KILLER PRICE

Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. The IRE Journal, Nov/Dec 2006 by Claxton, Melvin

Murder costing taxpayers millions; wide variety of services impacted

For Nashville. 2005 was a very violent year. The city saw a near-record 100 murders - a 72 percent increase from the previous year. It was the largest jump in homicides in any of the nation's 35 largest cities.

Hardest hit were the city's poor and minority neighborhoods. Law enforcement officials and community leaders blamed the increased violence on stepped-up gang activity, drugs and the ready availability of guns.

It was all too familiar.

The Tennessean and other local media reported on many of the murders. But with a significant number of the victims being young men linked by police to drugs and gangs, the public outcry over the spiraling murder rate was relatively muted.

It was understandable. Most Tennesseans felt removed from the violence or didn't see how the killings affected them.

But, even though they didn't realize it, Tennesseans were paying a heavy financial price tor homicides. Our story went beyond the usual recitation of crime statistics to explain to readers how much murder was costing them.

Our investigation showed that the state's taxpayers spend at least $110 million each year to investigate, try and incarcerate murderers. In Nashville alone, that bill was $18 million.

Tabulating the cost

Getting to the cost of murder wasn't easy. From the start, we faced significant obstacles to putting a price tag on the crime.

No government agency or private organisation in the state tracked this figure. Even agencies directly involved in investigating homicides or punishing killers didn't have specific cost data.

Our first task was to determine all the possible ways murder costs taxpayers, businesses and individuals. We began by identifying the local and state agencies involved at every stage of a murder case. We traced their involvement from the initial police investigation to the moment when the killers completed their sentences.

Once we identified the agencies and departments affected by homicides, we began the process of quantifying how much they spent each year on the crime. We started our hunt for numbers with a series of Freedom of Information requests for statistics and financial data from police, prosecutors, public defenders, courts, corrections, workers' compensation and the state's crime victim compensation fund.

We also interviewed police officials, prosecutors, defense lawyers, court officials, trauma experts, funeral home directors, EMS officials, crime scene cleanup specialists, social workers, hospital officials and relatives of victims and killers.

Our cost tabulation began with the police. The police department is typically the first government entity involved in a murder case. But getting precise figures on police murder-related costs proved difficult. The main obstacle was the fact that police detectives don't keep complete time logs on hours spent investigating murders, and most also work assault, rape and other major crimes.

There were other complications. Homicide detectives don't work murder cases alone but are assisted by patrol officers, forensic specialists and other police support staff. We had to factor these police employees into the equation.

We also had to deal with the fact that there is no average murder investigation.

Some cases are solved in a matter of hours, while others take months or remain open for years.

To come up with a realistic cost estimate, we created a database using 2005 statistics provided by the police. For each case, we showed the length of time it remained open, the number of officers and staff involved, hourly wages for each employee and the police department's rough estimate on the hours each employee spent on the case.

We used this data to determine how much police spent on salaries investigating murders in 2005. We also looked at indirect costs: office equipment, supplies, utilities and miscellaneous expenses. We totaled direct and indirect costs to determine a final figure for police expenditures and shared that figure and our methodology with the police before publication for their feedback. Police officials endorsed the methodology and final numbers.

Our police cost estimates were not the only approximations. Because prosecutors and court employees don't keep specific records on the time they spend on murder cases, we used published surveys, salary information, budget figures and trial duration data to determine prosecution and court-related costs.

We gathered detailed or very specific cost data in several other areas.

The public defenders' office, which represents the majority of indigent suspects, provided detailed estimates on its murder-related expenditure. And because the post-conviction defenders office only handles appeals in capital murder cases, its entire $1.2 million budget was murder-related.

In addition, we used billing records from courtappointed attorneys to determine how much taxpayers spend on private lawyers for indigent murder suspects. We made a public records request to obtain this information from the court administrator's office.