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What do they look for?
First, the cops have to determine who did it and what he looks like.
Putting all cops out in the bushes means resources are in the bushes instead of investigating the crime scene.
Remember that there are only something like 74 cops (I read that in one of the stories, but I don’t know how accurate that is). If 74 is the total number, half or maybe 40% are night shift or for some other reason are required to be elsewhere.
So say they had a total of 35 cops available.
How many to seal off the crime scene? A building large enough to house 900 students is going to require a lot of cops just to secure it. At least a dozen. Maybe 20. How many to make their massive presence known? We are now down to 18 cops, some of whom must do the investigation. How many would you put out in a 2,600 acre area with 100 buildings and 26,000 people?
If you used all of them and left no one to investigate, you would have one cop per 144 acres and roughly 5.5 buildings. Some of those buildings house hundreds of people. I have heard as high as 900 people in one dorm. Since we are supposing, lets suppose that those buildings average 500 people per building. Each cop would be expected to watch 2,500 people
And at this point, they have no idea whether they are looking for a white, black, Asian, resident, intruder....but everyone is supposed to feel good about it.
Much better for the cops to do their primary job and determine who did it, what he looks like and where he lives.
“Massive” police presence does not catch even serial killers, whose MO is well known from past events.
They are rarely caught until their identity is known. That is not determined during mindless wandering in the bushes.
>> Setting all available police to be on the lookout for a
>> possibly armed and dangerous fugitive and effectively
>> and promptly notifying the population that there had
>> been a murder and the suspect was at large would be a
>> reasonable response (imo).
>
> What do they look for?
Same thing they look for when they’re normally on patrol. Suspicious and unlawful activity, but with a heightened awareness that there may be an armed and dangerous fugitive in the area.
I’m not suggesting they take all the police and “beat the bushes”. I’m saying that the university cops from maybe some townies who weren’t immediately needed at the murder scene maybe would have made one less circle by the donut shop or down to the high school to try and bust kids for smoking and an extra one through the college campus.