CRIME IN NYC 2005: A return to the Bad Ol' Days?

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Actress shot and fiance pistol-whipped outside of Max Fish last night in botched robbery/mugging attempt. Meanwhile, uptown at a W.76th street Sushi restaurant, a stick-up goes down perpetrated by gun-wielding felon in "Michael Mayers" mask.

What the fuck is up? It's 1975 all over again. Where's Charles Bronson and Bernie Goetz when we need'em?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:16 (twenty-one years ago)

outside of max fish? whoa.

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:18 (twenty-one years ago)

"Meanwhile, non-white, non-young, non-beautiful non-acting random person killed in NYC last night during a mugging; nobody cares."

(Not saying you think this, Mr. Alex; it's just that a friend at work and I noticed this cover story today and were spooling out the assumptions that went into hyping this particular incident.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:19 (twenty-one years ago)

well that's the post for ya.

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:19 (twenty-one years ago)

well they were leaving max fish and it happened on rivington & clinton. like 2 blocks from my house. at 3:30am. which is just about the same route i take when stumbling home from darkroom/maxfish. oh well.

― phil-two (phil-two), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:21 (twenty-one years ago)

I suggest the NYTimes coverage of it (less sweeping hyperbole, though the `Post story piles on the needless pathos, as you'd imagine).

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:21 (twenty-one years ago)

what happened to the model chick who got shot on the subway last year?

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:22 (twenty-one years ago)

i wonder if this is going to lower my property value!

― phil-two (phil-two), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:24 (twenty-one years ago)

oh like you own.

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:24 (twenty-one years ago)

what sucks even more about this was that she was not even alone. She was with 3 other people and the 2 guys were walking away when she got shot.

― S!monB!rch (Carey), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:27 (twenty-one years ago)

And what about this summer in Williamsburg when some girl was attacked with a MEAT CLEAVER on Graham and Devoe.

― S!monB!rch (Carey), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:28 (twenty-one years ago)

yes while she did the smart thing by standing around being badgirl shouting "what're you gonna do, shoot me?"

― phil-two (phil-two), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:28 (twenty-one years ago)

the meat cleaver thing was actually over on Bushwick, because it happened right by a friend's house. It wasn't on the street, it was in a lady's apartment.

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:31 (twenty-one years ago)

that's weird, i read in the paper that it was on the street and all the neighbors came running out. were there 2 meat cleaver incidents?

― S!monB!rch (Carey), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:34 (twenty-one years ago)

actually, i just remember it was on devoe and near the graham stop so it might be the same one.

― S!monB!rch (Carey), Friday, 28 January 2005 23:35 (twenty-one years ago)

that guy who was murdered at orchard and broome a year or two ago? i heard that gunshot. craziness. and don't forget the two women gangraped in williamsburg last year. things ain't great here by any means.

― Jams Murphy (ystrickler), Saturday, 29 January 2005 00:04 (twenty-one years ago)

still nyc is safer than most big cities. see: mexico city, moscow, rio, grozny

― phil-two (phil-two), Saturday, 29 January 2005 00:12 (twenty-one years ago)

well, yeah. it's in an industrialized nation with a decent economy.

― Magic City (ano ano), Saturday, 29 January 2005 00:31 (twenty-one years ago)

okay, well i still feel safer here than in london and paris.

― phil-two (phil-two), Saturday, 29 January 2005 00:36 (twenty-one years ago)

I feel safer here than I did in Suburban Melbourne

― Seuss, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:20 (twenty-one years ago)

the michael meyers mask is a nice touch

― come on sock it to me, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:23 (twenty-one years ago)

I remember that the post was full of heroic stories of white people surviving the Tsunami and carrying on with their vacations when I was in NYC.

― Reviewer: Sir Potomus (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews (ex machina), Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:25 (twenty-one years ago)

If you felt unsafe in suburban Melbourne then I suggest you had paranoia problems.

NOTHING happens here.

― Andrew (enneff), Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:26 (twenty-one years ago)

Not true. I had a bottle smashed in my face for no reason while walking near Dandenong Station one night, and had my ipod stolen and my nose broken while walking in Springvale about a month later.

I'm talking outer suburban here. Where kids get bored and turn to random violence.

― Seuss, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:34 (twenty-one years ago)

in boston, there was a rise in crime last year and from every story i read, the thugs are getting younger and younger. maybe the slain actress thought 12year olds wouldn't be packing. maybe the attackers werent kids-who knows, was the rest of her group to drunk to get a face on any of the 5 attackers? so sad

― come on sock it to me, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:43 (twenty-one years ago)

It is because 50 cengt made it cool to sell crack rock

― Marque, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:45 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah, that's it. brilliant

― come on sock it to me, Saturday, 29 January 2005 01:47 (twenty-one years ago)

When I lived on Jane St a few years ago the garbage men found a dude dead in the trash at the end of the block. It wasn't news, though.

