Another illustration of public safety on Providence streets in 2021: Record gun seizure.

Guns are abundant on Providence’s streets. And the telltale behaviors of many people who tote them around are prevalent, too, say police.

A driver leans toward the foot area of a front passenger seat, pulls a mask over his face and jerks back to an upright position behind the wheel.

One man’s haphazard navigation of a stop sign suggests he’s decided, abruptly, to travel in the opposite direction of a passing police cruiser. Another driver sees a cruiser and just pulls over. Yet another driver, armed with a Glock 19, eyeballs a police vehicle on the road ahead. He tries to turn around quickly. He backs his Toyota Camry into a retaining wall.

Other men clutch the front waistbands of their pants, or grasp the front pockets of their hoody-style sweatshirts, as they try to walk away. Satchels are popular. One man has a Colt .357 inside a fabric bag designed to hold a bottle of Crown Royal whisky.

The city’s police officers and detectives compiled all of these behaviors in arrest reports last month as they seized 24 guns in just 30 days.

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It was an epic monthly haul at the tail end of a calendar year that has brought a record number of gun seizures in Providence — almost 200 heading into the last week of the year.

That higher number correlates with a significant bump in the number of homicides, including gun deaths.

There were 23 homicides in Providence in 2021, through Wednesday night, compared with 18 in 2020 and 13 in 2019.

Earlier in 2021, criminologists warned that both 2020 and 2021 were outlier years for crime statistics due to pandemic-related social upheaval. But as time marches on, and homicide statistics remain elevated, Providence and other U.S. cities caught in the same trends may face a reckoning about public safety conditions.

A close look at more than 300 pages of police reports detailing 24 gun seizures last month offers one type of perspective, mostly a police perspective, on those conditions in Providence.

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In 30 days, police seized an arsenal of handguns, from pistols with laser sights to a so-called "ghost gun," to a more classic 9mm handgun from a teenager. One gun, a Glock 19C, was set up to unleash automatic fire.

They arrested 26 people on weapons charges.

The reports do not describe the experiences of unarmed Providence residents who may have been searched by police.

To Providence’s police chief, Col. Hugh T. Clements Jr., the increased seizures underscore the high volume of guns on the city’s streets.

“What’s shocking to me is the availability of firearms,” Clements says.

The department’s success at seizing guns, he says, also demonstrates its response to the recent proliferation of dangerous weapons and to the careless gunfire of willing “trigger-pullers” who have scattered more than 1,200 bullet casings in 2021.

Arresting carriers and shooters is “extremely important,” but it’s only part of the job of countering gun violence, adds Clements.

Earlier this month: Providence police investigate city's 23rd homicide of 2021

Gun violence, like homelessness and drug addiction, is a byproduct of social illness, he says. Addressing it requires a holistic approach incorporating prevention, intervention, rehabilitation and reentry.

“We can’t do it by arresting our way out of it,” Clements says. “It’s a public health issue.”

Gun arrest after threats to church

November’s run of gun seizures got rolling on the first day of the month.

Detective Matthew Pine had obtained a search warrant to comb through the home of a man who was accused of yelling obscenities and threatening parishioners of St. Mary’s Church.

This followed the arrest of the church's pastor on child pornography charges. Witnesses had told police that William Nesbitt had displayed a gun under his shirt.

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In a drawer underneath the bed, Pine found a CZ 75 9mm semiautomatic pistol.

A few days later, a car with heavily tinted windows, including its front windshield, rolled down Cranston Street. Some detectives took notice.

As in many of the reports, the account says detectives were present due, in part, to complaints of gun violence and drug activity.

The car, driven by a 22-year-old Johnston man, stopped at intersections, idled on Hanover Street at Cranston, an area known for “high traffic drug activity.” At one point, another driver pulled up and tried to get the Johnston man’s attention.

All of this, says the report, formed a basis for the detectives to approach the dark-windowed car. The driver had cash sticking out of the pocket of his hooded sweatshirt, it says. He told the officers it was for his job — supplying ATM machines. He kept looking at a backpack on his front seat, where the detectives found $13,000 in cash and a loaded Berretta APX.

As in many of the reports, the detectives keyed in a one-word answer when they were asked to identify the victim of the crime. “Society,” they wrote.

