5 posts tagged “crime”

A couple days ago a man who works for the Mercer County government was stabbed multiple times in the parking lot across the street from the Mercer County Administrative Building. He'll survive. He's already out of the hospital, actually. The building, unlike most city, county, state, and federal government buildings, is not located in downtown Trenton. It's located around the corner from my house. I can actually see it from my doorway. Take a look: 

Mercer County Administrative Building as Seen From my Doorway

Anywho, immediately following the stabbing county officials and law enforcement agents stepped up security in the area (the parking lot is already under surveillance from a private security firm). When I drove by yesterday on my way to get some medicine for my throat I noticed a Mercer County Sheriff's SUV parked right in front of the parking lot across from the main entrance to the county administrative building. That may deter folk. May not. People have definitely been stabbed and shot to death in front of or across the street from police headquarters, precincts, city hall, etc. in the past few years.

This article from today's Trenton Times about a hastily assembled meeting organized by county officials for county workers was bothering for me as a lifelong Trentonian (don't count college and my time in the south) and neighborhood resident. A few quotes:

                             "One employee said he'd worked for the county for more than 20 years and 

                             never heard of any problems at the lot, making the attack all the more surprising.

                             County officials said they have searched their records and not found any record 

                             of violent crime at the site, though in the past two days a few employees have 

                             reported past incidents officials had not known about."

This neighborhood of South Trenton is def not the most violent part of Trenton, in my opinion. Most Trentonians would concur. Still there was a shooting last week just outside a nightclub down the street from the Mercer County Administrative Building. Also, as you go deeper into South Trenton coming towards my house the neighborhood generally gets progressively poorer and more dangerous. I continue:

                            "I know two people who work with me who have had something said to them (by 

                            strangers in the lot), as have I," one woman told Sheriff Kevin Larkin during the 

                            information session. "After 5 p.m., it's another world."

Another world? Really? Mind you, at 5 p.m. for much of the year it's not even dark yet. Even if it was I could never categorize it as "another world." Perhaps another world from the more idyllic suburbs many government workers who work in Trenton live in. Perhaps. Also, note the fact that both the county executive (essentially the mayor of this county which includes Trenton, Princeton [yes, where the University is], and office buildings or headquarters for various major firms ranging from Merrill Lynch to Bristol Myers-Squibb to Johnson & Johnson) and the county sheriff. The big dogs. One more:

                            "One employee asked whether the county offices could be relocated outside of 

                            Trenton. Larkin said he believed they could not because Trenton is the county seat."

Very disappointing that that proposal is even part of the conversation. Very. Places with comparatively high levels of concentrated poverty and low-quality educational systems where violence is more culturally accepted as inevitable usually are...more violent. Want to fix it? Fix Trenton Public Schools. Hire more Trentonians for jobs in our biggest employment sector: government work. Respond intelligently, creatively, and effectively to crime in Trenton. Take a look at what the county government's response to this lone incident included:

                     * Placing a Mercer County sheriff vehicle in front of the parking lot.

                     * Patching up holes in a fence of the parking lot making it harder to access.

                     * Clearing brush along the back of the lot making it harder for intruders to get in or "lie in wait."

                     * Placement of NEW, DIGITAL CAMEREAS in the lot to replace older cameras that produced "grainy 

                      images."

                     * Closure of a back entrance and pedestrian walkway to discourage pedestrians (note: mostly poor and     

                      working class Trentonians of color) from walking through the lot.

                     * Potentially monitoring the use of the back entrance so people who aren't supposed to be in the lot 

                      aren't in the lot.

                     * Issuance of pamphlets on personal safety to government employees.

                     * Issuance of HIGH-PITCHED MOBILE ALARM DEVICES to government employees.

                     * Reviewing conditions around the administrative building and addressing employee needs in an 

                     adjacent building. 

                     * Cleaning up the county-owned Millyard Park behind the administrative building (apparently, currently 

                     government employees are scared to eat lunch in the tiny park because it has benches and a 

                     fountain...some locals supposedly use the area as an "OUTDOOR SHOWER AND BATHROOM.")

                     * Assigning personnel from the sheriff's department and/or park rangers to monitor the park and having 

                     more concerts in the park to encourage its "proper use."

Whew...did you get all that? Wonder what the response to the shooting down the street was? Oh right. NOTHING AT ALL.

Many of my male students at Humphreys County High and Humphreys County Junior High claim affiliations to large, Chicago-based gang conglomerates such as the Folk Nation or the People's Nation. Usually I laugh them off and say something like, "Ya'll don't know nothing about no gangs." Through my use of triple negatives I think that my point gets across to my students. A popular misconception at my school is that I'm from Africa/Nigeria as oppose to my parents. I try to constantly remind my students that I was born and raised in New Jersey but their cognitive dissonance is at times impenetrable. They seem to just not be able to fully register the idea that despite my name, my nominal ability to speak Igbo, and my (over?) emphasis on African history and geography in my WORLD history and WORLD geography classes that I teach I am American, by and large. I am often reminded of this by my cousins, mother, and international friends and it is something that I have to accept. In any event, I feel that the more I relate myself to my students the better and, thus, the more I speak in slang around them and make references to rap and my upbringing not long before them the better. This is also why I'm averse to wearing ties too much or talking about where I went to college in many instances. These things serve to augment the socioeconomic and experiential rift between my students and myself that I aim to bridge.

