Showing posts tagged crime
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The slaying outside the McDonald’s would remain one of the open cases. What led to the gunfire—and how it was connected to a string of other violent acts around the city—wouldn’t become evident for another two years, after an investigation led deep into a highly profitable heroin ring on the west side that employed dozens of residents, served thousands of customers from around the midwest, and had ties to Mexican drug cartels.
“Anatomy of a Heroin Ring.” Mick Dumke, Chicago Reader

More tragedy in Camden, NJ

“A New Jersey city often described as the most dangerous in the country will no longer have its own police force, as a crunched state budget has intensified an effort to reduce costs by busting the local police union,” writes Travis Waldron at Think Progress.

The Philadelphia Inquirer also reports that the new county police force would welcome less than half of the city’s current police officers. Governor Chris Christie has backed this plan, which would force the layoffs of “the city’s roughly 270 officers.” The Camden police department was gutted last year due to a budget deficit that sent 168 police officers packing. A double shooting in July marked the most murders in “a single month since serial killer Howard Unruh killed 13 people in one day in 1949.”

Back in June, I wrote a short piece for PopMatters about Camden’s devastatingly sad condition and Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, a new book from Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco.

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With a homicide rate ranked the worst of the country’s 10 biggest cities, Philadelphia far exceeds the national averages for both the number of homicides and the percentage accomplished with a gun.
“How Two Photojournalists Are Taking on the City’s Gun Crisis,” Tara Murtha, Philadelphia Weekly
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Black communities in the United States spent much of late March expressing outrage about Zimmerman’s actions and the Sanford, Florida, police department’s inaction. But the anger and grief are not exclusively about this single act. They are prompted by the ways the case reveals the continuing subordination of full citizenship for black Americans.
‘Trayvon Martin: What It’s Like to Be a Problem,’ Melissa Harris-Perry in The Nation

Just an Ordinary Day of Death in Mexico's War on Drug Traffickers

Excellent work at the Wall Street Journal:

Mr. López is the first victim of July 29, a hot summer day much like any other in Mexico’s battle against powerful drug-trafficking gangs. Over the next 24 hours, at least 25 people die across Mexico in murders carrying the hallmarks of drug-gang hits.