Police

Suddenly It Became His Job

Well done, Officer Rogers! “An officer was actually on this block on another call and actually heard the shots being fired, said T.J. Smith, Baltimore City Police Spokesman. “That officer gave pursuit.” How often does that happen? And what exactly happened? An edited and shortened version of the bodycam footage had been acquired by WMAR, which made me go, “damn!”…

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Police

The Freddie Gray Effect in Baltimore

Building on my previous post on data presentation, I did some grunt work to get a count of murders and shootings for each and every day since January 1, 2012. (If you think that’s easy or [that] can be readily downloaded, you’re wrong. Update: I could have saved a few hours of grunt work had I thought of using the …

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Police

Prelude to a post

Homicide is going up. It’s been going up for two years. And yet educated people still act shocked. I’m tired of refuting the homicide-increase deniers, but their arguments comes down to these collectively nonsensical points: A) homicide isn’t up in every city; B) homicide is up a whole lot in some cities; C) the increased risk of homicide isn’t spread…

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Police

Sometimes there are good guys and bad guys

A Baltimore police officer shot and killed an armed man who pointed a loaded gun at him. You’d think this would be cut and dried. But no. It’s Baltimore. I mean really, if any police-involved shooting is clear cut. It’s this one. Luckily for police, the cop had a body camera. Luckily it captures (barely) the key moment. Deal, a…

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Police

The best of times, the worst of times

Ah, the ol’ Tale of Two Cities trope. But the diverging homicidal paths of Chicago and New York City are striking. The New York Post has a surprisingly good (especially for the NY Post) article on homicide in Chicago and NYC. These are raw numbers and not a rate. Chicago is roughly one-third the size of New York City. [Notwithstanding…

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Police

White-On-White Crime (lots, but without homicide)

[This relates to my previous post] Years ago, like when I was 13, I was with my father, driving from NYC to Chicago, on a baseball road trip (he drove). Between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, we spent one night in Johnstown, PA. (Remember the Johnstown Flood!). After watching the Johnston Jonnies play baseball, we had dinner in a local bar. My…

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Police

It Depends What Your Definition of “Rose” Is

What’s your definition of “rose”? Leaving aside the one that “would smell as sweet,” mine is “goes up.” I ask because the headlinein the New York Times says: “Murder Rates Rose in a Quarter of the Nation’s 100 Largest Cities.” When you say homicides “rose” in 25 of 100 cities, you might think it didn’t rise in 75 cities. Since…

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