News From Newark

Mr. McCarthy has instructed commanders in the city’s four precincts to take on so-called quality-of-life offenses like public drinking and loitering
[big snip]

Tauron Hinnant and Angelo Montalvo, rookie beat partners, are reluctant to arrest teenagers who are violating the city’s 11 p.m. curfew, or toothless alcoholics with open pints of Thunderbird.

“Everyone drinks and a lot of these people have no place to go,” Officer Montalvo said one night after shooing a group of men from the front of a bodega. “My feeling is that if you arrest them, they might lose their job and then they turn to something worse.”

[snip]

They often function as much as social workers as crime fighters, offering advice to women who have been beaten up by boyfriends or lecturing teenagers about their blatant gang attire.

Now why is talking to women victims of aggravated assault a job for social workers not police officers ? It seems that in the Newark PD there is disagreement about whether to arrest "toothless alcoholics with open pints of Thunderbird" but all agree that a little assault and battery between boyfriend and girlfriend is no reason to bother a judge.

Guess it doesn't affect the quality of life.