By Jamal Thalji, Times Staff Writer
Saturday, December 11, 2010
ST. PETERSBURG — Detective Tom Loveland used to go undercover to bust drug dealers. Now he fights crime by knocking on doors.
"You asleep?" he asked the lanky teenager who took too long to answer the door Wednesday evening.
"No, on the computer," the 15-year-old said.
"You doing good?" the officer asked.
"Yeah," the kid said. "All A's."
"Really?" Loveland said. "Good."
The detective is part of a new police unit, the Career Offender Tracking and Apprehension unit (COTA), whose job it is to keep tabs on the city's worst offenders — juvenile and adult.
St. Petersburg police theorize that because most crimes are the work of a handful of criminals, it makes sense to aggressively target them.
"The quicker we get them," said Assistant Chief Dave DeKay, "the sooner we get them before they commit a crime."
The city ...
