A Sign of Things to Come?
I took some time off to go be with my son. He’s doing better by the way, but still has a way to go. But as I was doing my checking on Indianapolis I was disturbed at a trend I was starting to see. Last week we had seven homicides in the Circle City.
What’s frightening though is that there were two double murders in two days. I was worried about this. I was worried that as soon as the weather got more accommodating people would start acting silly.
Although there is no official homicide count yet, by some estimates the total number is 17, with seven occurring in the last week. If we keep it up at this rate (a murder every three days) We’ll have 60 murders by the middle of the year which puts us on track for another record homicide year. Back in June 30, 2006 there were 69 homicides in Marion County. In June 2005 at this time there were only 45 homicides. This is not a good sign.
What makes matters worse is that these are the coldest months of the year when criminals should be staying behind closed doors. If they are this bad now, what is going to be like this summer, or for that matter, this spring. And unlike last year, law enforcement faces new challenges that were not there last year. Officers are still upset over no contract, there are not enough of them on patrol covering their beats. Up to 200 of them could retire by the end of the year and there are not enough to come through the ranks of the current class. In addition, while the city is moving officers from behind desks and putting them on the streets, I am told that a backlog of cases is continuing to grow.
I honestly hope things don’t get as bad as last year, but I really do think they are going to get worse unless something changes soon. I can afford to leave and so can many of my friends, but a lot of other people can’t and they will end up being the real victims.
