posted July 12, 2006 01:23 PM            

Nation's Capital Declares Crime Emergency
Jul 12 11:26 AM US/Eastern

By BRETT ZONGKER
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON

Two groups of tourists were robbed at gunpoint on the National Mall, just hours after the police chief declared a crime emergency in the city in response to a string of violence that included the killing of a British activist.

The activist, Alan Senitt, was attacked in the Georgetown area on Sunday, his throat was slit and police say the attackers attempted to rape his companion. It was the 13th homicide in the city this month. Robberies are up 14 percent, and armed assaults have jumped 18 percent in the past 30 days.

On Wednesday, U.S. Park Police were looking for connections between the latest Mall robberies and three similar incidents in the area in late May. There have been no arrests in any of those cases.

On Tuesday night, two women from Texas were robbed at gunpoint by two men dressed in all black, said U.S. Park Police Sgt. Scott Fear. About 15 minutes later, a family of four from Missouri was robbed by suspects with the same description, he said.

Though no one was injured, Fear said there were similarities to three violent attacks on the National Mall in May. In one case, a 17-year- old woman was sexually assaulted.

"We try to prevent this from happening," Fear said. "We're going to reallocate our resources. We're going to see what improvements we can make."

District of Columbia Police Chief Charles Ramsey declared a crime emergency in the city after Senitt, a volunteer for the potential presidential campaign of former Virginia Gov. Mark R. Warner, was killed.

The crime emergency declaration allows commanders more flexibility to adjust officers' schedules and reassign them to high-crime areas.

The tourist-friendly National Mall, which is under the jurisdiction of Park Police rather than D.C. police, is usually considered safe. But the recent crimes against tourists have raised calls for a larger police presence.

Police are asking Mall visitors to "be our eyes and ears," Fear said. "We're going to ask them to be vigilant."

posted July 12, 2006 01:53 PM              

....but I still believe we should have to "right" to bear arms....if we want to....

posted July 12, 2006 02:28 PM            

I read about a study once which I think was conducted in FL. They asked incarcerated criminals how likely they would be to attack someone a) they knew was NOT armed, b) they knew MIGHT be armed, and c) they knew were certainly armed. Apparently, criminals overwhelmingly prefer to commit a crime against an unarmed person. What a surprise.

I believe this study was quoted in an article in support of relaxing conceal carry laws in FL. I was under the impression that crime in FL went down quite a bit when they relaxed their conceal carry laws several years ago. (Jwhop? do you know anything about this?)

posted July 12, 2006 02:33 PM              

Is it because the contrast between the Have's & the Have-Nots is more glaringly stark there?

posted July 12, 2006 03:26 PM            

There was a recent amendment to Florida law which gives even more pause to criminals. It is no longer necessary for Florida citizens to attempt to retreat from violence before acting in self defense...with a firearm or otherwise.

It is a statical fact that states, counties and cities with restrictive firearms laws or laws forbidding private ownership of firearms have, by far the highest incidence of violent crimes.

In every state, county or city where right to carry laws were enacted, we found the gun grabbing nuts make absurd predictions of increased injury and or deaths due to misuse of firearms as a result. None, not one of those predictions or other predictions of the gun grabbing nuts came true anywhere and violent crime went down.

Florida
In the ten years following the passage of Florida's concealed carry law in 1987, there were 478,248 people who received permits to carry firearms.9 FBI reports show that the homicide rate in Florida, which in 1987 was much higher than the national average, fell 39% during that 10-year period. The Florida rate is now far below the national average.10 *

Do firearms carry laws result in chaos?
No
Consider the case of Florida. A citizen in the Sunshine State is almost twice as likely to be attacked by an alligator than to be assaulted by a concealed carry holder. During the first ten years that the Florida law was in effect, alligator attacks outpaced the number of crimes committed by carry holders by a 146 to 88 margin.11

Criminals avoid armed citizens

posted July 12, 2006 04:12 PM            

In actuality the majority of gun owners are responsible, trained and have never had to use their guns for defense. Stripping the guns out of the hands of civilized people only allows the thugs better access to illegal weapons to use on US.

The Brady Bill is an example of someone getting out of wack because of a tragedy and using that to try to strip us of our rights. Did a law-abiding citizen shoot Mr. Brady? No.. some crazed looney did it. The proponents of the law state they only want to enforce existing laws and tighten up loopsholes, but if you look at the site "www.bradycampaign.org" you can see they actually want to make it virtually impossible to own a gun.

Thank God I live in AZ- where we have looser gun laws and as a result have fewer armed robberies or break-ins (unless the people aren't home). Most of us own a gun and don't have a problem using it.

I still have to smile at the "Old West" connotation though.. especially when I go to shops around here (and most prevalent in the historic Tombstone) and see the "Check the weapons at the door or now Weapons allowed" LOL....