Another "chocolate" city.
On Sat, 23 Jun 2007 05:19:28 -0500, "Busta Capp" <wh@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>Summer's beginning: 6 dead in one day
>
>By Andrew Maykuth,Vernon Clark and Art Carey
>Jun. 22, 2007
>
>On the first day of summer, two violent outbursts less than 15 hours
apart
>and about two miles from each other left five people dead and a sixth
person
>clinging to life. And before the night ended, another homicide was
recorded,
>this time in Kingsessing.
>
>Thursday's six slayings - three young men gunned down in North
Philadelphia
>in the early hours; two people killed, one critically wounded, in
Kensington
>in the afternoon; and an unidentified man shot to death about 10:30 p.m.
in
>Southwest Philadelphia's Kingsessing neighborhood - pushed the year's
>homicide total to 195, compared with 177 at the same time last year,
police
>said.
>
>Few details were available in the Kingsessing shooting, other than that
the
>victim was found near 54th Street and Willows Avenue. He had been shot in
>the chest.
>
>In Kensington, police said gunfire erupted at Somerset and Emerald
Streets
>about 5:10 p.m., leaving a man and woman dead and another woman in
critical
>condition.
>
>Police said Raheem Haines, 20, was declared dead at the scene. Two
sisters
>were taken to Temple University Hospital, where one, Diana Patrick, 30,
was
>pronounced dead. The surviving sister's name was not released because she
>was a witness. She was in critical condition.
>
>Initial re****ts indicated that police were looking for two men who drove
off
>in a vehicle. They were later arrested away from the scene, and were
being
>interviewed late Thursday night at Police Headquarters. A homicide
>investigator said they would likely be charged overnight.
>
>At the scene, a detective said the shootings apparently resulted from an
>argument, but it was unclear over what.
>
>The slayings occurred in a neighborhood of tattered rowhouses that one
>resident described as "a melting pot - black, white, Hispanic, all
kinds."
>Alleys are littered with tires. Vacant lots sprout waist-high weeds. The
>yards of supply houses and body shops are protected by chain-link fences
>topped with concertina wire.
>
>Hours after the shooting, detectives were still working the neighborhood,
>and about a dozen markers near Haines' body indicated where the spent
>cartridges had fallen during the fusillade.
>
>Dozens of neighbors gathered behind the yellow crime-scene tape that
>cordoned off the intersection.
>
>"Didn't see nuthin'," one middle-aged man said gruffly in reply to a
>re****ter's question. "You know how it goes down here."
>
>When it came time to remove the body, the police surrounded it with
>vehicles, and two members of the crime scene unit held up a sheet to
block
>the view of spectators.
>
>"That's . . . ignorant," a woman complained.
>
>"No, it's respect or something," said a man next to her. Another man saw
the
>corpse as an object lesson, a warning.
>
>"Get the . . . out of Philadelphia," he remarked to a bystander. "It will
.
>. . grab y'all."
>
>Less than 15 hours earlier in the Ludlow section of North Philadelphia,
>three young men were killed in a burst of gunfire in the 1600 block of
North
>Sixth Street.
>
>Police said they had no suspects and no witnesses in the triple slaying,
>which occurred about 2:30 a.m.
>
>The three men were approached on foot by "either an individual or several
>individuals," said Homicide Sgt. William Gallagher. About a dozen spent
>casings were left on the pavement on the tree-lined block, along with the
>three bodies.
>
>The victims apparently were not armed or did not return fire, police
said.
>
>One of the victims, Bruce Burman, 23, lived on the block. The other two
were
>identified as a cousin of Burman's, Bobby Lundy, 25, of the 6400 block of
>North Broad Street, and Sean White, 19, of the 1400 block of North
Marshall
>Street.
>
>Police said the three victims had "been through the system" before -
>including narcotics arrests. Although two of the men had survived
previous
>shootings, neighbors and relatives insisted that they were not thugs.
>
>"They were not dummies, and they had families that loved and sup****ted
>them," said Marcia Green, who described herself as Burman's godmother and
>Lundy's cousin. She was aroused from sleep by the gunfire and rushed out
to
>the street to find her relatives dead. "None of them had been involved in
>crime," she said.
>
>According to family members, Burman was a graduate of Kensington High
>School, Lundy had a GED, and White was planning to attend Op****tunities
>Industrial Center in the fall.
>
>Lynette White, the mother of the youngest victim, said her son was shot
in
>his left side three months ago, and he still ha a bullet lodged in his
>chest.
>
>Lundy's relatives said he had survived a shooting last summer.
>
>Scott P. Charles, trauma outreach coordinator at Temple University
Hospital,
>said it was not unusual to see a gunshot victim who had been shot before.
>Often, gunshot victims return to the street intent on settling scores.
>
>"We're patching them up, and they're sending us back a couple more, if
they
>don't come back dead themselves," Charles said.
>
>Protest marches and expressions of moral outrage had proven ineffective
at
>curbing the culture of violence, he added.
>
>"We might just be past the tipping point; shootings have become so
normative
>that it becomes part of the neighborhood culture," he said. "I don't know
>how you fix that with a protest march."
>
>Though the city's homicide total is growing at a pace to surpass last
year's
>total of 406 homicides, the city is still behind the city's worst year
for
>homicides, 1990, when 500 were recorded.
>
>While the total number of homicide is still far shy of the record, the
>city's murder rate is getting perilously close to the high point.
>Philadelphia had a murder rate of 27.8 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2006,
>compared with 31.5 in 1990. The rate was 18.9 per 100,000 in 2002 when
288
>murders were recorded.
>
>Thursday's slayings followed a busy night with two homicides on
Wednesday.
>
>At 11:16 p.m. Wednesday, police found a man shot in the chest, arm and
groin
>in the 400 block of North Sickels Street. He was pronounced dead at the
>Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and remained unidentified.
>
>A few hours earlier, police said Theophilius Mason, 46, was gunned down
near
>his home in the 200 block of North Paxon Street. Shot in the chest, back
and
>arm, Mason was pronounced dead at 5:36 p.m. at the same hospital.
>
>
>
--
So I sit and write and ponder, while the house is deaf
and dumb. Seeing visions over yonder of the war I know
must come. In the corner-not a vision-but a sign of
coming days, stands a box of ammunition, and a rifle
in green baize. And in this, the living present, let
the word go through the land. Every tradesman, clerk
and peasant, should have these two things at hand. No,
no ranting song is needed, and no meeting, flag or
fuss-In the future, still unheeded, shall the Spirit
come to us. Without feathers, drum or riot, on the
day that is to be. We shall march down very quiet,
to our stations by the sea. While the bitter parties
stifle every voice that warns of war. Every man should
have a rifle. And cartridges in store. (Henry Lawson)
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