"Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night." - Rupert Brooke.
"Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night." - Rupert Brooke
When the sun falls behind the One Utah Center and Salt Lake professionals abandon their downtown offices for the freeway, violence and crime escalate in one of the West's fastest-growing cities.
Talk of the seriousness of Salt Lake City's night crime is backed up by statistics and the faces of those who work the graveyard shift - 11 p.m. to 7 a.m.
The "cover of darkness," as it is known to police and night workers, is now hiding more deviant behavior in the city than ever before, officials agree.
"There is a different climate at night - a different segment of the population is out," Salt Lake City Police Lt. Marty Vuyk said.
"We have seen a tremendous increase in criminal activity in Salt Lake City during the past 25 years. The thing that I have really noticed is the volume of activity, period, during the nighttime."
Twice as many Salt Lake police officers are deployed during afternoon and night hours, compared to the day shift. Consequently, any increase in overall department activity is sure to mirror an equal rate of added night calls, Vuyk said.
So, when considering that city police investigated 146,580 calls during 1992, it's safe to say that a majority of the violent crime likely occurred at night, Vuyk said. The figure is a 27 percent increase from the number of police calls a decade ago.
"The hour shift has definitely been toward higher activity in the evening," Vuyk said.
The story is the same for the Salt Lake City Fire Department. The department answered 190 calls of stabbings and gunshot wounds in 1988. The figure has steadily increased to 215 recorded last year.
Response to medical calls of assault or rape nearly doubled in the city from 766 in 1988 to 1,204 four years later, according to fire department reports.
"Mostly what we see (at night) are violent crime calls," Salt Lake City Fire Capt. Dan Andrus said. "We're called to assist on assaults, some family violence situations, and probably the most are intoxicated persons who have passed out."Night calls typically involve more serious crime, he said.
"We're seeing a lot more of the violent crime type of activity (at night)," Andrus said. "We have always had a fair problem with the intoxicated residents downtown, but now we're seeing more and more cases where we have to do staging" - a procedure that requires medical personnel to wait several blocks away until the scene is secured by police.
As long as crime continues on the streets of Salt Lake City, a majority of the violence will occur at night, officials predict.
It's all about who is on the streets and why.
Different crowd at night
Workers who earn their living downtown during the day, then beat it home to the suburbs at quitting time, rarely see the city's transformation. But for those who work the graveyard shift, it can't be ignored.
Restaurants frequented by trendy professionals during the day turn into popular gang hangouts at night, as proved by frequent police and ambulance calls to the establishments. The same phenomenon applies to parks, even specific downtown city streets.
Brook Barnson, 29, joined Gold Cross in 1982 at one of its busiest posts, Station No. 2 at 947 S. 200 West. In the decade since, Barnson has watched the city change and the ambulance business respond in kind.
"When I started here, everything was neat," he said. "It wasn't the way it is now. You'd get the odd family fight . . . it really wasn't a threat."
As an emergency medical technician and son of a veteran Salt Lake City Fire Department paramedic, Barnson has seen his share of the city's dark face. He spent three years on the ambulances and another seven years as a dispatcher. During that period, the number of Gold Cross callouts doubled, he said.
For Barnson and other emergency personnel, the changes on the street are obvious, as is the response of the emergency industry.
Medical workers must now wear gloves when they come in contact with the bodily fluids of a patient. Not so 10 years ago, Barnson said. Together with "staging," the move toward added protection is the result of a changing atmosphere in Salt Lake City.
"You didn't stay in this line of work if you couldn't get your hands bloody," Barnson said. That's not the case now. "The attitude towards firemen, police - everything has changed."
The staging procedure was developed some three years ago as medical responders faced more potentially dangerous situations. The requirement is widely recognized as a safety measure, but is often difficult to swallow for EMTs and paramedics, who are trained to provide immediate care for the wounded.
"Primarily it was (adopted) at the request of the police department," Andrus said. "They said, `We really don't want you in scenes like that.' People walking in in uniform can really cause a situation to become very violent and we simply do not have the recourse to deadly force . . . that the police do, that's really their jurisdiction.
