Contact: Cecil Angel at 313-223-4531 or angel@freepress.com.

In a show of unprecedented unity today, 10 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies gathered at Detroit's Northwestern police district and vowed to reduce crime in the city.

It was the official introduction of Operation TIDE, Tactical Intelligence Driven Enforcement, a crime-fighting collaboration that has been quietly in operation since May 5. All the agencies pool their resources and intelligence to identify crime patterns and the city's worst criminals.

“I am very excited that the end result will be the removal a lot of these violent felons in the city of Detroit and the reduction of violent crime,” Detroit Police Chief Ella Bully-Cummings said.

So far, more than 115 felony arrests have resulted directly from Operation TIDE in the Northwestern police district. It has been expanded to the Western, Eastern and Northeastern police districts.

The initiative is being funded with a $600,000 grant from Project Safe Neighborhoods, a U. S. Department of Justice anti-violence program.

“Whereas all of our efforts individually have done great things in the community to help reduce violence crime,” U.S. Attorney Stephen J. Murphy said, “today we stand together.”

Besides Detroit police, other Operation TIDE agencies include the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, Federal Bureau of Investigations, U. S. Marshals Services, U. S. Drug Enforcement Administration, state Department of Corrections, Michigan State Police, and the Wayne County Sheriff's Office.

“This is a day I thought I would never see,” Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said of the collaboration.