Mayor Joe Ganim announced the formation of a new violent crime reduction task force in the Bridgeport Police Department aimed at focusing efforts of the uniformed patrol division and the detective bureau to focus efforts on preventing incidents in violent crime hot spots in the city. The new task force will be headed by veteran Bridgeport police Captain Armando J. Perez, a 33-year veteran of the Bridgeport police force who has supervised the detective bureau for two years and prior to that led the narcotics division for four years.
“In the last year, Bridgeport has seen a sharp spike in violent crime, including nearly 50% more homicides and 30% more shooting victims than last year,” said Mayor Ganim. “At the same time, our police department is seriously undermanned. These two trends are both disturbing and related. I am directing Captain AJ Perez, a widely respected senior veteran of the department, to lead this task force that will focus police work on those areas of our city that have seen spikes in violent crime. I am giving Captain Perez wide latitude to use whatever resources and personnel he has at his disposal to work with our communities and get this gun violence and lawlessness under control. We are burying far too many young people who had bright futures in front of them. Enough is enough.”
“In the police force we are sworn to safeguard the people of Bridgeport, and Mayor Ganim has made it clear to all of us that reducing violent crime in our city is the top priority,” said Captain Perez. “We have already begun to implement new strategies to prevent gun violence before it happens and weed out bad actors from our community. We have strong partnerships with federal and state agencies that can help us apprehend and prosecute those who have no respect for the law and undermine the security of our neighborhoods. Our most important partnership, however, will be with the residents of our city on whom we will rely for cooperation and information as we fight to reduce crime. We will not allow our city to go back to the bad old days of rampant crime fear on our streets. We have zero tolerance for violent behavior and we will stamp it out. We want the citizens of Bridgeport to be safe at home and in their neighborhoods.”
In his new role, Captain Perez will be taking a proactive stance through strategic deployment of personnel and investigative follow-up. As head of the violent crime prevention task force, Captain Perez will take over responsibility for personnel assignment, management, and overtime allocation in the patrol division and detective bureau. The violent crime reduction task force will also coordinate strategy and execution with former police Chief Wilbur Chapman, senior advisor to Mayor Ganim on public safety issues.
(City of Bridgeport Press Release)
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