crime in your neighborhood 2012

Got home about 8:20 last night, entered lobby and headed for mailbox, guy runs in yelling "HOLD THE ELEVATOR" and runs into one going up. I get the mail and cops start rushing in, 6 or 7 in the next 2 minutes. Found out when they came to my apartment door about an hour later that the perp apparently stabbed someone about 2 blocks away.

This was my closest brush with such a thing in 20 years, since shortly after I moved to Brooklyn, but whaddya gonna do?

does cops beating up peaceful protesters count

This isn't in my neighborhood but we went out to the Rockaways on Sunday and drove down the part of Atlantic Avenue that goes through East New York toward JFK. At one intersection there's a police van blocking the street and yellow crime tape strung all the way across the whole intersection ... glancing down the block you could see upwards of 20 of those little yellow markers they put on the ground to show where shell casings landed.

Morbs were you actually in the elevator with this guy? Or just in the lobby

Oh never mind you were still getting mail when he ran by

Yeah, if I had been 20 seconds earlier I would've been in the elevator with him. I imagine he ditched the blade, but I think he musta been hyperventilating. It was an odd occurrence at first but I dismissed him as someone in a hurry for good or stupid reasons, so I didn't get any kind of look at him.

some guy got shot and killed around the corner from my house a month ago. admittedly I moved into a marginally-gentrifying area of Berkeley where there is still some kind of gang element, but it has been frustrating that, right around the corner from a nice residential street filled with kids, there is a liquor store, an illegal 'pot members-only club' (ie: not a licensed dispensary; the feds shut down that one, which was actually no hassle!) and people selling crack on the corner all day.

immediate neighborhood is p gentrified, v close to med center so lots of medical buildings etc. but it turns into 'bad town' p quick, area has been traditionally pretty poor & crime ridden ever since they built the freeways that carved the city up into isolated sections.

for the first few years after we moved in it was obvious - at least once a month there'd be police stops either across from our house or a few blocks down, random distant gunshots, police helicopters with full searchlights and loud speaker telling ppl to stay indoors were a pretty common occurence. spread out over months of course -- if it was every day we would have probably moved out right away, lol. When we first moved in there were also LOTS of hookers working pretty close by, then some of the neighborhoods around us starting posting 'no ho zone' posters and actively campaigned to clear them out, and I don't think I've seen any girls nearby in at least the last few years.

it seems to have slowly died away considerably in the past couple of years. we saw flashing blue lights the other night across the street but it turned out to be a random traffic stop which is kinda zzz around our neighborhood, lol.

the across the street neighbors are pretty cuckoo, there used to be a cop car over their at least 2 or 3 times a year, and the mom would be standing in the street screaming at someone, kids running all over...it's bad that i'm kind of nostalgic for that now, lol

cop was shot within earshot of my place earlier this year, although it was like 3/4 a mile away. Break-in in my buidling last week. Weird attack on a mom and her toddlers at the park a block from me recently (teenaged girls started pelting the TODDLERS with water balloons, then chased the family out of the park).

BTW moving.

most of the serious crime inmy neighborhood

err

most of the serious crime in my neighborhood, as with most of new york, involves dangerous driving. also a cop punched his poodle to death the other day.

what

wait no it wasn't a cop it was an nypb blue writer

nypd I give up

most of the crime in my neighborhood is people getting mugged for their iphones as they get off the subway. seems to have died down a bit though.

I don't think the clarification people were looking for was on whether he was a cop or not tbh

When I drove past Dorsey's Locker last night there were about 25 cops / 8 cop cars there, but also a pack of black dudes in suits filming the cops' every move. No idea what went down.

Do y'all live in the US? I don't think these stories are as common in the UK or the rest of Europe. In cities, encountering police tape on your way to work is common, even if you're middle class.

I live in a semi-urban area but all people do is sell marijuana. I go to the convenience store at 2 or 4 AM with no problem.

This seems to be a thread for talking about crime, not the lack of crime, in one's neighborhood. But just to temper the discussion, my neighborhood is extremely low crime. I feel safe everywhere and the 'police blotter' section of the local newspaper rarely lists anything more heinous than a car break-in. btw, I am in an adjacent suburb, not within Portland city limits.

I think I'm oblivious to things happening around me, tbh. I was walking home after dark last week and heard some POPs that may or may not have been gunshots, but I don't really know how different guns sound? These did not sound like fireworks to me, but tbh also didn't faze me when I heard them--nor anyone else on the street, either, who all kept doing what they were doing.

In other news:

"OAKLAND, Calif.—A body pulled from the Oakland Estuary had weights attached to it and police are calling the man's death suspicious."

