Three shootings occurred in Lauderdale Lakes in a span of three days last week, a stark number that has raised questions over whether the city is safe to live in and if officials are doing enough to curb gun violence.
“There’s a lot of emotions going around right now,” Mayor Veronica Edwards Phillips said at a Wednesday morning news conference to address residents’ fears. “Is it safe to go to the store? Is it safe to go to the park? Is it safe to just be out? And I want to let you know that the ‘We Care’ city of Lauderdale Lakes is making sure you can continue on with your daily routine without living in fear.”
The spate of shootings began on May 2, when Thierry Bastien, 41, was shot to death by an employee inside of the Walmart on State Road 7/US 441 after he intervened in a fight between the man and his female coworker. The next day, on May 3, an unknown driver fired a barrage of bullets at another car further down the same road, injuring a 58-year old woman. And on May 4, a man was shot outside the RaceTrac gas station at the intersection of Northwest 33rd Avenue and West Oakland Park Boulevard.
The jarring number of shootings — all of which occurred in the early afternoon — has drawn attention to rising gun violence across the county, the consequences of which have been felt in Lauderdale Lakes, situated in the center of Broward. And it has led some to call for a more active law enforcement presence in the community, particularly during daytime hours.
Lauderdale Lakes contracts with the Broward Sheriff’s Office for law enforcement services, but its total numbers have decreased over the years, further strained after BSO’s Lauderdale Lakes district merged with its Central Broward district in 2011 to cut costs. Beginning about 2008, the number of personnel covering Lauderdale Lakes decreased from 77 to 48.
“There are people who want more police, but it comes with a price,” Beverly Williams, a former city commissioner, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel. She said she would prefer if Lauderdale Lakes had its own police department, but outsourcing to BSO was a cheaper alternative. People in the community often complain about the lack of law enforcement but don’t want to pay for it in taxes, she said.
While the city’s overall crime rate has decreased over the years, the rate of violent crimes involving firearms has more than doubled, according to data from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, from 61 incidents in 2015 to 135 in 2020, the most recent year for which data is available.
The trend is not unique to Lauderdale Lakes. In Broward, the number shot up from over 1,900 to over 2,600 in the same time period. Across the state of Florida, the number went up noticeably, though less starkly, from over 26,000 to over 29,000.
District Captain Warnell Phillips sought to reassure the public Wednesday that the city is safe and BSO is handling the shootings effectively. Deputies arrested suspects in the Walmart shooting and the RaceTrac shooting the same day that the incidents occurred. The shooter in the road-rage incident remains at large, he said, but detectives have promising leads.
“I couldn’t be more proud of the efforts and the investigation that took place by our law enforcement deputies that live in the city,” Phillips said.
In the days since the shootings, BSO has increased patrols in the Walmart and traffic enforcement on the State Road 7/US 441 and Oakland Park Boulevard corridors to help “curtail some of the road rage incidents that seem to be going on,” he added.
Some residents were not satisfied, saying they want a more active law enforcement presence across the city to help people feel safe and deter shootings in the first place.
“We need more officers in the city,” Williams said. “I know we’re doing the budget now, so this is something we need to address. We need officers riding through the area just to show up, let residents know they are there.”
At a commission meeting Tuesday, Commissioner Tycie Causwell told District Captain Phillips that she often goes outside and looks for patrol cars but doesn’t see them.
“Could you bring that back, is that possible, just for them to circle, just go past 29th Street, maybe go over the bridge and come back so that people can feel a little bit more secure?” she asked at the meeting. Phillips said that he would look into it.
Residents also asked about the current staffing levels on Wednesday. Each day, the Sheriff’s Office provides eight dedicated patrol officers to the city, Phillips explained, divided over eight “zones.” BSO’s contract with the city requires a minimum staffing level of five officers per shift.
It is unclear how the officers are currently divided between the day and night shifts. The Broward Sheriff’s Office was still working on a response to questions about the staffing levels Wednesday.
Phillips said that there is no shortage of deputies, though “we can always use more help and more assistance.” At Tuesday’s meeting, the city commission also approved the hiring of two new deputies through the Department of Justice’s COPS program, funded by federal grant money, bringing the total number of personnel to 50.
“So you’re telling me we have eight officers during the daytime?” one resident asked. “For the record, I just want to make it crystal clear.”
“I’m telling you your community is safe and you have nothing to worry about,” Phillips replied.
The city’s law enforcement presence is only one piece of the puzzle, Causwell told the South Florida Sun Sentinel. The recent shootings are a reflection of a broader “proliferation of guns” and a lack of “respect” in the culture.
In March, the state approved a bill allowing people to carry concealed weapons without a permit.
Lauderdale Lakes’ location in the center of Broward County, with one of the busiest intersections in the state of Florida at State Road 7/US 441 and Oakland Park Boulevard, means that hundreds of thousands of people from throughout the county move through it, Causwell said. Neither of the two shooting suspects arrested last week are from the city.
“The same thing that happens in Lauderdale Lakes is happening in Lauderhill, it’s going to happen in Sunrise, it’s going to happen in Oakland Park,” Causwell said, adding, “the incident that happened in Walmart should not have happened … guns are prevalent, and the simplest thing triggers someone. If they didn’t have a gun, maybe it would have been a fist fight.”