That area is bordered on two sides with not good neighborhoods, but not the most violent nabes in the city. Some drugs, and maybe some break-ins but not the real violent stuff. But the neighborhood itself is a lot of student, and is otherwise pretty hip. This isn’t a typical crime that’s just getting a little play because he was a student. This sounds flat-out random.
When I was a student, I had a buddy that lived b/w 29th & 30th on St Paul, which is right where this happened, and I used to walk back from there to Hampden late at night ALL THE TIME and you knew folks got mugged around there from time to time.
It might sound strange to those who don’t live in the city, but while the city has roughly 300 murders per year, a lot of places you can feel as safe as in a small town. The majority of the violence is confined to a minority of areas and, honestly, is usually someone who might have “had it coming” and by that, I just mean it’s not Mrs. Sally the nursery school teacher who got shot standing on a corner at 1:30 am, dig?
It always gets a little more play when it’s somene who clearly wasn’t a dealer, either a poor kid caught in a cross-fire, a family that stood up to dealers, or something like this.
Strange. It will me interesting to hear how this turns out.
I’ve done a fair amount of traveling (All around Europe, Hong Kong, Taiwan) and have been in a lot of seedy places all over. Born and bred in BedStuy Brooklyn, I’ve never really worried where I’ve gone, but I’ll add my 2 cents to this conversation.
Kingston Jamaica is one place you need to seriously watch your ass. Dudes will kill you for a nickel down there.
As to the OP, I hope they find whoever did that, and for now make sure you keep that backdoor locked.
Nuh-uh. I’m moving up to nice, safe, my-boyfriend-inhabited Canada. You know what Montreal’s murder rate is? 1.9/100,000. Baltimore’s is 38.3/100,000, and you can’t even get good poutine here.
I’d like to, but we can’t afford the big hunk of compressed carbon necessary to be allowed to share a bed. If you can find us a tent, though, I could bring him and we could go camping a lot.
Anyway, to bring this back to the topic, (I gotta get Qadgop on AIM or something…) memorial services for the guy will be tomorrow, as planned. Apparently, by the request of the guy’s little sister, we’re supposed to wear “T-shirts, shorts and rainbow sandals,” though I’m not sure why.
If anyone in the Baltimore area wants to drop in for some reason, it’ll be at 10 in front of Gilman.
I heard about this story on the news as well. They kept calling it a “robbery gone bad,” but who breaks into a fraternity house with maybe 40 guys in it? I’m guessing someone who thinks they’ll all be passed out drunk and that they’ll have stuff worth breaking in to steal. It’s still stupid and tragic.
Hmmm… I can only offer relatively safe Mt. Vernon, and DSL. Maybe a little English chocolate.
Hmmmm, missing this thread is what I get for not checking the boards for a day or two.
I really want to know if there’s more to the story here before I decide whether to freak out or not - I just really don’t think it’s this simple, for some reason. That said, I’m going to be living in a row house up on East University next year, and you can be damn sure I’m going to be taking all security measures possible.
As a city, Baltimore is classic good places vs. bad places. Probably the biggest problem with Hopkins is that while the university area itself is in a ‘good place’, it’s only 5-10 blocks away from some ‘bad places’… and the SAE house (where this happened) in particular is only a few blocks away from a bad place. Still, it’s a location from which a fairly large number of inebriated people make their way home in the wee hours of the morning on a semi-regular basis. The city as a whole is definitely better than it used to be, IMO, but there’s still (obviously) a lot of work to be done.
elfbabe , do you know if there’s a picture of him posted anywhere, obituary or JHU site or anything? Just kind of curious if he was ever in one of my classes or anything.
Kiros, what year did you graduate? One of my classmates went there (he would have graduated last year) and a girl from the class behind ours. He was in biomedical engineering and she is pre-med.
elfbabe, that is so sad about that guy at your school. My school is in a rough part of DC, and 3 years ago a local guy was killed infront of the apartments and several years ago a girl was kidnapped from the dorm lobby and raped.
There’s a ID card entry system in place now (I’m a commuter student, so I’m not too sure on the details), but I suppose that wouldn’t have prevented a situation like this weekend.
Heh, I’m still here. After two years in University housing, they kick us out to find our own places - most students do one of the nearby apartment complexes, but a number move into the large number of nearby rowhouses, which is what I’m doing with a group of my friends. I also visited Baltimore a bunch of times as I was growing up, as I have relatives in the immediate area, so I’ve seen a lot of the city over the past ten years or so, which is my basis for comparison. I’m actually a year behind the student who was killed, but it still wouldn’t have been unusual to have seen him in one of my classes by chance given the nature of the stuff I take.
Thanks, elfbabe. I seem to recall the face from some soccer stuff I did my freshman year, actually, but I can’t say I really knew him. Will still be at the memorial tomorrow morning, of course. In a t-shirt and shorts, I guess, though I can’t say I have anything resembling “rainbow sandals”… huh? to that.
Economics, currently. I’ve also been known to take math and poly sci department classes in bunches, along with the odd psych, and some english for the W’s.
Hopefully. My boyfriend’s supposed to find out Any Day Now whether he’ll be attending Concordia’s music school, and once he gets in and I graduate, I’ll be exercising all my options to try and get up there.
My school is in a rough part of DC, and 3 years ago a local guy was killed infront of the apartments and several years ago a girl was kidnapped from the dorm lobby and raped.