Footage of the stop that was later released by the Department of Public Safety showed that the troopers drew their weapons but did not point them at the boy.Īt that point, Mr. Watson abruptly ended the partnership, even as he said in a news conference that it had succeeded in bringing down crime and improving 911 response times. Then came a television report in July that troopers had pointed their weapons at a 10-year-old boy and his father during a traffic stop. “If you call 911, you won’t get an answer for 10 minutes sometimes,” she said. She said that while she did not feel unsafe in the city, she welcomed the additional police resources, in part because getting local officers to respond to calls had lately been so difficult. On a recent Tuesday evening, state troopers could be found throughout Austin, pulling over drivers for traffic infractions or expired registrations, requesting permission to make searches, finding small amounts of drugs like Xanax, methamphetamine and marijuana.Īlong North Lamar Boulevard in northeast Austin, red and blue lights flashed silently in the night, visible from a distance in the low-rise neighborhood, indicating another car stop by state troopers. In Houston, a leading Democratic candidate for mayor has said that if elected, he would welcome 200 state troopers into the city to assist its Police Department with combating violent crime. Police officer shortages have been a nationwide problem, challenging major cities including New York and Los Angeles. The Republican-dominated Legislature passed laws this year limiting the discretion of elected local prosecutors and barring cities from enacting local ordinances on a range of issues. The deployment has also raised political concerns, with some Democrats suggesting that the influx of troopers was part of a push by Republican leaders in the State Capitol to exert greater control over growing, Democrat-led cities.
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