How can this be??? 1 murder a day!

[Adam_MA]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/13/AR2006071301745_pf.html

Each Victim In the City's Violent July Has a Story

By Robert E. Pierre and Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, July 14, 2006; A01



The surge in killings started just after midnight July 1 and has barely let up.

A former church usher was gunned down in a courtyard where flowers bloomed. A 24-year-old woman who lost a close friend to gun violence two years ago was herself shot by a neighbor. Two boyhood friends, who were shot at the same time, died days apart. Their cases received little attention compared with the slayings of a convenience store owner, a community activist and an aspiring British politician. But they created the same kind of anguish for the people they knew.

Many of the month's victims, including John Jackson, 26, were shot numerous times.

"I thought it was firecrackers," said Jackson's mother, Shirley Boyd, of the rapid fire -- in a courtyard across the street -- that startled her awake. It was just after 2 a.m. July 7. "They don't shoot with little guns."

There have been 14 homicides this month: Three on the 1st. Two on the 2nd. One each on the 4th and 5th. Two on the 7th. And one each day from July 8 through Wednesday.

As killings go, this is far from the District's worst stretch, nothing like the one starting in 1988 when the city averaged more than a homicide a day for eight of nine years.

Yet after a decade of declining numbers, this month's killings have so alarmed city officials that D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey declared a crime emergency.

All but two victims were men, and most were killed close to home in the wee hours of the morning. The homicides were spread across four quadrants: five in Northeast, three in Northwest, two in Southwest and four in Southeast.

D.C. police Lt. Robert Glover of the violent crimes unit noted that the city's killers are using more guns, firing more rounds and leaving behind crime scenes that often stretch for blocks. Police have made arrests in two of the cases and are seeking leads in the rest.

"I wish we could just wave a magic wand and say, 'Stop killing each other,' " Glover said.
<Snip>(see link for the names, dates, and story's of those killed.)

Wait a minute here.... This can't be true... There is a gun ban in DC..

D.C. police Lt. Robert Glover of the violent crimes unit noted that the city's killers are using more guns, firing more rounds and leaving behind crime scenes that often stretch for blocks.

 

[Twigg]

But isn't gun control supposed to work ?

Oh yeah, criminals don't really care about the law do they ?

Have they tried a buyback program ? I hear the one in Boston is a success.

 

[Moderator]

Maybe if we all hold hands and sing songs all the violence will stop.

 

[Nashmack]

Great idea Type O, as long as I'm not sandwiched between Adam, Brent, and Derek. That's one love triangle I'd hate to get in the middle of!

 

[Moderator]

Great idea Type O, as long as I'm not sandwiched between Adam, Brent, and Derek. That's one love triangle I'd hate to get in the middle of!

 

[Jaxon]

Great idea Type O, as long as I'm not sandwiched between Adam, Brent, and Derek. That's one love triangle I'd hate to get in the middle of!

It's amazing how any thread eventually takes a 90degree tangent.

Four posts. Is that a record?

RJ

 

[Nashmack]

I can skew it in one

 

[Adam_MA]

NEVER under estimate the power of corrupt minds working together!

 

[Nashmack]

NEVER under estimate the power of corrupt minds working together!

Isn't that what makes Massachusetts government work?

 

[Adam_MA]

Yep!

 

[Nashmack]

I wonder when they're going to declare martial law in D.C., maybe the military marching through the city and taking over will be good for our nation's capital?

 

[Coyote33]

I wonder when they're going to declare martial law in D.C., maybe the military marching through the city and taking over will be good for our nation's capital?

The cruel irony is THAT is the precise reason the 2nd amendment came about, isn't it?