Carcetti & O'Malley - The Stats Game

In the final blog post, I have decided to draw comparisons between fictional Mayor/Governor Tommy Carcetti with real-life Mayor/Governor Martin O’Malley. While David Simon argues O’Malley was only 'one of several inspirations' for Carcetti’s character, O’Malley rejects entirely the idea of links between himself and Carcetti, arguing 'I'm the antidote to The Wire.' Such cockiness, bordering on arrogance, is a line befitting of the fictional character Carcetti – perhaps this underlines the very link between the two hinted at by Peter Beilenson.

As real-life Mayor, O’Malley was responsible for the introduction of ‘stats culture’ to Baltimore Police Department. He was, in fact, widely praised for the ‘Compstat’ model he introduced, and for the accompanying statistical decreases in crime invoked (a 3,000 decrease in violent crimes in O'Malley's first year in office, for example). However, this is precisely the sort of policy David Simon seeks to criticize through The Wire. The culture of statistics is ultimately self-reinforcing, and sees Carcetti move from Mayor to Governor, with the same trajectory for O’Malley. Ultimately, O’Malley and his statistics can be seen as the embodiment of all that is wrong with society, in David Simon’s view.

Budgetary constraints in Baltimore: Real and fictional police cuts

Mayor Tommy Carcetti came into office with a genuine commitment to reform the police and change the culture of targets and statistics that had poisoned the BPD under Clarence Royce. Yet, an enormous deficit carried by the Baltimore city schools meant that his hands were tied, and was forced to make swinging cuts to the BPD budget. Season Five essentially revolves around this theme, with Jimmy McNulty and Lester Freeman’s attempts to secure extra funding for investigative work in a drawing-blood-from-the-stone scenario, through their fictional serial killer of homeless men.

Baltimore Police Union protest against pay cuts in January 2011

            Cuts to public services have become commonplace since the global financial crisis in 2007, particularly in Europe, and are omnipresent in my country of origin, the United Kingdom. Yet, it appears that the real-life Baltimore Police Department is also the victim of some incredibly deep cuts. 2% pay cuts for all Baltimore police officers announced in January 2011 means that the average policemen will earn around $205 less per month. In fact, the Baltimore Police Department experienced a total cut of $7 million dollars in FY2012 a total cut of $7 million in FY2012 after a vote by the Baltimore City Council, and while 300 new police officers will be recruited in 2012, many more will be laid off or face compulsory early retirement. While the press appear to be focused on the exploding industrial relations crisis between the City authorities and Police Unions, scant attention appears to be paid to the real-world impact these cuts could have upon safety on the streets of Baltimore.

Political Corruption: Impunity in Maryland

Having watched the first few episodes of Season 5 of The Wire, and with the background research being undertaken by Detective Freeman into Clay Davis’ corruption case, I thought it would be interesting to look into past political corruption in Baltimore, and Maryland more widely. Former Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon, former Prince George’s County Councilwoman Leslie Johnson, and former Anne Arundel County Councilman Daryl Jones are all prominent examples of Maryland politicians found guilty of corruption by a court in recent years.

            As recently as February 2012, the issue of political corruption made the headlines with Del. Jolene Ivey seeking to draw up stricter laws on political corruption in Maryland. These stricter laws are clearly needed – for the moment, little formal procedures exist for what happens after a politician is found guilty of corruption. Article XV of Maryland’s constitution calls for the removal from office of elected officials convicted of a felony, but this does not appear to be happening in practice. While all of the above names were indeed found guilty, remarkably none of them were forced to leave office by law. Ms. Dixon resigned under political pressure, as did Mr. Jones, but neither were forced by law to leave office. The others remained in their positions. Former Mayor Dixon claimed that "The Wire does not depict Baltimore", yet that viewpoint becomes rather farcical when her corruption case later came to light in a very similar fashion to that of character Senator Clay Davis.

            Sheila Dixon was indicted by a Baltimore Grand Jury on twelve separate counts, including four counts of perjury, three counts of theft, three counts of fraudulent misappropriations and two counts of misconduct.

Baltimore Public Schools: 'Duking the Stats'

Having watched the early stages of Season 4 of The Wire, the public school system seems, at first glance, to be afforded a different treatment than many of the other institutions so blasted by David Simon.

‘Bunnie’ Colvin is participating in a project to provide specific assistance to the ‘street kids’ who need it most; while some teachers are apathetic, others are still motivated and go the extra mile to help their pupils (for example, when Roland Pryzbylewski gives Dukie food for his lunch, and offers to wash his clothes everyday); and while many of the pupils are rowdy and disruptive, there are still a number who participate in the classes and attempt to participate.

This blog piece will look at the role Dr. Andres Alonso has played in the past few years since he took office as superintendent of Baltimore City Public Schools, as well as a number of other policy actors from the public and private sectors.  

With eight out of the top 100 worst high schools in the USA, Dr. Alonso was faced with a daunting challenge. Positive changes do seem to have occurred since his appointment in 2007, yet as will be discussed, Simon might be highly critical of the invocation of ‘duking facts and figures’ as a way to measure this success.

