didn't drop like it dropped in New York.

It also dropped first in New York.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah, yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And a lot of those cities also started focusing on crime. Again, the actual strategy wasn't that complicated.

It's not a complicated theory.

It's less. Let's go after repeat violent offenders.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

Is there a tradeoff of this aggressive or effective but more arrests and bringing down murder and crime, is there a trade off between that and people who are abused or brutalized by the police?

Complaints.

Complaints also went down.

That's a management issue now. I don't.

Look, look, that's important to say. During the time murder was declining, complaints of police abuse were also declining.

Yeah, it was. But, you know, it is a more aggressive form of policing. Inevitably there will be innocent people stopped. Well, there.

I think there might be better words than aggressive. Right. Aggressive makes it seem like someone's throwing elbows and busting up.

Well, intrusive. No, I don't mean that form of aggressive, but I mean more present.

There's more police. You're more likely to get arrested.

It's intrusive. Police get up in your business. I mean, that's what policing is.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And they're not always picking the right person.

So there is a trade off. But look, policing remains incredibly popular in.

The highest crime areas because people generally would prefer to be stopped by police, hopefully treated with a certain amount of dignity and respect.

If police are actually effective and they can walk to the bodega on the corner and feel safe.

[Mike Pesca]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Mike Pesca]

And we're back with Peter Moscos talking about New York City policing.

[Peter Moscos]

One thing that annoys me is dismissing the broken windows theory. I find that two. There are two strains of this. One is mischaracterizing what the theory actually is and the other one is saying it doesn't do anything. So why don't I'll set you up or I'll pitch the softball and you knock it out of the park.

The misc. You know, the mischaracterization happens a bit on both sides.

The bigger one is that broken windows is just evil and racist.

Now, I will say in New York.

I think it did morph into zero tolerance policing, which is not the same thing where suddenly stop this happens.

We're talking like 2004 to 2008 now.

It's a different time frame, a later timeframe where police started stopping people for the sake of stopping them to produce numbers of stops. And it wasn't focused on crime. It was the tail wagging the dog.

It was incredibly harmful and set policing back for decades. Still in New York, because people now say, well, that was broken Windows. No George Kelling, who co authored the.

Original Atlantic article, and Brad will tell you the difference.

That Broken Windows is about police discretion.

It is about listening to the community.

It is about saying that there are certain standards of behavior. It's granting that people have agency and you can actually police behavior, that policing as a verb, on the other hand, and John Miller says this in the book, it's not just that you take.

Care of the little things and the big things take care of themselves.

I would say a benefit to Broken Windows is those little things matter. I don't want someone pissing on my.

Stoop regardless of whether it leads to a murder.

I just don't want that happening.

And the very same people, the very same communities that want more police because they want more safety, also want the windows not to be broken in the streets, not to smell of urine.

But sometimes you have to separate it. And I think today you can see.

That with certain mental health issues and.

Homelessness, that actually is not the gun.

Violence problem there, but it's a separate problem.

But John Miller says you take care of the little things and the real violent criminals don't give a damn. They're going to still keep being predators out there.

[Guest Speaker]

Right.

[Peter Moscos]

What Broken Windows did do, it allowed police a legal reason to interact with.

People, to stop people.

So that's what I mean by saying.

It is more aggressive.

If you jump the turnstile, they're going to stop you. Now, if you just jump in the turnstile, you got a ticket and were released. If you had an open warrant or a weapon, then you would get arrested. You could also say, look, if you don't want to be stopped, then don't jump the turnstile. To me, that's win, win.

What about the idea that Stop and Frisk wasn't just racially disproportional, but racist, inherently racist. If you look at the statistics, and this is what the courts ruled about who was being stopped and frisked.

Well, again, I think it probably was.

When, when the NYPD went crazy with Stop, question and frisk.

But that doesn't mean that stopping people is. It's not the same thing. And that's, look, there are a lot of police abolitionists who sort of of try a lot of tactics, throw it.

Against the wall and see what sticks. Or they say, oh, stops are racist.

Well, I mean, then policing, then get rid of policing, because that's what.

But they want to. The abolitionists want to.

But the people who say, oh, I'm against racism. So therefore, I think they're right. No no. Understand what their goals are. And it is to drastically cut back or eliminate policing. Violent crime is racially disproportionate. I don't know how you can reduce.

Gun violence in New York City and.

Have it be racially equitable. Equitable in a way that reflects the.

City'S demographics where 90.

More than 95% of shooters and victims.

Of gunshots are black or Hispanic. I mean, it's.

It's. That's right, more than 95%. So if you're going after people shooting guns.

Oh, and by the way, we should establish that this. The racial makeup of the city is. It's what, 1/3 black and 1/3 40% Hispanic?

I think it's.

Right now, I think it's 55% black and more Hispanic, 35% white, 15% Asian. Does that add up to 100?

That does seem about right. It's a little more than 100. But people are too racist.

That's right.

Yes.

So we don't even have a way.

To sort of talk about racial disparities, honestly.