― mcd (mcd), Saturday, 29 January 2005 03:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Across the street from ilx approved Corner Bistro.

― mcd (mcd), Saturday, 29 January 2005 03:13 (twenty-one years ago)

What sushi restaurant?

― TOMBOT, Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Raku?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:31 (twenty-one years ago)

Yep, Raku on West 76th

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:33 (twenty-one years ago)

Where's Charles Bronson and Bernie Goetz when we need'em?

whatever bernie wants, bernie goetz:

http://www.navs-online.org/fest02/photos/Bernie_Goetz.jpg

― amanda lear (Jody Beth Rosen), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:39 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.bernieformayor.com/

― amanda lear (Jody Beth Rosen), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:41 (twenty-one years ago)

The man EMBODIES the veritable quitnessence of "Charisma," does he not?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Fucking hell, I miss the Veg City Diner.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Saturday, 29 January 2005 04:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Me too! Although my last time there I had a tragic ketchup incident.

OK, I've been full-time in NYC for just over 2 1/2 years, and it seems like every 6 months or so one of these random tabloid-shockah murders or muggings makes big news, and it always makes me jump a little, but then I remember there are 8 million people here day in and day out and if one person getting shot still makes big multi-day news, things are probably not so bad. And yes, the white actress/waitress will always get more headlines than the nonwhite nonactress waitress, and the city is averaging somewhere between 1 and 2 homicides a day right now, but once you factor out your drug-relateds and your plain old related-relateds, the incidence of people being killed or even assaulted by straight-up strangers is low low low.

On the other hand, if the perpetually looming fiscal crisis isn't dealt with a little more aggressively by mssrs. Bloomberg and Pataki -- i.e. by some means other than just cutting services left and right -- it's not like it would be impossible to backslide into the days when my aunt lived here and she and everyone she knew got mugged at least once a year.

― gypsy mothra (gypsy mothra), Saturday, 29 January 2005 10:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I remember growing up in the late 70's and early 80's, getting mugged was a more common threat/occurence (I was mugged as a grade schooler about three times). Giulliani, for all his quirks and faults, came in post-Dinkins and sincerley cleaned house in the crime department. This isn't to say that crime vanished entirely, but suddenly, it was relatively safe to walk the streets.

To hear about a random mugging now (let alone one that escalates tragically into murder) just seems like such an antiquated concept, regardless of the races involved.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 29 January 2005 10:11 (twenty-one years ago)

"outside of max fish? whoa."

Twenty years ago, you wouldn't have walked down that street -- or anywhere south of Houston on the LES -- unless you were URGENTLY looking to cop dope (or making arrests). Clinton Street, now a restaurant row, used to scare me to death -- in the daytime.

While these incidents are upsetting, let's hope they're isolated and don't represent a return to the full-scale/free ranging climate of fear that marked NYC in the bad old days. I'm not especially nostalgic for the time when you'd be riding the subway, say, casually look up from your book, and encounter some lunatic grinning at you w/a razor blade in between his teeth.

― lovebug starski (lovebug starski), Saturday, 29 January 2005 12:52 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh, Bloomberg knows what he's doing. The Raku II Robber's getaway was brilliantly foiled when he tried to flee on the C train.

― Paul Eater (eater), Saturday, 29 January 2005 15:40 (twenty-one years ago)

Ha.

Alex don't forget that Giuliani was the beneficiary of a nation-wide drop in crime that paralleled NYC's!

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Saturday, 29 January 2005 15:57 (twenty-one years ago)

ten years ago it wasn't even that great.

― hstencil (hstencil), Saturday, 29 January 2005 17:54 (twenty-one years ago)

so the police caught them already. one of the kids involved lives on a street in my neighborhood.

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 07:12 (twenty-one years ago)

the girl was from mn, this made the news here.

― f--gg (gcannon), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 07:21 (twenty-one years ago)

its worth pointing out that rivington and clinton, LES-wise, is NOT near max fish. figuratively its worlds away, really. closer to the much cushier schiller's.

― noizem duke (noize duke), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 08:25 (twenty-one years ago)

also tonic and esp. rothko for that matter

― noizem duke (noize duke), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 08:34 (twenty-one years ago)

I lived on that block -- next door to ABC No Rio -- in '94-95 (heroin boom, pre-Lansky Lounge vibe, daily busts in front of the bodega), and I was usually hyper-aware of my surroundings. Still, I got mugged on East Houston, jumped from behind, sometime in those 10 months.