One of the biggest things that I constantly lecture my students about is the impact of their own actions and choices on their future. I wish that I could show my students the potentially deleterious impact of particular, crucial choices that they are daily faced with down the line. From doing their assignments to not doing them or acting up in school to not acting up or selling drugs/having babies to not selling drugs/having babies, life is all about choices. Despite what the students see around them daily they seem to feel, like many teenagers and young adults, that they will be the exception to the culture, rule, or statistic. I wholeheartedly support this in certain manifestations and tell my students that, despite the realities of what is seemingly ubiquitous to their surroundings, they can be different. Being different requires immense fortitude, foresight, and HARD, hard work though. If not, local trappings await you. Take for example this kid who, although from a neighboring and comparably safer town to Trenton called Hamilton, was caught in the wrong part of Trenton at the wrong time in my neighborhood. Seventeen years old. Minority. Gang member. Shot dead in the street.

I tell my students things that other adults in their lives may not because I love them. I really do. Even (or especially) the ones that give me tough times or don't do their work or have significant learning disabilities that inhibit them from getting the most out of my class. Those are the ones who are truly "at risk" in my opinion and who are only a few steps away from dropping out and entering a lifestyle that I'm sure that in their heart of hearts they do not want to lead. People often stereotype the types of students that me and other MTCers teach as thugs, welfare queens, rejects, or whatever. I don't buy it though. I know thugs. I grew up and formed strong bonds with some. I've ran from their bullets when I was only 11 years-old. I've ducked down in my house from their automatic rounds during drive-bys. I've cautioned my little brother of wearing particular gang-affiliated colors when walking through our neighborhood. I've been cautioned of doing the same when I was around his age (16) and thought I was invincible. I know my students. I know that none of them are thugs. Not the 16 year-old in my 3rd period 8th grade class who gets sent out almost daily and has a 0 average in my class thus far. Not the 18 year-old kid in my 9th grade world geography class who's on probation for selling drugs and may literally not own a pencil, pen, or notebook. They're both good kids. Kids that in another environment with a different family and in a different school setting could be just fine. I just hope that they let me be their teacher and not the much harsher, permanent teacher of experience show them the way.

If you'll scroll down a bit on this wonderful blog that I've set up you'll find a post that I put up a few days ago about the homicides in Jackson thus far this year. There have been about 36 and the graphic from the Clarion-Ledger along with this article identifies the location of each along with the victim. Jackson is considered a really dangerous city not only because of its murders (which are frequent enough to scare most middle-class or wealthier residents into northeast Jackson/Fondren/Belhaven--a particular corner of Mississippi's capital thus concentrating middle-class folk who are ripe for the picking) but for its armed robberies--thus the nickname "Jack-town".

Still, I often look home to Trenton, New Jersey and find a similar situation. With three and a half months left to go in 2007, Trenton is looking like it's at least going to surpass last year's total of 21 murders. We have 18 right now. The total probably won't reach 2005's all-time high of 31 though. That's a good thing. While all of this is happening, our mayor is posing in $2,500 worth of luxury threads in Esquire magazine and talking about how his greatest triumph as mayor was changing the police department. To what? More middle-aged, White, non-residents incapable of protecting Trenton's most at-risk (of death) population--young, Black/Latino males? I check up on Trenton news every day and I often see this. Another one bites the dust. On the same infamous street that is home to my mother's job, my elementary school, City Hall, from the State Capitol building where New Jersey's governor works. All located on East State Street where a blood-stained sidewalk and spent shell casings mark another 18 year-old Black male's encounter with his maker. Same poop, different toilet from Jack-town or even Belzoni where, even with only one or two murders per year, its murder rate would make it one of the most dangerous cities in the nation if it had a larger population and was considered more significant. The "alleged" trigger man in one of those murders in my small town is supposed to be in either my 6th period world history class or my 7th period world geography class. I don't recall. He hasn't come to my class yet this school year. He probably has other things on his mind these days....

My students are getting to know me better and I've had to answer the tough and inevitable questions of, "how long are you here for?" and "when are you leaving?" It's tough because on the one hand I don't just want to say I'm here for two years and then I'm definitely leaving and contributing to the high teacher turnover rate and critical need for teachers in Mississippi in general and in the Delta in particular. On the other hand, I want to be honest with them and let them know that my family/future plans/heart lie in Trenton, New Jersey. I sometimes remind my students that my district was "worse" than theirs when I was in school. My high school was the worst in the state my senior year. I entered high school with myriad male friends from my neighborhood and other parts of Trenton though graduated with only a few. Many only came to school because it was something to do and they knew that a lot of girl would be there. Many sold drugs while we were in school, in front of the school, or on our way home and in our neighborhood. Many dropped out of school altogether when drug money started really rolling in and they decided they'd rather come to school with anal cavities full of crack-cocaine than backpacks full of books. Some were killed in the streets as teens. Others were incarcerated. Some are still locked up today. All regret the decisions they made while they were in high school.

