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Whatever happened to going to the mall?

By COLLEEN JENKINS and ABBIE VANSICKLE
Published August 17, 2006

Be careful if you're thinking of playing hooky from school.

Tampa police officers have stepped up their truancy enforcement.

Why?

Teens cutting class are a big reason for a spike in property crimes during the afternoon, police spokeswoman Andrea Davis said.

Statistics show most property crimes happen from noon to 3 p.m. Most assaults happen just after that, from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m., she said.

Skipping school may sound harmless enough, but it's a serious problem in Tampa, Davis said.

"It's not like when we were kids," she said. "Things are different now. We didn't go into people's homes and steal stuff."

fears of profiling: In his two years in the United States, Mohsin Teladia never felt uncomfortable over his religion. That is, until last week's announcement of the foiled terrorist plot in England.

Teladia, a Muslim clergyman who moved to the United States from England, was shopping Sunday with his wife and four children at a Wal-Mart when a man walked up to Teladia and said, "Osama."

"It was as though every person in the shopping center was staring at us," he said.

The stunned family left.

That experience prompted Teladia to attend the Council on American-Islamic Relations meeting this week at CAIR's Tampa headquarters on 56th Street. He and several other local Muslims met with law enforcement to share concerns.

He doesn't want anyone else to go through his experience, he said.

"The Muslim community is going through a lot of fear at the moment," he said.

unhappy with verdict: Not everyone is pleased with Sumos Thai operator Lawrence Storer's acquittal on manslaughter charges this month.

And we're not just talking about the State Attorney's Office.

Members of the George Edgecomb Bar Association, the largest predominately African-American group of attorneys in Tampa, issued an impassioned memo over their concern about the community's response to Storer avoiding prison for Shantavious Wilson's death.

Storer, who is Japanese-American, mowed down Wilson, who was black, with his sport utility vehicle after Wilson robbed the downtown cafe owner in October 2003.

Wilson should have been punished for his crime, association president Julie S. Sneed wrote, but not with the death penalty.

"Celebrating vigilantism is not appropriate in a civilized society such as ours," Sneed said. "Every life is sacred, and we should be careful as a society when we celebrate actions which cavalierly take away someone's life.

"Certainly, Wilson was wrong," the memo continued. "But the behavior of criminals like Wilson should not be used to encourage and celebrate lawlessness. Our country favors justice for all. Even the criminals."

arrest reports online: Been in a traffic accident? Need a copy of the police accident report for insurance purposes?

You're in luck.

Tampa police recently added a new feature to their Web site. Now, residents can request and purchase copies of accident reports online.

The reports cost $2 free delivery through standard mail, $23 to overnight through FedEx.

To get to the site, go to the Tampa Police Department home page at www.tampagov.net/dept_Police/. At the bottom of the page, click on "Order Traffic Crash Reports Online."

Fill in the report number, the year of the accident, the location, the date and the drivers' names.

Got a tip? For cops news, contact Abbie VanSickle at vansickle@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3373. For courts news, contact Colleen Jenkins at cjenkins@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3337.

[Last modified August 17, 2006, 06:32:04]