It's wise not to "boulevard" on the LES like you're on Madison Ave at noon.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 14:31 (twenty-one years ago)

stick-up goes down perpetrated by gun-wielding felon in "Michael Mayers" mask.

i think these kompakt fans are getting a bit out of hand!

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 14:41 (twenty-one years ago)

hahaha yeah we were talking about your old hood sunday night morbs!

my roommates have both been mugged in the past 6 months.

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 17:38 (twenty-one years ago)

a stick-up goes down perpetrated by gun-wielding felon in "Michael Mayers" mask.

My first thought upon reading this was WTF is wrong with Kompakt fans these days. Is it that hard to find the money to buy new 12"s? Also where can I buy a Michael Mayer mask! I wanna be him for Halloween haha

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 17:41 (twenty-one years ago)

its worth pointing out that rivington and clinton, LES-wise, is NOT near max fish. figuratively its worlds away, really. closer to the much cushier schiller's.

True, but they were on their way home from Max Fish, as it turns out...hence its mention (although, as you say, it's far enough away from the spot that I wonder why the `Post referred to it as a "Bar Mugging"...it's like like it went down in a bar).

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 18:04 (twenty-one years ago)

Same diff: the bulk of the surprise, for me, is that it was late Thursday in a neighborhood generally full of bars and Bloomberg's unique new Outdoor Smokers' Crime Observation Squads.

I'm with Gypsy on a lot of things. And in Manhattan I tend to feel significantly safer than I did in equivalent Chicago spots. Which may just be a result of still having holdover Chicago thought patterns -- busy well-lit places good, long cold blocks past abandoned warehouses bad -- that don't fit as neatly here; but generally I think it's true.

Her "what are you going to do, shoot us" is the thing that vexes the whole story and makes me groan and not want to think of it; the whole thing is terrible but then imagining that line just throws it all off for me. Especially since, according to her boyfriend, the whole robbery was already going terribly, and the shooters accomplices were already trying to keep him from flipping out and doing weird shit.

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 21:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe everyone would benefit from the adoption of a nationwide robbery etiquette. Kind of like a fair catch in football, you know: you're robbing me? No complaints here, let's take our time and make this pleasant for everyone.

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 1 February 2005 21:04 (twenty-one years ago)

oof, walking home on my block just now, some kids from across the street threw a glass bottle at me, but missed, then when i got to the door, i saw them from the corner of my eye running towards me - managed to open the door and it shut behind me like half a second before they got there. they started banging on the door and i just kept walking. ugh

― phil-two (phil-two), Saturday, 5 February 2005 06:03 (twenty-one years ago)

That sucks, Phil, I'm sorry to hear that. What `hood are you in again?

Go pour yourself a drink.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 5 February 2005 06:13 (twenty-one years ago)

in the LES, except more east towards the housing projects, and farther from the hipster circus. like 2 blocks from where the girl got murdered last week. i would have gotten my head bashed in. which would have doubly sucked since i dont have any insurance

― phil-two (phil-two), Saturday, 5 February 2005 06:19 (twenty-one years ago)

fuck, i cant sleep. really paranoid now. hopefully i'll forgot about it by the morning

― phil-two (phil-two), Saturday, 5 February 2005 07:49 (twenty-one years ago)

I lived in the LES for two years and never had the slightest sense of danger anywhere. But last time I was back in NYC I did get chased, and it felt horrible. So I'm feeling for Phil here.

― Momus (Momus), Saturday, 5 February 2005 10:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Be watchful, Phil.

Did anyone see the news photo of the murdered woman's fiance holding a torch aloft after lighting up some kind of representation of her body... AT THE CRIME SCENE??

I honestly don't have any problem judging him to be a dick.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 5 February 2005 16:37 (twenty-one years ago)

i've felt safe here for a long time but i remember how it used to be, when things were so bad women were urged not to wear jewelry on the subway. new york used to look like san francisco in terms of the number of scary homeless crackheads wandering around. i don't know how many of the lower east side hipsters lived in town back when tompkins square park and the pedestrian mall in the middle of allen st. were campsites for the homeless, filled with shopping carts and garbage bags and grubby blankets. union square was a semi-deserted industrial area instead of a model hangout, and penn station and the port authority were REALLY FUCKIN' SCARY at night. even if we're having a crime wave now, the city's come a long long way.

― oskar shindig! (Jody Beth Rosen), Saturday, 5 February 2005 20:58 (twenty-one years ago)

last night a cop car fucking trailed me down kent, lights flashing, going slow on the opposite side of the street where i was walking! and stopped in front of me. sometimes cops can be scarier than criminals.

― hstencil (hstencil), Saturday, 5 February 2005 22:51 (twenty-one years ago)

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