Concurrent bills in the House and Senate committees this week will focus on ensuring pre-kindergarten access for all 4-year olds in the city, focus on ensuring pre-kindergarten access for all 4 year-olds in the city, sponsored in large part by PNC Bank who, through their ‘Grow Up Great’ initiative, are also investing in teacher training and high school facilities. 

Prior to the schemes introduced by Dr. Alonso, just 35% of Baltimore’s students received high-school diplomas. This was largely due to the high rate of expulsions and suspensions. Down from around 12.5%, now only 7% of Baltimore's students were suspended or expelled in the past year.

However, a decrease in the number of expelled students does not necessarily mean that standards of education, or even behavior, are better. With Dr. Alonso arguing that 'you can't suspend the kids like that', all that this necessarily proves is that a change in mindset has occurred, where kids are kept in the classroom rather than kicked out. This is, in a sense, ‘duking the statistics’ to produce a positive headline and narrative for one’s political masters, in the same way the Baltimore Police Department do in The Wire for Mayor Clarence Royce.

Blurring Good and Bad: 'Little' Melvin Williams

David Simon is renowned for blurring the lines of morality between good and bad; giving ‘good guys’, like McNulty, a ‘rough’ womanizing and alcohol-abusing edge. Equally, the ‘bad guys’, like Avon Barksdale, have a ‘good’ side, caring about community involvement. A magisterial and subtle tour de force, Simons takes this a step further by involving real-life criminals in the production of The Wire.

Little Melvin Williams is a classic example of this. Playing ‘The Deacon’ in The Wire, his character is a religious leader in the community, trying to bring about positive change and offering an alternative source of action from the official City authorities, for example in supporting the development of Cutty’s boxing gym.

Yet, in real life, Little Melvin Williams is an exceptionally controversial individual. A major drugs player in Baltimore for many years, akin to the fictional Avon Barksdale, he was eventually sentenced to 22 years in prison in late 2000. Serving just three of those years, he was then invited by Simon to play the role of The Deacon. Simon had previously written extensively on Williams while still a reporter at the Baltimore Sun.

However, some have claimed that Little Melvin’s miraculous transformation from kingpin to law-abiding citizen is not as it seems.

Writing in 2008, in Baltimore City Paper, Van Smith accuses Wiliams of still being involved in illegal gambling rackets and drug dealing. Williams, unsurprisingly, boots the reporter out of his warehouse in fury.

Melvin William’s involvement in The Wire helps make it the incredible show that it is. He undoubtedly adds authenticity, and, although subtly, further adds to Simon’s argument that the distinction between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ is not always clear.

Abandoned Youth: Cutty's Gym

Cutty is an intriguing character, first coming to prominence in Season Three as he is released from prison with Avon Barksdale. At first turning back to a life ‘in the game’, he quickly comes to learn that he no longer seeks that type of life and attempts to go straight.

            Alongside manual labor, Cutty, or ‘Dennis’ as he now prefers to be known, takes it upon himself to open a gym to engage with the youths of West Baltimore. He struggles with getting hold of the necessary permits from the City authorities at first, and his exasperation at the bureaucracy and red-tape is witness to what Simon evidently perceives as inefficiency. Without the intervention of Delegate Watkins, Cutty may never have got the proper licensing to establish his gym. As such, many well-intentioned attempts to engage with youth projects may fall by the wayside. Simon is clearly critical of ‘institution’ of Balimore City here in failing to address the ‘youth issue.’

            Many of the prominent actors and actresses involved in The Wire established their own organizations, all of which very much had a focus on ‘youth engagement.’

            Jamie Hector, who played Marlo Stanfield in The Wire, subsequently established his organization Moving Mountains. Through drama and theatre production, the group aims to take street-kids between the ages of 12 and 21 off the corners and onto the stage. Felicia ‘Snoop’ Parsons was also pivotal in the establishment of the group.

            Sonja Sohn, a.k.a. Detective Kima Greggs, perhaps most famously brought about the ReWired for Change group, aided in particular by cast members Wendell Pierce, a.k.a. Detective Bunk Moreland, and Michael K. Williams, a.k.a. Omar Little. Running after school activities and entertainment, as well as more structured homework assistance, Sohn felt duty bound upon completing filming of The Wire to remain in Baltimore and attempt to help create a better future for the local children.

            As fantastic as these organizations obviously are, the question begs asking – why are such schemes reliant on the generosity and time of committed and, often but not necessarily, wealthy individuals? Where are the City authorities? Cutty speaks to this theme in The Wire – the street kids are dependent on him as an individual, not the formal authorities, to provide some form of activity to pull them away from a life of crime. 

Drug addiction in the 'heroine capital'

Drug addiction in Baltimore, the so-called 'heroine capital', is one of the major themes explored in The Wire, primarily through the characters of Bubbles and his friend Johnny Weeks. In the first three seasons in particular, their addiction is at its peak with the eventual demise of Johnny as a result of an overdose in the season finale.

