OVER 190 CONVICTIONS AND NO END IN SIGHT

He's Back: Kevin Morgan Was Still Wearing His Prison-Issue Shoes When
Last Arrested Four Days Ago. He's One Of The Reasons Vancouver Police
Created A Special Unit To Deal With 'Super-Chronic Offenders' --
Usually Drug-Addicted Criminals --Who Plague The City

When Kevin Morgan was arrested in the back room of a Main Street
restaurant on June 14, he was still wearing his prison-issue Velcro shoes.

Morgan, 38, told the arresting officer he was looking for potato
chips. He'd been out of jail just two days. There was not enough
evidence for a charge in that case, but Morgan already has more than
190 convictions to his name. His most recent, on charges of theft
under $5,000, earned him three months in jail.

Morgan is what the Vancouver Police Department defines as a
"super-chronic" offender -- one who has at least 12 charges in the
past 12 months.

Drug-addicted and mentally ill, Morgan personifies the problem police
have in managing super-chronics. His only appreciable crime-free
period was when he was a patient at Riverview Hospital.

Morgan is so well known that his photo is tacked to a notice board in
the VPD's Chronic Offenders Program (COP) office. He is wearing
nothing but a stolen leather mini-skirt, the label and price tag
still attached.

As head of the year-old COP unit, Det. Const. Rowan Pitt-Payne knows
Morgan better than most. Morgan's face and name are frequently on his
unit's Top 10 list.

Morgan moves from the street to court to jail and back again like
it's a game of Snakes and Ladders. In one instance, Pitt-Payne says,
Morgan was a free man for just three minutes (not counting travel
time to meet with his probation officer) when he stepped off a bus,
bought a rock of crack cocaine and was promptly re-arrested.

COP is unique in Canada, the only program of its kind. Its goal is
relatively simple yet frustratingly elusive -- to stop an offender's
crime spree long enough to reduce societal harm.

Two key targets right now are 36-year-old Kyle Fossella, a man with a
lengthy record who is wanted on a Canada-wide warrant for breach of
parole, and 34-year-old Franklin Hall, sought on a Canada-wide
warrant for break-and-enter and assault. Hall, too, has a long
history with police.

Each of the three COP detectives works at least 10 cases at any one
time. The Top 10 list typically features five names of incorrigible
petty criminals (unrestrained shoplifters, for example) who are
frequently arrested, like Morgan. Some of them can steal up to
$10,000 worth of retail goods a week.

The other five names are of "smarter guys," Pitt-Payne says,
primarily property criminals who put a bit of thought and planning
into their actions, but are unpredictable and sometimes violent nonetheless.

Once an offender is identified and added to the ranks, COP officers
liaise with Crown counsel in order to let the court know what kind of
criminal it is dealing with.

The goal, Pitt-Payne says, is "purposeful sentencing," a period of
incarceration long enough to get the message across and long enough
for the accused to take advantage of substance-abuse-management and
other programs while inside. "The only time I can help him is when
he's in custody," Pitt-Payne says. "Nothing less than a year inside
will do any good for a drug addict."

Officers also look for answers with the offenders themselves. A big
part of the COP unit's work is meeting with super-chronics in
custody. The off-the-record chats are a chance for the accused to
strike up a relationship with the police and for police to learn from
their targets.

"If we can learn what makes these guys tick, perhaps we can stop
[them]," Pitt-Payne says.

If during an interview an addicted offender says he wants help,
police try to set up detox facilities and substance-abuse programs
behind bars and outside. Attempts are also made to link the offender
up with mental-health services -- which are scarce. If the offender
refuses help, they become the focus of surveillance.

[Sidebar]

Few Offenders, So Much Crime

- - Between four and 10 per cent of offenders commit approximately 80
per cent of all crimes.

- - Between 82 and 85 per cent of criminals apprehended are
recidivists, or repeat offenders.

One Man's Criminal Spree

Since 2001, a man we'll call Joe Typical has come into contact with
Vancouver police 101 times. He is a textbook "super-chronic"
offender, someone with at least 12 charges in 12 months.

He is not the worst on the Vancouver police Chronic Offender Program
Top 10 target list. He is the average.

But his criminal tendencies are anything but.

Consider Typical's month of March. On March 5, he was arrested for
theft from auto. Five days later, he was a suspect in a truck theft.

The day after that, he was a suspect in a break-and-enter. The very
next day, March 12, he was arrested for possession of stolen property.

On March 20, he was charged again with possession of stolen property
he was suspected of shoplifting from a Vancouver store.

When police were forced to ram the fleeing car in which he was a
passenger, they determined the vehicle was, in fact, stolen.

As of Friday, Typical was a free man.

His court record and sentences are detailed below.

Pending charges

- - May 2/06, counterfeiting currency

- - April 6/06, theft under $5,000

- - March 20/06, possession of stolen property under $5,000

- - Feb. 19/06, possession of break-in tools

- - June 4/01, possession of stolen property under $5,000

Convictions

- - Nov. 21/05, car theft under $5,000, 20 days in jail, 40 days time served

- - Oct. 16/05, breach of probation, one day in jail

- - Dec. 30/04, residential break-and-enter, one day in jail

- - April 5/04, possession of break-in tools, six months in jail and 12
months probation

- - Sept. 25/03, possession of break-in tools, one day in jail, 18
months probation

- - Jan. 7/03, theft from auto under $5,000, 3 months jail

- - Jan. 7/03, theft of auto over $5,000, 1 month jail

- - Nov. 3/01, possession of stolen property under $5,000, 2 months in
jail, 1 year probation

Charges stayed

- - Nov. 7/05, possession of stolen property

- - Jan. 29/05, breach of probation

- - Mar. 12/04, theft from motor vehicle under $5,000

- - Feb. 28/04, break-and-enter in a business

- - Feb. 19/04, assault with a weapon

- - Jan. 16/04, theft under $5,000

- - June 17/03, possession of stolen property under $5,000

- - Aug. 13/02, theft from auto under $5,000

Other charges, accusations

- - Jan. 20/05, breach of bail

- - Oct. 20/02, breach of bail

- - Sept. 28/02, breach of bail

- - Aug. 14/02, breach of bail

- - June 30/02, breach of bail

- - May 31/02, breach of bail

- - April 2/02, breach of bail

- - Jan. 3/02, robbery

- - Jan. 3/02, robbery

- - Jan. 3/02, possession of stolen property over $5,000

- - Jan. 2/02, break-and-enter

- - Dec. 23/01, theft of auto under $5,000

- - Nov. 3/01, possession of stolen property

- - Nov. 3/01, theft of auto under $5,000

- - June 7/01, theft of auto under $5,000