Finally, local media and the police are discussing what Bay View residents already knew -- There's a crime problem in the area, a BIG problem.
The crime spree has made the TV news.
Why now?
Maybe people freak out when a Starbucks gets robbed.
That's the tipping point, I guess.
Actually, I think the TV coverage was related to the police department's statement on Tuesday that 20 area businesses have been robbed since December.
From The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
Bay View business owners gathered Monday at the former VFW post to talk with officials about crime prevention in a neighborhood that has been shook up by an armed bandit.
...Milwaukee police said Tuesday that there have been 20 similar robberies of businesses in the neighborhood since December, starting with Fantasy Gifts.
"We can't say they're all related, but we are looking at them as a group because of the similarities," Police Department spokeswoman Anne E. Schwartz said.
The method is usually the same. The robber walks in with a gun, sometimes orders customers to the ground, demands money from a cashier and flees. He covers his face with a scarf. More recently, he began wearing sunglasses. No one has been hurt.
He was described as a white man, about 5 feet 8 inches to 5 feet 9 inches tall with a stocky build. On Monday, he wore a blue, thigh-length jacket, a dark-colored hooded sweat shirt and baggy blue jeans. He also wore white winter gloves. He carried a gray, semiautomatic gun.
Bill Sell, who has lived in Bay View for 24 years, said he and others will gather out in front of Bella's Fat Cat, 2737 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., at 8 tonight to walk the neighborhood. Bella's was robbed Feb. 18.
On the whole, Bay View residents are committed to their neighborhood.
They've invested in their homes and businesses; and some, if not most, won't surrender what they've built without a fight.
Unfortunately, the media and the police aren't doing a very good job of informing the public about the crime explosion.
This JS article, for example, is misleading.
The way it's written, it sounds as if the suspect in the robberies has been a white man.
Not so.
Applebee's was robbed a week ago by a black man.
Patrons of an Applebee's in Bay View were ordered to the ground at gunpoint when the restaurant was robbed late last night.
The suspect entered the restaurant, 270 W. Holt Ave., at 10:15 p.m. and pointed the gun at customers. He took a cash drawer and fled, according to police.
Police described the suspect as being a black male in his 30s, 6'1" tall and wearing a puffy coat with a fur hood.
This man had a gun. He ordered patrons to the floor; but he wasn't white and he wasn't short.
In some of the other robberies, a trio of men wearing masks committed the crimes, not one stocky white man.
A threesome ordered restaurant patrons to the floor as they robbed Tenuta's in January. Three men wearing masks also robbed Layton Heights bar. That was in December.
So, the theory is the robberies are connected, even though in some cases the perpetrators were three men wearing masks, in another case the crime was committed by a lone black man with a fur-hooded puffy coat, and in other instances the robber is a stocky white man.
It's hard to compile complete information on the crimes since reports often didn't provide details of the robberies beyond the fact that the suspect (or suspects) was male and had a gun.
In sum, it's clear that the method is NOT usually the same.
It certainly doesn't appear that one person is responsible for all or most of the robberies.
Why give the impression that one person is behind the crime outbreak?
Is there supposed to be some comfort in believing that there's just one suspect, a stocky white guy?
If so, it's a false sense of comfort because it's not true.
There's more than one person preying on Bay View and far south side businesses.
That's not what the print and broadcast media are reporting, and it's not what the police department is leading the public to believe.
A dose of reality is badly needed.
No comments:
Post a Comment