Q&A: LPD Chief Scott Galloway on shootings, ’24 crime stats and feeling safe

Crime was up slightly in Lafayette in key categories in 2024, but still down from a decade earlier. Lafayette's police chief sees it ‘as a good thing,’ and hopes the community feels that way, too.

Lafayette Police Chief Scott Galloway (Photo: Dave Bangert)

A year ago, Lafayette police paired up with the Tippecanoe County prosecutor’s office on what they called a Major Crimes Investigation Unit, specifically targeting shooting incidents and what LPD Chief Scott Galloway called an all-hands-on-deck approach to unsettling gunshot incidents.

In 2024, the number of gun incidents dropped to 31, from 61 in 2023, as arrests tied to those crimes continued to trend up, according to crime stats reported by Lafayette Police Department earlier in January.

In 2024, arrests were made in 58% of gun violence cases investigated by Lafayette police, the highest percentage in the past six years, according to LPD’s figures.

“It’s never going to be good enough for some of us,” Galloway said. “We feel, in the numbers, though, we’re seeing some results.”

Overall in Lafayette, crime was up 2.2% in 2024 over 2023, based on 1,957 reports covering homicide, rape, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, auto theft and arson. That figure was still the second lowest tracked by LPD since 2002 and down 48% from a peak a decade ago.

Check the breakdown of the 2024 statistics and Lafayette crime trends below, from LPD’s annual report.

Last week, Galloway sat for a Q&A about the numbers and LPD’s approach to dealing the trends in crime. Here are excerpts from that conversation. (Note: The interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.)

Question: Overall crime LPD reported is up in 2024 compared to the previous year. But it’s part of a downward trend over the past two decades. How do you account for both of those?

Scott Galloway: When you say it's up a little bit, I think you can attribute that to two categories. Rape reports were up. There were 62 in 2022. They went down to 42 (in 2023). There was a rape law change in 2022 that created new mandatory reporters and evidence collection that had to be contained and analyzed. I think that attributes to (an increase in 2024 to 67). Also, I think that rape’s such underreported crime that maybe we're getting to a point where people feel more comfortable talking to police about those things. I know when I was a detective for 10 years, it was always a tossup whether a survivor was going to cooperate with the police investigation. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't. I'm hoping that the reporting aspect is a trend in that sense. We know more than 67 rapes probably happened. That's just how many reported it.

The other one was aggravated assault. Those are incidences where somebody uses a weapon or something to do a battery. They're up in ’22, they're down in 23, and back up again. So, I attribute those two stats to making overall crime up just slightly last year. If you took those categories and had them leveled off, you would have a significant continued decrease in crime.

Question: Where do you see that decrease coming, if you’re looking at LPD numbers from 2013 or so to today, where the overall number is not quite half of what it was? Is it a change in reporting numbers? Or how do you account for that?

Scott Galloway: I think you can look at two categories. One is robberies. And I hate to put it in these terms, but return on investment. I don't think criminals are smart, but I think they realize that they're going to get caught more now than when you saw those numbers spike. For instance, in 2015 or ‘16, that's probably opioid epidemic, with people panicking to get drugs and needed money for that.

But a key figure is the burglary one. In 2006, you had 781 burglaries, and now you have it at 118 (in 2024). I attribute that to people having Ring cameras, doorbell cameras. It just doesn't pay to go in and break into the house. You're going to get caught. And we effectively use the Flock camera safety system to get the license plate readers to find out who's in that area, if it's a crime involving a vehicle. We canvas neighborhoods to look for those cameras to analyze what we have. We have four civilian (crime scene investigators), and we also have our other sworn CSIs that are able to go through this information. Instead of being inundated with lots of video and lots of information, now we have people to go through these and solve these crimes. Going from 781 down to 118 burglaries is really impactful. I've worked burglaries before, where people felt they had to move out of their house – like, the house was burglarized, I'm not living here anymore. Having those crimes going down really impacts the community.

The other one is larceny. You're always going to have people stealing, especially from bank accounts. We’ve tried to do a good job trying to educate the public on checking your bank account frequently, protecting your information, doing those things to not be a victim. Those have gone down drastically.

I’m a broken record on the two things we’ve got to do right, and that’s hiring and driving down violent crime. Whenever I’m in front of our officers, that’s what I’m talking about, those two things.

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Question: How do you approach that, driving down violent crime?

Scott Galloway: Back in these middle years (between 2002 and 2024) on these numbers, we would get a police report, we’d try to then hunt down suspects or do victimology of whoever was shot at or whatever house was shot up – kind of a slow process. That's not what we do anymore. If a house is shot up or somebody discharges a firearm, it is a full court press. And what we're finding – it's shocking to me – is that people discharge firearms not to shoot or hurt or harm anyone, but just like as intimidation. We had an incident where a woman was mad at her boyfriend or husband or significant other. They were in an argument, and she went out the back door and fired the gun in the air. We made an arrest on that. What I found interesting was that person was shocked that we were investigating it. Because, a lot of people have come from different parts of the area, the Midwest, to here, and something like that wouldn't be investigated. Nobody was shot, nobody was killed, we'll move on. Whereas, we're taking an aggressive stance at anybody that shoots a gun. We're going to try to find that person.

