Elite police unit means business with local criminals

At 8:10 p.m., University Police Sgt. Tom Rambo lays down the rules: No photos of officers on the force's Special Response Team, which Rambo heads, because they work both undercover and in uniform. Stay in the car at all times unless he gives the word. That's all. The move was one of several made by officials to attempt to stem crime in the wake of last fall's mugging wave, which was capped with Patrick Leroy's shooting. "Our assignment with the SRT is to prevent crime by being visible and preventing people from committing crime," he says. Because the patrolmen only respond to high-priority reports of crime over the police radio, Rambo adds, you won't see the SRT "trying to get keys out of the car with a slim jim for a half hour." It becomes clear as we zip around University City that the team's officers have few rules; they can do whatever they want, wherever they want. And the lack of boundaries -- the SRT guys aren't confined to a small patrol area or even the University Police jurisdiction (bounded by the Schuylkill to the east, Market Street to the north, 43rd Street to the west and roughly Baltimore and University avenues to the south) -- helps explain precisely why these officers are involved in many of the arrests University Police make. Among the unit's 60-plus arrests and other feats since its inception seven months ago are the following: · February 4 -- Officer Len Harrison takes it on the chin? literally. As he tries to stick an assault suspect into a police van, the suspect kicks Harrison in the face, giving him a concussion, while another suspect escapes on foot. Fortunately, University Police rearrest both suspects minutes later. · February 25 -- Harrison and Officer Mike Sylvester prevent any serious damage or injury when they get to the Tabard Society house fire before it gets out of hand. · March 24 -- Harrison and Sylvester apprehend two suspects -- one carrying 16 packets of crack cocaine -- shortly after they allegedly rob a professor at gunpoint near campus. Our first taste of action tonight happens in front of Chestnut Hall, where a blue Pontiac 6000SE idles with its hazard lights flashing but no one in the car. Rambo gets out and writes a $25 double-parking ticket, to the dismay of the middle-aged driver who shakes his head, maintaining he was making a quick delivery. You were backing up traffic throughout 39th Street, Rambo retorts as he returns to the wheel, three minutes lost. End of argument. We crisscoss nearly every street within the University Police jurisdiction, including several I never previously walked down, but nothing seems to happen. At the night's start, another officer told us to "get ready to get bored," and after several futile hours of searching for crime, it appears that the SRT has accomplished its crime-prevention goal -- at least for a few hours.

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