And if we care about gun violence, we need to.

And I don't know how we start that discussion.

But of course, police.

Police and gun violence is going to reflect that disparity.

Now, you could have racism on top.

Of that, of course, but simply because.

There'S a disparity, the denominator has to be of the perpetrators of that crime. But it's also important to say, look, some of the people you stop won't be guilty. And yes, there is racial disparity in that, and that may be inevitable.

And that's why you need leadership to talk about it, to say why we're doing it.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And for cops to treat people with respect.

Bloomberg always said that there's no reason why you can't do the stop and frisk. To the extent that he endorsed stop and frisk. Frisk, but also do it professionally and stop and frisk. Stop question and frisk doesn't have to always be destructive interaction.

It doesn't.

But there were seven, what, 700,000 one year.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

After the court decision, it went down to, you know, 7,000 or something.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And violence dropped as well.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

Know in hindsight that what was happening.

In that era in the 2000s did not work for crime reduction and it was bad for the community and. And for police.

Yeah. And so this post dates the book, but I do want to go back to that because I do a segment on my show called I Was Wrong. And even before that segment, before I had this Formal segment. I did a segment saying, you know, I thought when stop and frisk went away, the murder rate would go back up. And it didn't under de Blasio. It didn't. Then it did in 2020. Was that a lag, a lagging indicator of stop and frisk going away? Do you think that we were wrong to say that stop and frisk kept murder down?

We were wrong to say that stop and frisk. And again, a lot of people were stopped. Were not frisk. That's why. But all those stops.

But many were. No, I think we were wrong. I expected.

I expected violence to go up a bit, and it didn't.

It went down. It went down a lot. Then what happened is people sort of thought that.

That it was just natural and we didn't need policing anymore. And, you know, talk about, you know, decolonizing the subways, that was kooky.

And then. And then, you know, then a combination.

Of various policies and laws at the city and state level.

And at some point, I think those.

Collectively have a big. Have a big impact.

Do you think these gains that you chronicle would have been possible if New York didn't have the toughest gun control laws in the country?

It would have been a lot harder. That was certainly part of it.

[Mike Pesca]

And so contrast it, like, let's say.

[Peter Moscos]

They tried to do. Let's say Jack Maple was in Jacksonville, Florida. What difficulties would he have that he didn't have?

Most even there, you know, felons with guns pretty much, you know, is illegal everywhere, pretty much.

So you can still enforce the laws you have. New York, I think, is a little bit safer because most people don't have guns. So a lot of arguments don't end up in shootings, but the. The deterrence effect. And I heard this first from students.

In the early two. There was some famous football player who shot himself, Flaxico Burris. And he did time, of course, he did years.

He's bleeding from the leg, and he did two years today.

He would not be prosecuted, I don't think.

Really?

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

But the moral, my students said, yeah, if you get caught with an illegal gun, you will do time.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And by and large, that was true. And that gave people an out to.

Say, no, I don't want to play that game.

When that is how deterrence works. It's not. Well, it sent one guy to.

To jail, but it's not sending everyone to jail.

It's keeping people away from illegal activity.

Well, the other way deterrence works. The other example I always give is not Just plaxico burris. But if you were flying through New York and wanted to check your gun in the locker there, they'd arrest you. At jfk, they were pretty strict about that.

I had to be careful because I, my girlfriend lived in New York at the time. I'd come up from Baltimore and I had to, you know, when you were.

A police, a police officer in Baltimore.

With a guy, if I carried, I.

Mean, I, I didn't bring it because.

It would have been a felony. You know, I was required to carry.

It in Baltimore city. And then if I bring it through New Jersey, that those laws have changed since then. Now, now, now that would be possible.

But yeah, New York gun laws were no joke.

Tell me about when you say your students, what's the dynamic there? They, they report to you what the realities of the street are. Where do you teach and what kind of students do you have?

I teach at the fabulous John Jay College of Criminal justice in Manhattan.

It's part of cuny, the City University of New York. So it is a four year public college. And by and large, I teach two different groups of students. I teach undergrads who are all New York City kids, not almost all the New York City kids, and almost all immigrants or children of immigrants. And they are, you know, moving up in the social economic ladder and they're great.

Do they mostly want to be police?

No, no. It's not as much of a cop.

School, which I think is unfortunate as people think it is.

Yeah, they want a, they want a job that has, you know, has stability and benefits that no one in their.

Family has ever had before.

And by and large they're going to get them.

My school does great for upward mobility.

Some do become cops, but, you know, they want jobs, basically. And then I teach ranking New York.

City police officers in a master's program.

Many of whom are those same kids, but you know, 20 years older.

[Guest Speaker]

Right.

[Peter Moscos]

So those are two ways I can.

Sort of keep my ear to the ground, I mean, along with living here. But yeah, the students at John Jay are great.

And if we could have an insight as to what your graduate students, what their attitudes are, where they are on the continuum of racist to non racist, sensitive to non sensitive, hard ass to forgiving. Would we be surprised? Would we be gratified? What would our reaction be?