YA THINK?

haha

expect this case to get solved NEVER

I hear gunshots every few weeks near my place. when we first moved in last august the first two times we heard them it was extremely alarming. now, almost a year later, it doesn't even faze me.

Dorsey's Locker! Oh Man! Hahaha ... that neighborhood has gentrified quite a bit though.

It has, but the Bushrod Park/Dorsey's part of it still makes me nervous.

One morning when I was walking to work last year there was a trail of blood on the sidewalk almost the whole way (10 min walk) that stopped in a large puddle of blood outside the subway station. I took pictures and posted them on some thread. By the time I went home that night it had been cleaned up and I couldn't find any evidence of what had happened in the news. Best guess is that someone was stabbed by the train and then ran home trailing the blood. It was extremely creepy.

Oakland is now the 4th most dangerous city!

yay us!

There've been a couple high profile shootings in Toronto lately in busy, touristy areas which is always lovely. A week after the one at our big mall I saw a couple dudes just chilling.. in bulletproof vests! Not security guards or anything. IMO skip the bulletproof vests and change who you're hanging out with if you think you need those. Which I guess is not as easy as typing the sentences of scorn was.

I live in the perfect neighbourhood - rich people to my left, poor to my right - my house will never be broken into. Yay.

St. Louis still going strong at #3, I see.

I've gotten used to playing the "firecrackers or gunshots?" game during the summer.
Had a number of people shot and killed on our street, mostly during summer months. One died on the building doorstep. Had the building stormed by a couple hundred cops about a year and a half ago to catch a "serial killer" (what they said). A kid in the building has gone missing.
This is in Flatbush, Brooklyn. SF was kinda comparable or maybe even worse when I lived there (some drive bys, the machete attacks, some gang shootings etc.) and when I was in Seattle there was a lot of shocking crime.
Kind of a bummer. Wish I could live in a nicer place.

Try Bed-Stuy! I was on my roof last night around 12 and for a while it was so quiet up there, you wouldn't have known anyone lived for blocks around if it weren't for their lights being on. Then a light changed and some traffic went by, but still the quietest place I've ever lived.

Most notable crime in my immediate neighborhood was back in November, a 17-year-old kid was shot and killed during a fight at a gas station about a mile from my house. Nothing really since then; my city is generally pretty free from violent crime.

Try Bed-Stuy! I was on my roof last night around 12 and for a while it was so quiet up there, you wouldn't have known anyone lived for blocks around if it weren't for their lights being on. Then a light changed and some traffic went by, but still the quietest place I've ever lived.

― how did I get here? why am I in the whiskey aisle? this is all so (Laurel), Wednesday, June 20, 2012 1:54 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I don't think it's been like that for very long

where are you in Bed Stuy? I subletted by the Myrtle Willoughby stop in the past, which was a bit uh dumpy, but otherwise I think I kinda love that whole neighborhood.
don't think my girlfriend wants to live there though :(

and, oh Flatbush, the *noise* is ridiculous. people setting up soundsystems in warm weather and yelling into microphones. it's a ridiculously loud neighborhood.

I'm off all the main streets, tucked into one of those residential pockets around the intersection of Halsey and Utica (within a few blocks). Utica just got another nice little coffee shop that sells nice pastries and will make you a fancy breakfast in the AM if you have time to wait! And there are a couple of cafes I haven't been to.

Bed Stuy seems like the place to live now if you want to live in the Fort Greene of several years ago, which is kind of where I want to live, except that it's a terrible commute for me.

Also we came to the conclusion that we don't want to rent again in a "next hot area" only to have to move again in a couple years, and we'd prefer a neighborhood with more preschool options and the like.

yeah ok I love that Utica stop zone.
anyway, despite all the stories above, I don't think I've heard any shots etc. yet this year. maybe 2012 is when Flatbush turns it all around.

SF was kinda comparable or maybe even worse when I lived there (some drive bys, the machete attacks, some gang shootings etc.)

wtf?! machete attacks

there have been some minor robberies in my building, mostly crimes of opportunity (dude following a delivery guy in and stealing packages, then a bike, etc.)

there was a gang shooting at like 2am about a block away a few months ago. been pretty quiet in general.

/bragging

apparently cyclists on shotwell and capp are getting knocked off their bikes and robbed.

xp shakey - do you live near Ben?

