By Jen McCaffery
The Virginian-Pilot
PORTSMOUTH
It’s a chilly Sunday night, and Ted Lamb is patrolling the streets of Cradock, helping lead the charge to take his neighborhood back.
The head of the community’s recently reorganized neighborhood watch drives slowly past the apartment building on Farragut Street where a 23-year-old man was shot on a recent Wednesday night and later died.
He points out a garage covered in graffiti that reads: “Cradock Gangstas.”
The Suffolk special education teacher and father of two is grateful to Portsmouth Sheriff Bill Watson for using his community enforcement unit to help fight crime in his Cradock neighborhood .
But Lamb also points out that crime statistics were already on the decline. From Nov. 1, 2006, through Oct. 31 , property crimes decreased 10 percent, according to statistics Lamb received from the Portsmouth Police Department. And personal crimes, such as rape, assault and robbery, decreased by more than 23 percent during that time .
Lamb, 35, credits combined efforts, including the work of the Police Department’s community officer and a 400-member neighborhood watch Lamb helped reorganize over the p ast year and a half .
“It certainly appears that the combination of many things going on in Cradock are having an impact on crime,” said Lt. Sean Dunn, who heads the Police Department’s community policing unit.
Community Officer W.J. Baker said he talks to Lamb and other members of the neighborhood watch and civic league daily.
“They’re listening for me, they’re seeing what’s going on, and they communicate back to me,” Baker said.
Before the reorganization of the neighborhood watch, Cradock residents had been saying for years that they needed to do something about crime, Laura Somers said.
Fighting crime became a priority when Somers took over as civic league president in January 2006.
A small community watch had existed, but it was staffed by a small group of people, doing the same things over and over again, Somers said.
Lamb, who is from Ohio, moved to Cradock with his family in September 2005.
People had told them Cradock had a crime problem, but as they drove around the neighborhood, they didn’t see anything. “I guess we didn’t know what to look for, either,” Lamb said.
After they moved in, however, several of their neighbors’ homes got broken into.
Lamb asked whether Cradock had a neighborhood watch. And he started hearing more stories about residents seeing drug deals and hearing gun shots.
He met Somers and got the civic league’s support. Then he approached the Police Department, which provided the steps needed to set up a neighborhood watch.
In the spring of 2006, Lamb started going door to door.
“Ninety-six percent of all houses that I walked to said yes, that this was something that they wanted,” he said.
With some help , Lamb collected about 350 signatures in support of the program.
“He was a go-getter,” said the Rev. Rob Edwards, pastor of Cradock Baptist Church . “He knocked on a lot of doors.”
Residents had sometimes been frustrated by police response when they called in about gang symbols that had been spray-painted in front of their houses or drug deals they witnessed, Somers said.
“We were basically getting tired of hearing, 'W e can’t do anything for you,’” Somers said.
She said Baker inspired residents to trust the police again after he started work in Cradock in May.
“He’s compassionate with those he needs to be compassionate to,” Somers said. “He’s heavy-handed with those he needs to be heavy-handed with.”
In June, the neighborhood watch held its first meeting at Cradock Baptist Church. Now, members patrol Cradock daily in their cars and on foot.
Lamb’s enthusiasm and motivation “have just inspired the neighborhood,” Dunn said.
When members see crimes, they contact the Police Department and their block captains. The captains then call Baker.
“Chances are, he already knows,” Lamb said.
Jen McCaffery, (757) 446-2627,
jen.mccaffery@pilotonline.com