So for me it's tough remaining in Mississippi when the present-day realities of Trenton are a constant reminder of where I "should" be. Think globally, act locally meaning maintain an understanding of world problems though counteract them in your own community. I should practice what I preach.

Article on Jackson's homicides thus far in 2007:

http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007709100344

there's an interactive map of all the homicides on the right side of the screen under "Related Items."

Everyday I read the local newspaper for my hometown in Jersey online here. It's kinda strange. Growing up in Trenton I never had a strong sense of city pride. I just thought my city was, to some degree, like any other city in the country. Working class, relatively diverse racially (especially as far as New Jersey cities and suburbs go), crappy public schools, and a downtown shopping area. Normal, right? It wasn't until I left Trenton and went off to college that I realized my city was not normal by any means. For one, Trenton is not all working class. There are actually a few wealthier sections of Trenton including a very upscale neighborhood on the westside of Trenton called Hiltonia that I barely new existed for my 18 years there. Having grown up in a neighborhood where almost every house looks like this       I had no idea Trenton had neighborhoods filled with houses that look like this        Oh, class segregation.... I also came to find out that although my city was fairly racially diverse (about 50% Black, 30% White, and 20% Latino [of any race]), the public schools were not. Somehow, my high school was 97% Black and Latino. Where'd that 30% of White people go? Speaking of public schools, I found out that not only did Trenton have one of the worst school districts in the state (giving districts like Camden and Irvington a run for the title of worst) but the school year that I graduated (2002-2003) my high school was probably THE worst school in the state. Period. It was something like 1, 1, and 3 in terms of having the highest suspension rates, lowest attendance rates, and highest dropout rates of any public high school in New Jersey. What's more, something like three of the six schools in the state labeled through No Child Left Behind as being "persistently dangerous" were in Trenton. One of which was my high school. Another was my middle school. But I digress....

Strangely, I also had to leave Trenton to realize that I have a big bone to pick with the local media there. When I graduated from high school as I talked about in a previous blog post, I really wanted to help debunk the myth of Trenton teenagers (especially its young, Black males) being violent, stupid, dope-selling brutes destined for the criminal justice system, teen parenthood, or the grave at an all-too young age.  A big part of this was the interview in the Trenton Times, my city's leading local paper.  Despite the positive and rare shine given to Trentonians through that wonderful article, much more often the local newspapers look something like this where three of the top five local news stories on Trenton are about shootings. In all actuality, these pieces would more aptly be called blurbs than articles as a number of them are under 100 words and say little beyond who was shot, where, and what happened to the victim (i.e. whether the victim was killed or taken to hospital X and treated). They serve little purpose beyond scaring the public, which of course influences White/middle-class/Black flight from Trenton and is a large part of why our city's population has consistently been on the decline in the past few decades. Now, one of our former suburbs (Hamilton) is actually more populous than Trenton. What kinda stuff is that? Anyway, articles like these really piss me off as they only seem to serve a negative purpose and never get into deeper issues of inner-city violence such as the connection between it and (duh) poverty...physically dilapidated (and thus psychologically deflating) neighborhoods... pedagogically oppressive public school instruction...almost non-existent green space (I swear I feel like the area around Campus Walk Apartments has more green space than all of Trenton)...underfunded or out-of-touch job training programs...etc. Yes, I will blame everything except the people committing crime themselves because I don't buy into the conservative bull crap about every individual being their own conscious actor despite their environment, so-to-speak. People in sad, seemingly hopeless environments often end up doing sad, seemingly hopeless things. There are exceptions and some people just enjoy doing violent, reckless stuff but they're few and far between.

My favorite television show is The Wire and I continue to see glaring similarities between Baltimore and Trenton. This upcoming fifth and final season of the show, the focus will be on the local media (mainly the fictional counterpart of the Baltimore Sun) and the politics and interests behind which stories are sought, covered, published, and why. I eagerly await the commencement of this season because I am also seeing the aforementioned similarities between Baltimore and Trenton manifested in the city that will be my home for the next two years: Jackson, Mississippi (aka "Jack-town"...denizen for armed robbery). What you have is a majority Black, working class inner-city with a large open-air drug market, infamously poor public schools, and a local media system all too eager to highlight these problems devoid of their historical and present-day causes or, more importantly, prospective solutions. The urban population is running to the 'burbs and, in turn, the suburban population is attempting to return to the city by scooping up low-cost real estate closer to what is often the city they work in during the day but scramble to not be caught dead in (no pun intended) at night. What ends up happening is crazy things like this where, as NPR reports, for the first time more poor people live in the suburbs than in the cities. Funny...perhaps Trenton is not so different after all.