            Up to this point, attempts to remedy their addiction have failed. Bubbles briefly attempts to go ‘cold turkey’ and drop his usage of drugs completely, but without Kima’s financial support while she is comatose, he returns to his former lifestyle of usage. Likewise for Johnny, whom even after his hospitalization following a beating from Boadie and the other corner boys, and having discovered that unsterilized needles have left him HIV positive, he continues to fuel his addiction through a life of petty-crime along with Bubbles.

            There seems to be little in way of a safety net, or support (be that financial or otherwise), afforded to these individuals. This is consistent with one of David Simon’s core contentions with the 21^st century American capitalist society, whereby 'human beings-all of us-are worth less. We're worth less every day...'  The fact that Bubbles and Johnny are largely left to ‘fend for themselves’, and almost don’t even feature ‘on the radar’ of authorities or social services, is consistent with Simon’s arguments regarding the decreasing value attached to human life.

            Even in real life, the Baltimore City authorities are seen as merely duking the statistics, so as to portray an image of policy success in combating drugs addiction, and providing some material for their re-election campaigns. David Simon argues that 'one of the themes of The Wire really was that statistics will always lie...statistics can be made to say anything.' Simon sees the formal institutions which are supposed to have a duty of care to their citizens, here regarding engagement to combat drug addiction, are more concerned with their own self-preservation. Indeed, in reality, the Baltimore City authorities are financially dependant on the Open Society Foundation, led by George Soros, to administer and finance the drive to combat addiction in the city.

            As will be seen in later seasons of The Wire, it is left for informal meeting and solidarity groups, seemingly without support from the formal institutions of Baltimore City, to remedy the ills of drug addiction. Bubbles, fortunately, manages to escape the spiral of drug addiction through this group.

            A wider theme examined by David Simon is the catastrophic failure of the policy of drug criminalization, primarily highlighted through Major ‘Bunny’ Colvin’s ‘Hamsterdam’ initiative. Although discussion logically herein leads to consideration of this issue, that theme will be reserved for a later blog post in season three.

Human Trafficking: Misdirected Prosecution

The issue of human trafficking and forced prostitution is omnipresent in Season Two of The Wire, and David Simon offers a nuanced and thoughtful critique of the current supposedly-remedial policy of the law authorities on the issue.

The discovery of thirteen dead Eastern European girls in a shipping container, as well as the one found floating in the river by Detective McNulty, sets the scene for forthcoming episodes. Coming full-circle, in the final episode a montage shows that in spite of the former instigators of the trafficking having departed, new instigators step in to fill the void and the practice recommences, seemingly interrupted only momentarily.

We see early in the series that other Eastern European girls, who have also been trafficked illegally to the country, are imprisoned and as such face prosecution or deportation, when Bunk and Lester attempt unsuccessfully to extract information from them. Later, when Jimmy plays an undercover john in a successful string operation to expose the brothel, the girls forced to work there are arrested, along with some of the lower-level instigators who coordinate the day-to-day prostitution racket. In fact, the only actor involved in the entire sex trade who isn’t in some way criminalized in The Wire is the john that McNulty catches in order to get the phone number of one of these girls.

The fact that the practice is seen to continue at the end of the Season portrays current policing efforts as futile, and in particular the apportioning of blame to the girls themselves while ‘pardoning’ the men who engage in this practice. In 2007, the Maryland Human Trafficking Task Force was established, and ever since ‘busted’ several prostitution rings in Baltimore, with a high profile case in September 2011. Yet, once again, those prosecuted here were the girls themselves, and who after all the victims in this modern-day slavery of human-trafficking. Evidently, Simons utilizes The Wire as a pay to criticize the current evidently inadequate and ineffective policy of criminalizing said girls, while simultaneously ‘pardoning’ the johns.

Ziggy and Nick Sobotka: Blood thicker than water

Aware of it or not, David Simon brought this phrase to life through the juxtaposition of the docklands 'water' environment, and the 'blood' of the Sobotka family ties. The relationship between Ziggy and Nick which plays out in Season 2 is a heart-warming one. Although frequently irritated by his cousin's antics, Nick never gives up on Ziggy and relentlessly and unconditionally supports him, ultimately ostracizing him from important negotiations but selflessly giving him a significant share of the revenue from the various packages Nick ultimately oversees the sale of.

'The family' is often considered a societal institution. For the purposes of our discussion this week regarding institutions, I don't think that 'family' is one of the moreover physical institutions, like the BPD, that Simon tries to criticize through The Wire, and shouldn't be regarded as such. Rather, familial solidarity and compassion is used as a narrative tool by Simon to give supposedly 'bad' characters, who might conduct illicit activities such as theft and drug-dealing, depth and a 'positive' side. This is all part of Simon's rejection of the classic dichotomous 'good v. bad' nature of the police-criminal relationship. Alasdair McMillan deplores the way that, in classic U.S. cop shows, all police officers seem to be 'driven by their own virtuous nature' (McMillan, 2009: 52) alone, and are almost flawless characters. I argue that this extends further to the classic 'villains', or criminals, and through family ties Simon humanizes these 'villains' into 'rough diamonds.'

A future blog post may look at the role of 'family' in the Barksdale criminal 'institution', and consider the similarities with and differences to the role of 'family' with the Sobotkas in the docklands 'institution.'