BAGUIO CITY – The leadership of the Baguio City Police (BCPO) belied earlier reports that the city is the sixth most dangerous urban center in the country because of alleged high crime rate over the past six years, saying that the city’s crime data has been true and correct because of the awareness of police personnel that getting the true crime picture of its area of responsibility will lead to a progressive, deliberate and systematic course of action.
Senior Superintendent George D. Daskeo, BCPO acting city director, said the reported 1,417 monthly crime incidents in the city from 2010 to 2016 is obviously bloated and without factual basis considering that there were a total of 26,761 index crimes and 47,519 non-index crimes recorded by the BCPO during the said period.
Applying the generally accepted formula, Daskeo pointed out actual data showed that the average monthly index crime rate is only 117 while the average monthly non-index crime is 207 which are way below the reported 1,417 average monthly crime rate in the city.
It can be recalled that in 2012 a team from the Regional Investigation and Detective Management Division of the Police Regional Office – Cordillera under the instruction of then Regional Director Chief Superintendent Benjamin B. Magalong conducted validation of crime data in all the police stations in the city.
Daskeo cited results of the validation showed that there were discrepancies on the reported data compared to the actual data recorded in the police blotters, thus, appropriate actions were taken against those who were found out with 6 percent and above discrepancies.
Since then, the police official asserted BCPO personnel became dedicated and transparent in reporting all crime incidents that transpired in its area of responsibility compared to other police stations in different regions as stated by the validation conducted by the Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management in Camp Crame.
According to Daskeo, based on the crime data used to compare Baguio City with other cities in the country, the city was ranked sixth with the high index crimes due to under-reporting of police stations of other regions not reporting the true crime picture of their area and different treatment of cases that can be handled by the barangay.
In the city, he explained there are crime incidents that could be handled by the barangays that are still being brought to the police stations like slight physical injuries.
Further, Daskeo added the accessibility of the police stations and the trust level of the community to the police contributed to the preference of the involved party to report crime incidents to the police station instead of going to the barangay for initial attention and most of the said cases end up being settled by both parties or for many instances, the aggrieved party would just request to record the complaint in the blotter for future reference./Dexter A. See
