The St. Louis Post-Dispatch produced a large and nationally significant series of stories -- with an extensive online presentation -- about the hundreds of thousands of fugitives who run but don't even have to hide.
Why? Amazingly, there is no federal law that requires police departments to enter fugitive warrants into the FBI's national database.
So how many names are missing from the database? Thirteen states disclosed data and give a glimpse of what is happening nationwide. This is one heck of a mess:
The Post-Dispatch reviewed thousands of pages of government records, analyzed dozens of computer databases and interviewed hundreds of people, including police officers, prosecutors, ex-fugitives and crime victims. The newspaper found:
• More than a third of all felony warrants are not entered into a national database routinely checked by police across the nation.
• Few fugitives are hunted, and most states don't even screen for criminal warrants before handing out licenses.
• When fugitives are found in other states, authorities routinely refuse to pick them up -- including some wanted for violent crimes.
• In St. Louis and a handful of other metro areas, authorities don't even issue warrants for thousands of fugitives.
The lapses mean hundreds of thousands of felony fugitives can run -- and they don't need to hide.
The paper found that among those felonies not entered in the national database were:
... nearly 20 percent of Ohio's homicide warrants, 40 percent of Michigan's sexual assault warrants and more than 50 percent of Arizona's robbery warrants.
Police in Massachusetts have left out nearly 80 percent of their violent felony warrants.
"The numbers are staggering of the violent people we don't have in," said Kevin Horton, who just retired as head of the Massachusetts State Police fugitive unit.