Question: Do you see that that has affected these numbers in shootings? The shooting incidents were down in 2024 compared to the four years previous, but not when compared to 2019. Do you see 2024 was an anomaly and that shooting crimes will go back up? Or do you think this is the start of something?

Scott Galloway: You could always see that, as numbers can go up and down. What I think is happening in these stats is that the people who are committing these types of shooting crimes are being jailed. We have made a concentrated effort on getting what I call trigger-pullers off the street – the people who aren't afraid to go shoot at a house, who aren't afraid to be in an alley standoff with somebody, who maybe shoots the gun at the ground or at somebody. If we can keep those people who are shooting the guns at people or houses off the street, that's what's making an impact here. It's usually just a few people, and maybe a couple of groups of people, that are fighting with each other. It's not some rampant thing. It's just a few people that really can impact these numbers.

Question: How many of these shooting incidents in 2024 were random versus people they knew?

Scott Galloway: The only one that I know that was random was the Lafayette Laundry. (From December 2024: “LPD: Killer drove from Nebraska the day he shot customers at Lafayette Laundry without a word.”) That's the only shooting incident that we had in 2024 that was not attached to some sort of domestic situation, juvenile crime, that sort of thing. I don't know if you talk to (Tippecanoe Superior Court 3) Judge (Faith) Graham very much, but she is really worried about and concentrated on the fact that we were having to house lots of teenagers, 15- and 16-year-old kids, for gun crimes. That's what you're seeing. We take those people, those kids, off the street, then your numbers get driven down.

Question: These numbers include juveniles, correct?

Scott Galloway: Yes.

Question: You mentioned the murder at Lafayette Laundry in December. Do you expect to see more information coming out of LPD’s investigation into Louis McGlothlin and his motive, coming from Nebraska that day and killing one man and shooting three other people in doing their laundry?

Scott Galloway: Of course, yes. And as soon as we get the final analysis of whatever information we have coming in, we will make sure we tell the family first of any findings that we could give them answers to and then put that out on our social media and in the public and answer whatever questions we can.

Question: On shooting trends, you see these mainly as beefs or as domestic situations?

Scott Galloway: We are seeing less and less of any sort of the traditional gangs. So, it's not over colors, it's not over territory, it's not over drug sales. They're over beefs on the internet about somebody doesn't like somebody or somebody says something – it's really so petty and minimal – that then leads to juveniles shooting guns at each other or shooting houses. It's just so reckless that you shoot at a house. The one on Wilson Street (in June 2024), that had several bullet holes in it, almost hit people in the house. That's why having kids with guns is really a problem, because they're not thinking through things. I don't like to say it, but the domestic situations that involve guns, we can't prevent those. We don't want that to happen, but if you put a cop on every corner, you wouldn't stop that kind of stuff. But we really do target juveniles with guns. There are public safety announcements about locking your car up, because we get so many stolen guns out of cars. That's a problem. Kids going through cars used to steal change out of your console, now they're looking for guns, and they're getting them.

Question: Almost a year ago, LPD started its Major Crimes Unit. (From February 2024: “LPD, prosecutor team up for major crimes investigation unit to investigate shooting incidents and other violent crimes.”) Shooting crimes was the thrust of it. Has that partnership worked out? And has it contributed to these numbers?

Scott Galloway: We have an office set aside for (the prosecutor). When we have these incidents happen, they deploy their resources here with an attorney and investigators. What happens in that moment is they will watch our interviews, they will be there when we're collecting evidence. The attorneys see things a little differently than the officers do. So the officers are getting their information, their interviews, and the attorney will be watching that and will think of a question that might pop up in court, and we're able to feed that to the officers with the technology that we have in this building. It's been just a great relationship, using those two disciplines to then affect the crime and the case.

Question: Is it something that you see tweaks that need to happen. Is it something that will continue?

Scott Galloway: It's going to continue, and we'll maybe even grow it.

Question: What would be the next stage of that?

Scott Galloway: Potentially doing something with drugs or some other type of crime that we think is going to be relevant to having boots on the ground helping working those crimes.

Question: You talked a little bit about the sense that people have, that things are either safe or not safe in Lafayette. What's your sense of the community today in terms of safety and the perception of safety?