"It's something we certainly acknowledge on one level to be necessary for our safety," Andrus said. "But it really goes against our basic inclination to get in there and help people. I can really say that it drives us crazy to be sent to a scene and not be able to go in and help immediately. It's awfully hard to sit and wait."
But Andrus is one of many emergency personnel who has experienced what can happen without the protection.
"I was assaulted one night by a call that came in as an unknown problem," Andrus said. The call turned out to be a domestic dispute.
"This gentleman was down on the floor and I started checking him out and he just took a swing at me and actually managed to connect and knock me off my feet," he said. "We've had several incidents where our paramedics and EMTs have been assaulted."
One Gold Cross crew member recounted being chased from a house by a man with a knife. That incident also involved a domestic dispute. While they may not like it, most EMTs and paramedics recognize the need for protection when faced with the city's changing atmosphere.
"If it was a shooting, it was generally a done deal by the time we got there," Barnson said. "The trend now is people are sticking around," often with weapons. It's not the way it used to be, when the perpetrator simply ran away.
In contrast to the police agencies, the daylight hours were traditionally the busiest for the ambulance company. The volume of calls widely fluctuated according to day, time and season. Now, night shift activity - previously relatively slow - has increased to the point where, day or night, it all looks the same, some crew members say.
The added nighttime activity is making the traditional 24-hour shift something of a dinosaur. Mike Reynolds, Gold Cross spokesman, first joined Gold Cross on its ambulances as an EMT in 1978. He said the company is implementing more 12-hour shifts, as being on duty for 24 hours straight is becoming too taxing for workers.
"If I got up twice at night, that was a busy night," Reynolds said. "These guys are up all night (now)."
"It's like tonight," said Terry Zaugg, 36, of Clinton. "We'll go on at least one stabbing or shooting. Summer, winter, it's all about the same."
On a recent night, Zaugg and his partner, 20-year-old Kelly Moran of Salt Lake City, were found waiting out a momentary quiet spell in a parking lot at the corner of 800 S. 900 East. To lessen its response time, Gold Cross has customized its dispatch system to track the callouts. In essence, the program predicts where the calls will originate, based on data from previous years, said Darren Judd, Gold Cross communications supervisor. Units are then stationed in those areas.
Cover of darkness
The "cover of darkness" is a key factor regarding types of crime, as well as the criminal mind, say police officers who work the graveyard shift.
On a recent night, Salt Lake police officer Kelly Nye and two shifts of the city's west patrol were briefed downtown before they split up to answer calls on the streets of Salt Lake.
The night marked the first Friday that city police had worked a new schedule, one that called for a temporary overlap of the afternoon and graveyard shifts on the city's west side.
A bulletin for a possible serial rapist topped the night's agenda. It's a profile the officer was familiar with and, before her shift ended, she would be called back to headquarters for a second briefing to go undercover.
To fill the in-between hours, Nye - a three-year veteran of the night beat - answered calls in a downtown area that stretches from South Temple to 400 South, 200 West to 200 East.
Since her days as a rookie, the officer said she's watched the city change from a vantage point on one of Salt Lake's busiest beats. Some changes - like the patterns of graffiti - are subtle.
Others are obvious, like the traveling prostitution rings that arrive in town with their "girls," gaudily dressed in California clothes, ready to make a quick buck on State Street and move on.
Some 11/2 hours into the shift, Nye pulled up across from Pioneer Park and a couple wandered over to the patrol car to report people fighting with broken bottles in the park's center.
At the area where the fight is reported to have occurred, the park is filled with trash and broken bottles. A once-ornate fountain sprays water continuously. It's the only sound evident, except questions from officers and the muted replies of three women sitting on a bench there.
They saw nothing.
On the next call, at 11:51 p.m., officers arrive to find a noose dangling from a tree and a despondent man with possible rope burns sitting in the back yard of his home.
A woman had called from a 7-Eleven to report her husband constructed the noose in a tree outside their house and was sitting in the branches, threatening suicide.
Officers called to reserve him a place in the city's detox center, only to find it full. When given the option of going to jail or quieting down and going to bed at home, he chose the latter.