I think you, Mike, would be surprised at.

Well, first of all, the diversity, you know, it's, it's. There are not that many for undergrads. I have very few white students. And even among the ranking officers, it's probably majority minority. You would be surprised at how smart they are.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

How diverse they are and how conservative they are. You know, cops are conservative.

Right.

But you don't know until you really like it is, it is a very politically conservative institution.

And I, I mean, I've known that for a while.

But that, that, that part is true. But I don't know. I wish more people of other ideological.

Bents would, would go into policing their hiring.

Speaker 1 what's your assessment of the rest of academia and why they are still confused by what you clearly chronicle? They shouldn't be as confused about the crime drop as it seems like many of these academics are.

I mean, the ones I don't know partly, I think they're not impacted by crime.

So it's always in the abstract. So it's very easy.

[Mike Pesca]

But just lay the.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

Give us the sense of. In academia, they just won't even admit that crime went down for the specific reasons that the, that Jack Maple, Rudy Giuliani and the people who implemented the strategy predicted crime would go down. Is this right? They're just saying it was more or less random.

Yeah, they're saying it's random. You know, the same thing in the reverse happened in 2020 when violence tripled.

And me and a couple other people are trying to raise the alarm.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

Because I think that's important.

And the response, I'm not going to.

Out him by name, but from a couple prominent academics was no, the NYPD.

Is making up numbers.

I'm like, you really think that they are inventing shootings for some weird political, like, you're crazy. No shootings are going up. Why don't we care? And a couple months later they're like.

Well, I guess shootings did go up.

Well, maybe if we reacted earlier, we could have saved some lives.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

I don't know. It's too much theory and not enough sort of feet on the ground sense of pragmatism.

And let's actually get to work and do stuff.

I like to check in on criminologists a lot. And there's a very good panel, sort of modeled on the University of Chicago economist panel where they ask 60 prominent criminologists, is this having an effect or isn't that. And by and large, there is more wisdom among the real criminologists than the ones I see, you know, quoted most frequently in the New York Times. Although I do think the New York Times tries to get the answers right.

[Mike Pesca]

But why is it the case that.

[Peter Moscos]

But at the most exalted schools. You have a negative correlation between what you know, at John Jay College and what this panel of criminologists and what most people most invested in keeping crime down in their cities know. Because I don't want to be the kind of person who just, you know, says the Ivy League, they're out of touch. But it does seem that way on the issue of criminology.

You know, I would say actually at.

The bigger, more prominent schools, the criminologists are more right than wrong. There are people out there who are focusing on.

They're maybe not so charismatic and they.

Might be more quantitative and so, you know, they're not out there as much, but there is a good cadre of academics focused on actual crime reduction. The problem, I think, comes in the more abstract anthropology or sociology or critical theories where they're just not, you know, it's just quoting Foucault and, you know, talking about abolishing police and that. That's just an ideological. But it's a large ideological side.

Yeah, but the people.

Since the 90s, crime drop, you know.

People look at things.

There is real evidence on hotspot policing and, you know, there are various things and evidence based policing and so on.

We know what works.

There have been studies.

Now some people just deny it, which.

Is kind of funny.

But yeah, if you put more cops out there that are actually doing something, even actually, if you put.

There's studies showing if you put more cops out there not doing anything, it reduces crime. But why waste your money on cops standing.

Yeah, you're gonna pay them anyway. Yeah, yeah.

Have them actually do something.

The problem is it's just very hard to sort of to scale up and institutionalize good leadership.

It does come down to individual men and women who are actually thinking about it and caring and doing the right thing and, you know.

Yeah, it's hard work.

What's the rule of thumb? I was reading Herman Lopez on this. For every 10 cops hired, one murder drop.

There's something like that. I don't. I mean, it's a little too.

It's a little too glib.

Yeah, yeah, but there is. The studies that show the cops standing.

Around are actually good ones related to terrorism levels. There's one in D.C. we're just simply having more cops because it went from yellow to red, reduced crime in the surrounding area. There's another looking at, in Argentina looking at protection of, I think the Jewish. The Israeli embassy or Jewish cultural center. The one that was bombed.

[Guest Speaker]

Yeah.

[Peter Moscos]

And that showed that police presence impacted things.

But yeah, we can do better than that. We can.

We can actually go out there and change behavior.

Peter Moscos is a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal justice in nyc, and his new book is Back from the brink inside the NYPD in New York City's extraordinary 1990s crime drop. Thanks so much.

Oh, thanks for having me. It's been great.

[Mike Pesca]

That's it for today's show. Cory Wara produces the Gist. I assembled the Gist list alongside Kathleen Sykes. I mean, not really alongside. She's in Utah. I'm here. But we collaborate, as do Astrid Green and the team. She runs our socials. And Ashley Kahn is our production coordinator. Who's in charge? It's Michelle Pesca. As I'll tell you, she is loathe to say improve G Peru.

[Peter Moscos]

Do Peru.

[Mike Pesca]

And thanks for listening.