Alphecca

Violent Crime Down, Gun Crime Up

I've been reading the articles appearing over the past couple days. From the Lexington Herald-Leader (KY):

"We're at the front end of an epidemic," said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a law-enforcement policy center based in Washington.

Wexler, commenting on the report, said police chiefs from around the country who attended an August forum sponsored by his group reported that the increase in violent crimes first seen in 2005 had continued into this year, with major hikes in three categories: homicides, robberies and aggravated assaults.

He and others quoted in the article refuse to place the blame on two important points. One of them is only briefly alluded to in the penultimate paragraph:

At the August forum, law-enforcement officials called on the federal government to refocus its efforts on fighting violent crime and suggested that international anti-terrorism efforts had sapped crime-fighting efforts.

A bit more blunt was this from the Wilmington Star (NC):

Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty listened to complaints about dwindling federal anti-crime aid from several dozen mayors and police chiefs at a public meeting in Washington on Aug. 30. Several days later, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales told reporters that cities will have to work harder but should not count on more federal money because of growing demands in the fight against terrorism.

Nevertheless, Gonzales arranged a private meeting in New York last Thursday with three state police executives and the police chiefs of Los Angeles, Miami and Providence, R.I., The Associated Press learned.

One of them, Providence's Dean Esserman, came away "impressed at how much he listened. He wasn't there to defend himself. He could have used the time to preach; instead he used it to hear our concerns."

Esserman said all but few cities have fewer police officers now than in 2001, with big reductions in New York, Boston and Detroit "because of the loss of federal money." A Clinton administration program paid for local departments to hire community-oriented police officers, but the Bush administration stopped the money for such hiring.

"I believe in homeland defense, but I also believe in crime fighting," Esserman said. "I don't want one neglected for the other. Every year we're losing 16,000 people to murder, mostly young people and mostly killed by guns, and that's more than three times the number that died at the World Trade Center" in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

So as federal funds dry-up for municipalities' crime fighting efforts, less police mean more crime. But that's only half the story. Remember, I said there were two causes of the problem and the second one is -- again only hinted at -- in that second quotation. Here's a hint: "...mostly young people and mostly killed by guns...". Street gangs. I've been harping on it here at Alphecca for almost four years now.

Perhaps it is politically incorrect because most gang members are black, hispanic, or mexican. Maybe the law enforcement officers quoted in these articles are afraid to place blame on the fasted rising demographic of crime statistics. It's punk kids killing each other with illegal firearms. Of course, it can't be THAT big a secret when you have police departments around the nation forming task forces specifically to fight gang violence so why did this report mentioned in both articles fail to mention gang violence?

The stupidest quotation of the day comes here:

Professor Alfred Blumstein of Carnegie Mellon University said the rise in gun violence was particularly troubling.

"A major police effort to confiscate guns helped bring down the surge in violent crime that occurred in the late 1980s and early 1990s," Blumstein said. "But gun distribution is easier now because we have begun to back off gun control."

Backed by the National Rifle Association, the Bush administration has been cool toward gun control measures.

Blumstein is an idiot. How is "gun distribution easier" than it was in the last two decades? Shall issue laws in various states don't have a single fucking thing to do with criminal use of firearms. There are fewer gun dealers than ever. Everybody legally purchasing a firearm from a gun dealer has to undergo a NICS background check. Many states have enacted their own "assault weapons bans". Does Blumstein actually think gang-bangers and other thugs give a rat's ass about gun control measures?

Gangs steal, trade, or straw-purchase firearms. Period. They're not bothering with Firearm I.D. cards, carry permits, or any other of the 20,000 gun control laws on the books. It's not that guns are easier to get, just that there are more organized street gangs using illegal firearms. Control the gangs, lock them up forever, and you'll see violent crime decrease. Period, too.

Lastly, the writer of the Wilmington Star article couldn't help himself somehow dragging President Bush and the NRA into the article as causes of the problem. That's completely irrelevant to the problem of gun distribution although Bush could be faulted for reduced federal aid to cities' law enforcement.

I know; I'm preaching to the choir but to sum up again, the two real factors in rising murder rates is:

1) Smaller police forces at a time when we have,

2) Larger gang forces.

To make it even simpler: It's the gangs, stupid. Deal with them.

Posted by Jeff Soyer at September 12, 2006 08:40 AM