I heard a siren last week, but it turned out to be an ambulance, not a cop. #noteverythinginthebooniesisbad

people in the building two doors up called the cops about what they'd assumed were gunshots. Pretty sure their "gunshots" were the fireworks I saw on the same block as my friends' place about 5 blocks away. n.b. there do tend to be gunshots around there, too.

also n.b. the cops responded to the call the next day.

xp shakey - do you live near Ben?

yep, just 3 blocks away. used to live across the street from him, altho that was like 15 years ago. jesus I'm old.

also lol cops

Mission goes nuts with fireworks on July 4th, kids probably just getting a head start

http://www.pressherald.com/news/Mass-woman-drives-car-onto-golf-course-into-sand-trap-.html

i live in the prostitution capital of San diego and often see uncomfortable looking women and sweaty gross men haggling in cars on the next block

my block is cool tho

xxp - in November, I will have lived in the same apartment for 15 years.

xp: when I lived in North Park, I worked at the Hollywood Video on El Cajon. Our parking lot had to have been the absolute epicenter of prostitution in the area. Girls would come into our bathroom to redo their make-up and sometimes hide from people.

I think crime is pretty low around here these days, although there were a couple "Nude man on PCP refuses to be arrested" stories in the news a couple weeks ago that make me think it's gonna be a poppin' summer.

look out for nude men on drugs :-/

someone tried to steal my car recently. i'd left my lights on the day before, and my dead battery sat on my kitchen table. had they gotten in before the neighbor caught them they would have been confused.

"OAKLAND, Calif.—A body pulled from the Oakland Estuary had weights attached to it and police are calling the man's death suspicious."

YA THINK?

apparently it was suicide. dude was from susanville.

so this happened directly in front of my house this afternoon:

http://www.berkeleyside.com/2012/06/20/berkeley-police-investigating-shots-fired-in-south-berkeley/

while little kids were on bikes on the sidewalk. my son was sitting by the front window and my wife had to yell at him to get down. target was some dumbass who lives up the street who has taken to sitting on the fire hydrant on the corner an awful lot, selling dime bags I assume. he left a trail of blood in front of my house.

we've lived here a year, maybe we'll put the house up for sale now.

geez. neighbor told me tonight that someone in her building got mugged at gunpoint almost directly under my window saturday evening (i wasn't home).

also there is that 19th and Capp rape story making the rounds. Crime week in the bay area!

2 violent muggings on the street outside my flat in the last couple of months, my wife was home both times and had to give statements to police. Apart from that, nothing much happening really. Seems like my street is most dangerous around 5pm tbh. I think they're targetting shoppers (I live just off the High St)

nothing i can think of, though it's quite possible i would remain unaware unless something was serious enough to warrant one of those yellow 'did you notice' signs or got actual coverage

so this is the perp who ran into my building:

The victim was walking along _____ Avenue around 8:20 p.m. when he bumped into a man carrying a computer. The computer fell to the ground, and the man carrying it allegedly responded by punching the other man in the face.

The victim fell to the ground, and as he tried to stand, the suspect procured a knife and stabbed him in the abdomen. The victim was transported to Lutheran Hospital, where he remains in stable condition,

This was the attack at my local park

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Cooper-Park-Mom-Water-Balloon-Attack-Girl--158960595.html

also there is that 19th and Capp rape story making the rounds

wait waht I didn't hear about this

also omg man sorry yr kid had to go through that. time to up stakes (if you can)

it's one house on thh block and one person in that house that is causing the problems. the block itself has little kids in every other house. so I think we can do something about this. we can't afford to live anywhere nicer unfortunately.

capp st rape: http://missionlocal.org/2012/06/30-year-old-woman-allegedly-raped-on-19th-and-capp-sts/

yeah I googled that. the implication of that article is that she didn't file a police report...?

yeah it's a little confusing if you read the comments, there are a number of people who say they know friends of hers and claim she did, but someone also talked to the SFPD and they couldn't find any record of it. not that I doubt that the SFPD would lose important crap, they don't fill me with confidence.

I hate the Mission District cops with a passion so yeah I'm not one to expect quality police work

but by way of comparison, this reads quite differently from how the recent assaults at Potrero and 24th were handled (cops asking the community for help catching a suspect, community meetings, perp eventually caught etc.)

the warehouse around the corner burned down last night. four ladder trucks. cops told my neighbor it started in the dumpster so now he's sure it's arson.

when I lived in kansas City my car had its windows smashed and things stloen three times in one year - then I learned to leave the doors unlocked and still do today in nice Maine. there were alos many armed gang-muggings in my hood. it sucked. fuck that town

I had several car break-ins in New Brunswick and Jersey City, NJ. Once someone smashed my rear window and stole (as far as I could tell) nothing other than a free Trick Daddy CD I had gotten from my school newspaper. Another time I stupidly left a scanner I used for work in the trunk of my car, and someone was smart enough to break in and open the trunk, which needn't really be all that smart I guess.

