Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Weis creates new category of 'indoor' homicides

"Indoor" homicides are considered homicides that occurs inside people's homes. I would assume that would entail domestic violence amongst families. Police Superintendant Weis has police measure "outdoor" homicides separately from these "indoor" homicides. Ald. Lyle sees no distinctions:
Ald. Freddrenna Lyle (6th) has her hands full combating a surge of homicides in the South Side’s Gresham District.

She was also forced to lock or take down the basketball rims at Chatham’s Cole Park after two shootings at the courts in one month left several young people wounded.

Not surprisingly, Lyle draws no such distinction between indoor and outdoor homicides.

“I understand the logic — that police would have no way to know about what goes on inside peoples’ homes. But, I don’t necessarily believe that becomes a separate category when you’re talking about the number of people murdered in a city. The average citizen doesn’t make that distinction,” she said.

“I understand that what would go on inside my house this evening the superintendent would have no way of knowing and no way to intervene if there was an incident. But, it doesn’t diminish the numbers.”

Lyle said she’s grown “immune to the numbers game” being played with Chicago’s crime statistics.

“It doesn’t bother me. They do press conferences releasing reports that say homicides have gone down citywide. What I have to deal with is a community that knows that, maybe they’ve gone down citywide, but they’re up in my community,” she said.

“Crime is up tremendously in the 6th District. ... That’s because crime has moved as housing patterns have moved. [But], there’s been no real acknowledgement that crime has moved with the migration of people” tied to the so-called “Plan for Transformation” that demolished CHA high-rises.
So you may ask what makes an "outdoor" homicide. Well if a murder happens outside then there are witnesses and people are more likely to call police.

Hmmm we should address this issue involving the "Plan for Transformation". I think there is some truth to the crime moving from former CHA projects into the neighborhoods. Is there really any acknowledgement of that fact? And what can we do to prevent those who are prone to criminal activity from engaging in that activity outside of their CHA projects?

BTW, the rest of the article is worth a good read when you have time!

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