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\nThe coronavirus pandemic had a much greater effect on the Tempe Police Department than the killing of George Floyd in 2020, an Arizona State University study released this week<\/a>\u00a0asserts. <\/p>\n Critics may suggest that’s a bold claim to make for just one research study and decry unfairness to compare a global health crisis with a political justice movement spurred by the killing of one Black man by police.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nBut the ASU professor of criminology dove deep and tracked police trends from 2017 to 2021. The data trove included police calls for service, reported crime, police presence in the community, traffic accidents, and arrests.\n<\/p>\n \nResearchers also reviewed body camera footage from 475 police interactions and measured the use of force, a consistent issue advocates levy against the Tempe Police Department<\/a>.<\/p>\n When Joel Cornejo was 11 years old, a Tempe police officer pointed a loaded gun at him inside a middle school, he claims. That’s why he founded Semillas AZ, a grassroots human rights advocacy group based in Tempe.<\/p>\n “Tempe Police Department hides behind the liberal front that the city likes to show,” Cornejo told Phoenix New Times<\/i>. “The reality is that the city overfunds the police department in Tempe. The police in Tempe do whatever they want with no accountability.”<\/p>\n Tempe Mayor Corey Woods, who is a Black man, was elected to serve the residents of the city in March 2020 and is still in office. Woods did not respond to a request for comment for this story.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nThe pandemic had a drastic effect on the day-to-day lives<\/a> of Valley residents. Financial strain, isolation, and disrupted routines were perhaps overshadowed by the loss of loved ones, depression, and declining physical health.\n<\/p>\n \nLast month, the U.S. surpassed a forboding milestone \u2014 more than 900,000 Americans\u2019 lives were robbed by the deadly virus, on track to hit 1 million dead next month.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe pandemic altered every aspect of police activity,\u201d said Michael White, a professor of criminology and criminal justice at ASU and the lead author of the recent study.\n<\/p>\n \nPolice officers bore the brunt of responding to the reality of the pandemic, enforcing stay-at-home orders while cutting back on community outreach projects, pedestrian stops, and overall police presence.\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cNo one dislikes bad cops more than good cops.”<\/p>\n tweet this <\/span> <\/a> <\/p><\/blockquote>\n \nMeanwhile, Tempe Police Department struggled with a personnel shortage as more and more officers were incapacitated by the virus as waves of infections would take workers out of the field.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nMask mandates not just for the public but for officers alike became a challenge for the Tempe Police Department, Detective Natalie Barela said.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMandating face coverings gave us challenges to have that personal face-to-face connectivity with people,\u201d Barela told New Times<\/i>. \u201cWe\u2019re responding to people in crisis. We want to be empathetic and a lot of that is tied to facial expressions.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nJust two months after Arizona along with much of the nation began the social and economic lockdown, a stark reminder of the long history of police brutality against Black individuals happened. <\/p>\n Minneapolis police officers killed George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man while trying to arrest him on suspicion of floating a counterfeit $20 bill at a convenience store. Anti-police protests both peaceful and sometimes violent erupted in the city and spread across the country.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nThe aftermath of that incident on policing nationwide was arguably the biggest in American history<\/a>, advocates assert.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe killing of George Floyd and of other Black Americans by the police spurred unprecedented scrutiny of the police, protests, and calls for defunding,\u201d White, the researcher who is himself white, said. \u201cThese occurred against the backdrop of the pandemic, which police responded to in myriad ways, and both the killings and the pandemic coincided with a large increase in violent crime.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nData released by the FBI<\/a> shows a 30 percent spike in murders across the U.S. during the pandemic.<\/p>\n Researchers predicted a radical drop in property crime during the lockdown, but economic depravity led to a jump in thefts and robberies<\/a>, too.\n<\/p>\n \nThe effect of the pandemic and Floyd\u2019s death on crime was mixed, according to the study which was peer-reviewed and published in an academic journal. <\/p>\n It was not immediately clear where the funding for the research study came from through it appears that it was part of the regular research curriculum through ASU, not supported by an outside group attempting to influence the results for political gain.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nResearchers noticed a significant decrease in all reported crime when COVID-19 reared its ugly head in Arizona. That temporary pause in all crimes reported lasted months after Floyd\u2019s death.\n<\/p>\n \nArrests were slashed in half and traffic accidents fell nearly 60 percent as police responded to 22 percent fewer citizen-initiated calls and 11 percent fewer officer-initiated calls. That’s likely because so few people were driving on the roads and instead worked from home.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cVehicle stops became a challenge,\u201d Barela said. \u201cPeople became fearful of that close contact.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe fallout from Floyd\u2019s death was different, both researchers and cops concurred. <\/p>\n While the government response to the pandemic widely accepted that major changes to modern life would be required to keep the public safe, there was more dissent when advocates demanded less aggressive police interaction with communities of color. <\/p>\n \nFor example, the Tempe Police Department already had measures in place to prevent a similar tragedy in Tempe. And argued that was enough. <\/p>\n Those measures were bolstered when the city established the Tempe Public Safety Advisory Task Force in October 2020.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGeorge Floyd allowed us an opportunity to sit down, examine things, and have difficult conversations,\u201d Barela said.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \nWhile calls for service and traffic accidents dropped in frequency, officer productivity \u201cdeclined precipitously\u201d and use of force among officers in Tempe spiked in the weeks following Floyd\u2019s death, data shows.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNo one dislikes bad cops more than good cops,\u201d Barela said. \u201cIt hurt a lot of us to see how the actions of those few officers really affected everybody.\u201d\n<\/p>\n