Md. Police Chief Moves Big Ideas To Smaller City

Pocomoke City Police Chief Kelvin Sewell
Daily Times Photo

POCOMOKE CITY - Kelvin Sewell, in his time as a homicide detective in the Baltimore Police Department, was often confronted with murderers who cared not a whit about what he wanted, which was a confession -- or at least a lead.

Time after time, suspect after suspect: "We're at an impasse. He's slouching back in his chair," Sewell recounts in his book, "Why Do We Kill?: The Pathology of Murder in Baltimore," co-written with a reporter and published this year, after he'd left the force. "I'm asking questions that he's not answering, at least not truthfully. He's tough, stubborn; he's not afraid of me."

He had to devise a tactic to break the mental wall, and what he says he came up with is completely counterintuitive. " 'If you're so tough,' I say, 'recite the alphabet.' " They never see that query coming, he says; and it turns out every suspect he's asked to do this could not accomplish the task. "Even if I offered them straight-up immunity," he writes, "they could not string together the 26 letters that comprise the English language." The suspect is now off-guard, and the interrogation begins in earnest.

That's a stirring example of creativity in policing. Why bring it up? Because Sewell is the new police chief of Pocomoke City, a municipality less than 1 percent of Baltimore's size. He had been working in a leadership position for the Pocomoke Police Department for a year when, upon the retirement of Chief J.D. Ervin, he was tapped to take the chief's seat.

Sewell tells us he's thrilled to have the position, and loves living on the Eastern Shore. About people there, he said in an interview, "they wave to you. They say 'Hi,' even in their cars. You wave to somebody in Baltimore City, you might get shot."

And he intends to put in practice policing techniques he wishes had been deployed in Baltimore but weren't because of hidebound bureaucracy and -- he is blunt about this, in the book -- simple incompetence and lack of effort, on the part of both politicians and police officers. He acknowledges that some parts of the city see more drug sales than others, and he's putting more patrols in those places.

Source;  http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20111205/NEWS/112050332/Md-police-chief-moves-big-ideas-smaller-city

Chief Sewell has been the police chief of Pocomoke City for a week now and I've been wondering all week what he thinks about the peace and quiet in Pocomoke compared to the turmoil in the city. I spent almost a week there last winter and found within a couple of days and nights that Baltimore is NOTHING like home. Such a beautiful city, filled with things to see and do but I could not live there and quite frankly, I don't know how a dear family member of mine has lived there all these years and loves it.
　
　I couldn't help but notice that he has already put his policing techniques in place by reintroducing the bike patrol.
Maybe it has always been there and I just have not seen it recently but it is a great deterrent for crime.  Looking forward to any changes that may continue to keep Pocomoke City a safe place to live and shop.


Good luck to you, Chief Sewell. I am sure you will enjoy the Pocomoke area and find the people of Pocomoke
to be quite helpful.... and compared to Baltimore City - it's quiet!
(I also asked Santa to bring me a copy of your book)