Per the commentary article linked below, I have to admit I thought the “get super tough on crime” approach used in NY, and other cities in the mid 80’s and into the 90’s, pretty much beat back this kind of rampant, terrorist style criminality that was the bane of the 70’s and 80’s urban environment, but it seems (according to the article) to still be a real problem in LA. Is this article correct in that a there are “hot zone” areas of LA that are near “Mogadishu like” in their lawlessness?
Why hasn’t LA cleaned these areas the way NY did theirs?
Well in Detroit I’m not sure if part or all of the city but in shooting 911 calls an ambulance isn’t allowed to respond until the police have arrived for an escourt.
And stopping devils night (10/30) was the worst thing…when crime’s this bad just let the place burn from end to end and rebuild later.
Do you have a cite for this assertion, cause it sounds highly improbable to me that an Iowa EMT is going to wait on a police escort before they go to pick up a farmer or suburbanite having a heart attack.
The most dangerous spot in LA is Nickerson Gardens Housing Project.
The cops raid the place all the time. Brutal area.
The safest area is Downtown Civic Center. I suggest to anyone to Park at the Music Center and walk around for about 5 blocks North, West or South direction. Especially at evening this time of year. Beautiful.
Bunco artists aren’t unusual, but rarely any crime beyond that. Anyone walking up to you that tells the tale of a problem and needs money is a Bunco artist, and a good one.
My brother is a 36 year LAPD officer, mostly on this beat.
Devil’s night is an arsonists free-for-all. (Or was. Guess it’s gone out of style now.) I’d have liked to have a googled page for you, but it’s all coming up as song lyrics.
Devil’s Night in Detroit used to be nasty - the night before Halloween, punks would go out and set things on fire. At its worst, the firebugs would start the burning two or even three days before Halloween. I remember one newspaper headline on Halloween morning sometime in the mid-80s that was just a number, “238.” That was the number of fires set the night before.
After that year, the mayor and city council decided to put an end to it; the next year there was a huge campaign for volunteers to walk the streets on Devil’s Night - redubbed Angel’s Night - enforced curfews, increased police presence, patrolling fire engines, a big community effort. They got the numbers of fires down all right. The next year, there were fewer. The next year, fewer still. Since then, with one exception, the weekend of Devil’s Night has no more fires than any other weekend of the year, i.e. those started accidentally. The one exception was in the early 90s, the first year Dennis Archer was mayor, and he slacked off on the Devil’s Night vigil. There was a resurgence that year, though nowhere near the peak levels of the 80s. He learned his lesson for the next year.
The patrols are an automatic now; there are rarely ever public calls for volunteers on the news like there used to be, and the old fires are never mentioned in them anymore. It is becoming what you do on Devil’s Night. The original reason for walking the streets has become less important than the community effort itself.
I’m afraid to google…