Econ_May_05

26 United States

The Economist

May 5th 2018

Steve Komarow

Chateau marmot

OURNALISTSwho become prominent

coveringwars or politics are generally

eulogised for scoops scored or prizes

secured. Steve Komarow’s four-decade

careerwasmost accomplished, but his

main achievement was something even

rarer in the often cut-throat worlds of

Washington bureaus and foreign corre-

sponding. His calmly intense confidence

as a reporter, and clear-eyed equanimity

as an editor, producedwidespread re-

spect with no lasting enmity.

AfterMr Komarowdied at 61 from

brain cancer, tributes focused on the

preternatural calm, intellectual range,

high standards, lowvolume and cock-

eyed grin that secured his stature in all

four newsroomswhere he played a

pivotal role. The last was

, part of The

Economist Group, where hewas exec-

utive editor from2015.

His approach earnedwide notice

when hewas a cub reporter for the Asso-

ciated Press. On themorning ofDecem-

ber 8th1982, an anti-nuclear protester

calledNormanMayer drove a lorry,

which he claimedwas riggedwith

1,000lb of dynamite, to the base of the

WashingtonMonument, demanding to

negotiatewith an unmarried and child-

less reporter. Mr Komarowvolunteered,

and by nightfall secured the release of

nine hostages inside the obelisk.

Covering a Congress just starting its

descent into partisan gridlock, Mr Koma-

row’s countervailing courtesy led the

press corps to choose himas their negoti-

ator over access. Hired by

USA Today

, he

went to Bosnia, Kosovo andHaiti, and

was the first to cover a cruise-missile

launch from inside a

-52. After Septem-

ber11th 2001he decamped to Afghani-

stan, where his best work, he thought,

was smuggling a rescue dog out of the

country over the Khyber Pass. Then

posted to Iraq, hewas among the first to

report from the holewhere Saddam

Husseinwas captured.

He returned to

for four years as

deputyWashington bureau chief, help-

ing tomanage election coverage in 2008.

Then came five years at Bloomberg,

directing its reporting on BarackObama’s

White House, followed, for the final 29

months of his life, by nurturing a staff of

mostly younger journalists covering

Capitol Hill for

Roll Call.

“Hewas adventurous—who else

wouldwant to try themarmot for lunch

inMacedonia?—and hewaswise,” said

Dan Rubin, a fellowforeign correspon-

dent. “He alwayswore a sports coat

when flying in case the airlineswere

overbooked and needed to upgrade

someone for business class. He coun-

selled: ‘Always look like you belong

there.’ And of course he always did.”

WASHINGTON, DC

The editorof aWashington institution died onApril 29th

Steve Komarow

AHM EMANUEL is an expensive date

for Ken Griffin. Encouraged by Chica-

go’s forceful mayor, after he complained

about the overcrowded lakefront trail, the

billionaire hedge-fund manager donated

$12m for a separate bicycle path in 2016. He

gave $3m for soccer fields in poor neigh-

bourhoods in December. Mr Emanuel, a

Democrat, even persuaded Mr Griffin, a

Republican, to pony up $1m for his re-elec-

tion campaign. And at a recent tête-à-tête,

he persuaded Mr Griffin to part with $10m

to bankroll the joint effort by the Chicago

Police Department (

CPD

) and the Universi-

ty of Chicago’s Crime Lab, a research cen-

tre, to use data-analytics programs to

predict and prevent violence in the crime-

plagued city.

Mr Griffin’s latest gift to his hometown

will mostly go to the

CPD

’s Strategic Deci-

sion Support Centres (

SDSC

), where civil-

ian analysts and cops crunch data from

gunshot detection-systems, surveillance

cameras and computer programs with the

aim of identifying the places where vio-

lence is likely to breakout. Startingwith six

last year, the city has set up such centres in

13 of its 22 police districts. Some ofMr Grif-

fin’s money will also finance mental-

health care for officers; some will go to-

wards evaluating complaints against them.

Policing software such as Predpol or

HunchLab, their makers claim, is able to

forecastwhere crime is likely tobe commit-

ted. Certainly the numbers are intriguing.

After 2016 turned out to be the deadliest

year for two decades, with 762 murders

and 3,550 shootings, the following year,

which coincided with the establishment

of the first

SDSC

, was less bloody, with 650

murders and 2,785 shootings. The decline

in crime in police districts with the new

data centres was steeper than in those

without. This could just have been rever-

sion to the mean. But the Chicago police

department thinks thatHunchLab, the par-

ticular program it bought, has something

to dowith it.

To see why this might be the case, con-

siderEnglewood. Ahard-up, predominant-

ly blackneighbourhood on the South Side,

Englewood saw a decline in murders of

44% in 2017 comparedwith 2016. Shootings

fell by43%. Abyword forconcentratedpov-

erty, rampant crime, drugs, guns andgangs,

Englewood seems to have taken everyone

by surprisewith its progress.

Laura West, an officer working at the

district’s

SDSC

, which is staffed by two offi-

cers at all times, spends her days sur-

rounded by screens. One shows a program

called ShotSpotter, which uses the sound

of gunfire to pinpoint shootings; another

showswhere surveillance cameras are (the

cityhasmore than 40,000); and a third dis-

plays HunchLab software. This blends

data on crime statistics, population densi-

ty and weather patterns with fixed points

such as liquor stores and highway exit-

ramps, to identify patterns of crime that

may repeat themselves. (Predictive polic-

ing software also takes into account the

phases of the moon and the schedules of

sports games.) At-risk sites are marked

with boxes colour-coded according to the

type of crime. Patrol officers are encour-

aged to check them frequently.

The key to Englewood’s improvement

has not been more aggressive policing,

says Kenneth Johnson, the district com-

mander. “We cannot arrest our way out of

our problems,” he says. Instead, as he tells

it, the change is the result of targeted inter-

ventions, combined with improved rela-

tions with the local community. The

CPD

’s

relationship with blackChicagoans in par-

ticular has long been fraught. Its recent na-

dirwas awhite officer’s seeminglywanton

firing of 16 bullets into Laquan McDonald,

Policing

Serve and predict

CHICAGO

Data analytics are showing promise as a

tool to prevent violent crime

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