Springfield Police Capt. Brian Keenan, head of the city’s Firearms Investigation Unit, says his team makes plenty of arrests. That’s not the problem.
“We seize a lot of guns. However, no one is in jail,” he said. “You would cut our homicide rate in half if people who were supposed to be held were held.”
Police and prosecutors, joined by Springfield’s mayor, believe firmly that the court system too readily returns people arrested for gun crimes to the streets, where they break laws again and imperil public safety.
