OXFORD – Now that summer is over, police are expecting temperaments to cool down with the temperature.

Over the past two years, assaults have reached an average of 5.4 per month during June, July and August, while the average is 2.2 per month for the previous five months.

Summer burglaries average 2.7 per month, up from 1.7 in the previous months. Thefts, a little over 6 per month, remain the same.

“Weather plays a big part in this,” Tibbetts said. “If you have a long, hot stretch everybody’s temper is short.”

Cities would admire those crime rates, but Oxford is not a big city.

There are three full-time police and 10 part-time police to share the daily work duties. Some of the part-time police work for other departments.

“We’ve had more assaults with weapons, like baseball bats and clubs, than ever in the past,” Tibbetts said. “I’m glad to see school start up again, because some of these involved kids.”

Tibbetts, who has been in law enforcement for 21 years – 8 years with Oxford, said he is also glad to see the town go back to its “normal contingency” of people. Summer lake residents and lake visitors are gone until next season and the Oxford Plains Speedway’s summer season is over.

Three assaults this summer were associated with racing events at the speedway.

“We’re really quite busy, for being a small, rural community,” Tibbetts said. “Complaint-wise we’re pretty close to being equal to Norway and Paris.”

Oxford Police Sgt. Rickie Jack said this was the toughest summer he had concerning assaults since he started working full time about 4 years ago.

“One weekend in July, I had two assaults in one day,” Jack said.

He said one involved a man who threatened a family member with a gun and then a knife and later was stopped before the beginning of an assault on a woman.

“Some of it is the economy,” Jack said. “To a certain extent, families are having a tough time making ends meet. The other problem is drinking. I estimate that 80 percent of the domestics I cover involve alcohol.”

Tibbetts said that percentage held true for all the assault cases.

Sgt. Theron Bickford has been assaulted twice this summer, both times by patients receiving psychiatric care.

Tibbetts said Bickford was attacked once by an elderly woman who poured Kool-Aid over his head and another time when a woman resisted protective custody. In struggle he was pushed into a window.

Tibbetts said the crime of assault is one of the easier ones to investigate.

“You have the victim and the perpetrator. You know all the players, it is not as if you have to go looking for them,” Tibbetts said.

He said nine of 10 times the perpetrator admits to the crime.

Tibbetts said that Oxford police arrest participants in most assault cases, rather than just issuing a summons. He noted that in arrest, bail conditions including no drinking or drug use and no contact with victims, are most often set.

He said the bail conditions help keep combatants away from each other in many, but not all, cases.

Tibbetts said the increased activity in the summer created overtime for police.

“It wasn’t more than we could handle, but it did stretch our resources tight,” Tibbetts said.

jsmedley@sunjournal.com

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