http://www.pressherald.com/news/Police-Windsor-fuel-thieves-caught-on-camera.html

Second break-in this month in my building. Oddly, the reports don't seem to show up in local papers/websites even though the police were notified, which makes me think crime in my area is generally underreported.

crime in my area is generally underreported.

reports of my death are greatly underreported

I live in the middle of Turkish / Kurdish gang territory which probably keeps visible crime much lower than it would be in other areas. What little crime we do have tends to be horrible though - there's usually a couple of shootings every year within a quarter-mile of my flat.

spent 20 minutes this morning talking to neighbor dude i had never met before who had just finished chasing a guy who had broken into his car and stolen his laptop, keys, phone, etc.

cool, he probably needed someone to talk to after that

nothing but tagging going on in my hood, this thread makes me thankful that all I have to do is paint over it.

live next to the red light district. few months ago dude raped a girl and sexually assaulted another one about 1km from my building. there was a brothel in my building, romanian prostitutes. it got shut down by the cops about a year ago.

then just generally booze-fuelled violence. glasgow's reputation is worse than the reality but it's not completely unfounded.

same with oakland tbh

im moving to strathcona, vancouver in 8 days so i'll have a different story to tell then i guess.

I live around the corner from the house mentioned in this article - http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/SF-DA-Evidence-points-to-revenge-killing-of-pimp-3689126.php

That one house is probably responsible for 99 percent of the crime in the area. I know a few months ago the cops were sitting out there 24/7 on the corner. I have lived in the area since I was in college, over 15 years, and everything always goes back to that same house.

The house is also mentioned in this book http://www.amazon.com/Painted-Ladies-Franciscos-Resplendent-Victorians/dp/052548244X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341798247&sr=8-1&keywords=Painted+ladies+san+francisco

apparently there was just a shooting on 24th and Harrison - in San Francisco?

http://www.timesledger.com/stories/2013/36/rapepatternforestpark_web_2013_09_05_q.html

Fucked up -- same guy has apparently been doing this for two years.

So that article someone posted to the Breaking Bad thread about the plight of confidential informers has got me interested in news and analysis about crime. Are there any news websites that do just this?

http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_23191897/oakland-robbery-capital-america

My city is the Robbery Capital of the US yet again

Don't brag.

http://www.korthalsaltes.com/photo/glitter-dodecahedron-02.jpg

Did you have that queued up?

no, but i am having an angry day

Oh, sorry.

is there crime in your neighborhood? a friend who lives around the corner from me got his car broken into and bike stolen a few weeks ago.

I was living on 14th Ave, on the edge of San Antonio. There was crime. A guy running from the cops was chased to our walkway. He jumped off and was cuffed in the neighbor's yard. But I wouldn't really say "there was crime" to somebody. There's crime everywhere, so only in that sense was there crime. The kids talked about 14th Ave boogeymen but it was all out of proportion to what it's really like. It's folk sociology.

Then I was living near you again. People get their cars broken into on Perry, but big deal. I'd say there's very little crime near you. I hear about it sometimes. One of the substitute teachers was talking about a woman being robbed at gunpoint (they took her car but I don't think she was in it? so I guess it's a carjacking, but she described it as being "robbed") in Cleveland Heights, and I said, "Is there really crime out there?" and she said in a knowing way, "There's crime because people THINK there isn't any crime. They let their guard down." But I think she's wrong and I think that incident was an anomaly. I take walks and eat pizza and Thai food there. The woman is nice, but old and high-strung.

Then I'm living by Coolidge. There's crime, I guess. I don't hear about it. I don't worry about crime in Dimond or Laurel or Allendale. One of my students complains about walking alone in the School neighborhood, but he is a tiny 11 year old Karen kid. Literally everyone is bigger than him.

Crime hasn't been an issue for me, even when my bike got stolen or I sort of got mugged. You look at the photographs of all the people who get killed in Oakland and they're almost all brown men. It's really depressing.

Mostly I'm kind of shocked by how safe Forest Hills, Queens feels. I mean I know there's some crime, but I've left my car unlocked a whole bunch of times and even left a gps in view and nothing is ever taken. It doesn't really seem logical that a neighborhood so transit-accessible from so many other places would be completely safe. All that said, there was a push-in rape in Rego Park, the next neighborhood over -- dude followed a woman from the train. And there have apparently been a few jogger rapes over the last few years in Forest Park (border of my neighborhood and a couple others) that are now believed to be the same attacker.

xp - there's still a handful of holiday cards from various relatives of yours sitting around here. I will gladly send them to you if I knew where to send them.