Modified pistol becomes a 'mini machine gun'

The following day, a team of Providence detectives focused on organized crime, along with other investigators, including federal agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, in setting up a surveillance operation targeting an apartment in a complex at 102 Linwood Ave.

More specifically, says the report, the raiders were pursuing a 22-year-old man who had been seen with a Glock pistol.

The pistol had been modified, illegally, to generate bursts of gunfire automatically, it says. Shooters with guns modified this way only need to pull the trigger once and hold it to discharge a spray of rapid fire.

“It’s a mini machine gun,” says Special Agent Matthew O’Shaughnessy of the ATF’s field division in Boston.

The police had a warrant to search the apartment, but they waited until Enger Correa arrived with some other men. He had a “satchel” slung over his shoulder, says Detective Matthew McGloin’s report, which says satchels are increasingly popular for people carrying guns.

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When the raiding team pounced, Correa jumped out a window in a foiled attempt at escape, says the report. In the apartment, it says, police found a satchel that looked like the one Correa had been carrying. They say they found a .40-caliber pistol.

They also found an illegally modified Glock 19C inside a black purse, four magazines and 115 rounds of ammunition of different caliber.

As of Wednesday night, Providence police had seized 198 guns in 2021. Clements says that’s a record. He doesn’t know what the record was previously, but the average has been between 110 and 140 seizures a year. Clements says he also believes the 24 guns seized in November amounted to a new record.

A 'delicate balance' between public safety and 'hassling the good people'

Guns have been used in the vast majority of killings and attempted killings in the city this year.

People who carry guns illegally without permits and who fire them illegally in compact areas keep their guns concealed most of the time.

To take those guns away, police officers have to make judgments, often based on observations, to carry out searches for hidden or partially hidden weapons. In 2021, they’ve made such judgments in an environment charged with the racial tensions of the pandemic era.

In Providence, as well as across the country, many people feel targeted by police officers rather than protected by them.

“They have to be careful that they’re not hassling the good people,” says Steve Santos, vice president of the Chad Brown Alumni Association.

Santos grew up in the Chad Brown public housing complex. He grew up hating police officers, he says.

But lately, he says he hasn’t heard a lot complaints about Providence police.

He says the shootings of 2020 and 2021 have been a discussion topic there. Since a man was shot and killed on Branch Avenue in 2020, he says, the neighborhood has been the scene of about four or five shootings with people pulling triggers from passing cars.

"Getting guns off the street is always a good thing," he says.

In each of the seizure cases, police cite observations that they say fostered their initial suspicions and led them to probe and investigate and eventually find the gun.

Some of the behaviors noted in the reports are benign: exhibiting nervousness or anxiety; wanting to get away from watchful police officers.

“That speaks to the complicated nature of our challenge and the job of keeping this community safe,” says Clements. “It’s a delicate balance.”

In one case, on Nov. 25, around closing time at a club on Broad Street, police noticed six people standing around two parked vehicles.

The report says that one of the people saw the "police presence" and “yelled something.” The other people in the group, it says, turned and looked, then climbed into the vehicles.

After that, the officers say they saw a passenger look back at them and then suddenly bend down for a moment.

It’s easy to envision someone reaching for many things, perhaps a cellphone that has slipped out of a pocket. But in this case, the person’s sudden bend, combined with various other factors, led to the traffic stop.

And the officers found a "ghost gun" — a gun that lacks a serial number that would allow it to be traced — stashed in a map pocket on the back of the driver’s seat.

Clements hasn’t compiled statistics on the number of vehicles and cars that were searched in November without any gun seizures.

He says the department’s approach is “directed” and “surgical.”

The last seizure of November came on Nov. 29 at 3:42 a.m. Three officers stopped a Porsche Panamera and noticed “furtive movements” inside the car, says the report. A rear-seat passenger, Samil Rodriguez, “hunched down” toward the floor at one point, it says.

Under the carpet in that area, says the report, an officer found a .40-caliber Smith & Wesson. In the trunk of the black sports car, it says, the officers found an armored vest.

They also found a box for ammunition. It was empty.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Record gun haul in Providence evokes public safety conditions