Scott Galloway: I'm hypersensitive to people's opinions of being safe or not, because I think a public safety is a precursor for prosperity. I mean, you're not going to have people building businesses and schools and things like that if you don't have a safe community. That's what numbers point to. But I think it's the stories that you tell that are probably the more impactful thing. When people say, I don't feel safe going to Lafayette at night or something, that really affects me, and I will stop right then and there and talk to that person about what we're doing and that when you do see things like this, it's not random. They're not trying to hurt innocent people. It's these, typically, juveniles or somebody that has a reason for pulling a trigger or getting in a fight or whatever crime you're seeing. …

I think most people feel safe. I think most people would recognize these numbers as a good thing. Crime’s going down, especially when the population is going up. We are not letting our foot off the gas pedal.

Question: When you looked at these numbers, were you satisfied with 2024? Did you come away thinking it was it good enough?

Scott Galloway: I would never be satisfied with any shootings, to be honest with you. But I know they're going to happen. I’ve got to be a realist. We're already looking onto the next year and what things are we doing. What things can we improve on? … When there are issues of the number of rapes being up or aggravated assaults going up, I want to look at that more than the successes.

Question: With the civilian CSI push that you've done, how has that worked out? And what’s next with that?

Scott Galloway: Just for background, we have four patrol CSIs. The patrol CSIs were created around 2008, and the purpose was to handle small incidents. They were police officers. They had to go to crashes, they had to go to domestics, they had to go do traffic stops. They also got called to a burglary to take pictures, take some fingerprints. Those CSIs evolved into being full-time CSIs. They go to autopsies, they go to homicide investigations, and it got overwhelming. They get burned out. That's why we went the route of trying to get a cadre of civilian CSIs that can take some of that pressure off. They analyze digital data. They do crime scene investigations. Whenever you have one of these incidents and you're all hands on deck, that also means them, so they go on call and go to the scene. … They have been essential in driving these numbers down. Because when we get any type of a major crime, there's phones, there's computers, there's data, there's cameras, there's video, and somebody has to look at that. That's what they've been doing.

Question: That keeps officers and other detectives free for other calls?

Scott Galloway: That’s exactly what happens. When a crime happens, the real work starts afterward. Now we have a group of people able to take care of the evidence and do the follow-up work that can take a long time to get it to court.

Question: How are the social outreach positions, another set of civilian positions added since 2023, going?

Scott Galloway: We have three. We have a homeless and community outreach liaison. That’s Amanda Ferguson. We have a resource navigator and community advocate, Adam Murphy. And we just hired Norah Ashcraft as a victim advocate specialist. She retired from the YWCA and will be working with us. We have an interdisciplinary team here with resource navigation, homelessness and then a victim advocate for people involved in domestic violence, family crimes, kids, seniors. That puts our detectives in a position to be able to get back to other cases. With the domestic situation, I look at it as trying to drive down repeat incidents of domestic violence. That's the goal. And the homeless outreach, it’s, hey, maybe we go to a person that's in crisis 20 times a month. Maybe we knock that down to five times a month. Same with domestic violence.

Question: Do you see that social positioning grow in the department?

Scott Galloway: This was my goal, to have three. At Bloomington (Police Department), they started with one, and every year for four years they added somebody. I don't anticipate that. I think we have a lot to learn here still. The thing we do well is, I think we put good people in positions that are empowered, and they do a good job.

Question: LPD recently started working AI into its reports. How is that going?

Scott Galloway: What's been really critical for a lot of the stuff that you're seeing, stat-wise, is the Axon AI police reports. If we’re talking right now and I have my (body) camera on, it can take the critical parts of that interview and put them in a police report. The officer has to review it and make those adjustments. It can take a 20-minute police report down into 30 seconds. What used to happen is if you called and said, “Hey, my car was broken into,” I would do my notes with you on the street, take your name, all those things. Now I can look at your ID, it sees your ID and fills all the information out as well as takes all the things you’re telling me – Hey, I parked my car here on this night, this is the time I noticed things were missing, this is what was missing – it puts that into a police report. There's some systems in there that we have to verify for accuracy. But that has been really good at putting officers back on the streets.

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• From The Associated Press, August 2024: “Police officers are starting to use AI chatbots to write crime reports. Will they hold up in court?”

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Question: When did you go to that? And has it caused any issues or problems with reports?

Scott Galloway: It was in the past year – probably six to eight months since we’ve been doing it fully, because we had some test programming and pilot officers using it first. It’s not causing any problems. The officers love it. It's made police reports better, because the writings cleaner, there's less spelling errors than when a human being’s behind the keyboard. It's translating as you're going, just picking out the pieces that are important to a police report. It's peeled off the layer where ChatGPT might put some sort of creative stuff in it. It's that's not in any of that. It's just straight facts. We do have safeguards that our officers have to go back and look to verify that the information is correct, and it is. They're good police reports, they're accurate, and it saved us time.

Question: Have you had any issues coming back from the prosecutor, saying facts don’t line up?

Scott Galloway: We had meetings with the prosecutor before we deployed this and as we were deploying it, so we can make sure that we were doing the right things. … I embrace technology. And the mayor's directive to all the department heads was, if there's ways that we can use AI to increase our productivity, let's do it. And this is what police department came up with.

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