Fights in the park and domestic disputes - the calls are typical of the dark hours, officers say.
"A lot of criminals, druggies sleep during the day and are up doing their thing (at night)," Nye said. "Bandits like to use the `cover of darkness.' "
Crime hits home
Gary Ratliff, 43, is a native of Salt Lake City and has lived in his North Redwood neighborhood for 20 years. A facilities manager for the University of Utah and chairman of the Jordan Meadows Community Council, Ratliff is the father of five.
Like any father, he's worried for his children and their welfare. Unfortunately, statistics indicate he has reason.
Gold Cross ambulance crews responded to four nighttime calls of shootings or stabbings in Ratliff's council area last year. His neighborhood also straddles the boundaries of the Salt Lake City Fire Department's first- and fifth-busiest areas for 1992.
During the first six months of this year, Gold Cross responded to 16 cases of assault that occurred in or near Ratliff's community council area during night hours, from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.
"I wouldn't allow (the children) to walk at night for the fear of what would happen to them," Ratliff said. "If they were walking on the street, a gang could stop by . . . and beat them up. If they were wearing the wrong colors, they could get shot."
Ratliff said he no longer allows his children to walk home Sundays from their church, seven or eight minutes away.
He tossed around words like "shootings" and "gangs" with the even tone of someone who has recognized the problem, but doesn't accept it.
A decade ago, the crime rate in the neighborhood was "not anywhere near" what it is now, he said. Drive-by shootings and graffiti are the most high-profile changes evident in his subdivision.
"There's certainly a lot more kids out than you would see before. It seems like the kids don't have enough to do. We've got a few little pockets - like everybody does - of where the gangs are at."
Now, as for many residents citywide, extra safety precautions - like not walking at night - are a given for the family.
But it's not something they accept without a fight.
Ratliff was instrumental in organizing the Neighborhood Mobile Watch Program, in place since July 2. He and his wife, Gabriele, join some 14 other neighborhood residents in regularly patrolling their streets at night, on the lookout for crime to report to police.
"We've seen a lot of difference," he said. "We've stopped a lot of crime."
Despite the efforts of worried residents, the trend is likely to continue. As Salt Lake City moves forward on its fast track toward big-city status, crime and violence will likely follow at an equal rate.
Unfortunately, with the demise of the city's infancy, many residents no longer feel safe walking in the park or jogging late at night. And, perhaps rightly so.
As officer Nye said, "A lot of people up this late are up to no good."
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(Chart)
Salt Lake Police Dept.
Rank Calls Location
1. 1,575 50 S. Main
2. 1,177 210 S. Rio Grande
3. 582 585-616 S. 200 W.
4. 548 150-235 W. 400 S.
5. 534 876 E. 800 S.
6. 529 400 S. 300 W.
7. 484 780-828 S. 900 W.
8. 444 15 S. Main
9. 442 900-1000 W. N. Temple
10. 416 210-250 W. 500 S.
11. 396 2290 S. 1300 E.
12. 389 300-301 W. S. Temple
13. 386 600-641 W. N. Temple
14. 380 140-150 N. 900 W.
15. 376 160 W. S. Temple
Salt Lake Fire Dept.
Rank Calls Location
1. 2,373 From Redwood Rd. to 6800 W., 2100 S. to north city boundry.
2. 1,383 W. Temple to I-15, N. Temple to 400 s.
3. 1,322 900 S. to 2100 S., 1-15 to Redwood Rd.
4. 1,203 W. Temple to 200 E., S. Temple to 500 S.
5. 1,130 800 N. to N. Temple, Redwood R.d to I-15
6. 1,040 I-15 to State St., 900 S. to 2100 S.
7. 824 400 S. to 900 S., I-15 to State St.
8. 765 400 S. to 900 S., State St. to 400 E.
9. 640 Beck St. to N. Temple, I-15 to 300 W.
10. 542 400 s. to 900 s., 400 E. to 700 E.
Map: S.L. hot spots
Maps show the busiest areas in Salt Lake City for both the plice and fire departments in 1992. Gray areas indicate the top 10 busiest areas for the fire department. Black circles indicate the top 15 busiest locations for the police department.