Welcome To The Cop Bowl
There are times when policing becomes more about the police team winning than any other priority.

This was one of those times -- when service on four NYC subway lines was suspended for more than an hour as the police searched for a petty jewelry thief.

For anybody who hasn't lived in New York or taken the trains, shutting down one train means that people who need to transfer between trains to get places are sunk, so that's a much bigger shut-down than just four lines.

Sure, we want the thieves caught (or not allowed to escape from the Keystone cops, as was the case in this case).

But unless there's a dangerous criminal on the loose, what's with stopping life for countless non-criminal citizens?

As @DanGillmor put it in a tweet:

Welcome to Lockdown America. NYC shuts down subway to catch an alleged teenaged necklace thief. http://owl.li/kL3zF

Shimon Prokupecz and Brynn Gingras write at NBCNewYork:

Vuktilaj was being led out of his apartment building on Saint Nicholas Avenue in Hamilton Heights Monday morning when he pushed an officer out of the way and ran toward the subway at 145th Street, police said.

The MTA suspended service on parts of the A, B, C and D lines as police and K-9 units searched the tunnels for Vuktilaj. Regular service on those lines resumed by about 1:15 p.m.

Police said Vuktilaj had been arrested last week in connection with two chain-snatching attacks on women in their 60s.

Law enforcement officials say police were arresting him Monday for an additional necklace robbery when he fled.

There was an event like this in the hood in Venice a week or so ago where pretty much every cop car in West LA seemed to be called out, plus at least one chopper, maybe more, plus the SWAT Team. The criminal? A dopehead and petty thief the cops know to be non-violent (per the local lady who monitors all police action) who was trapped on a roof and lying down in a half-fetal position.

Oh, did he "refuse to come down," as they put it in the LA Times? Well, go the hell up there and yank him down by the scruff of the neck. And if he resists, tase him!