Last week's issue of the City Paper featured a cover story that breaks down Baltimore's 2005 murder statistics, by Anna Ditkoff, who's been covering the homicide beat for the past couple years in the Murder Ink column. It doesn't purport to contain any solutions or revelations, but's worth a read nonetheless. I think in some ways I'm still a little naive about this city's violent crime problem just because I've fortunately had very little direct or indirect contact with it. I know some parts of the city are safer than others, but reading something like this brings home the fact that there have been murders in the past year not far from from where my girlfriend works or where we live (and we definitely live in one of the safest parts of the city) or in the parking lot of a club I go to regularly. I definitely try not to be cavalier about it, all the "Bodymore, Murdaland" bragging and shit, but it is what it is. It can be heartbreaking or infuriating or frightening to think about, but it needs to be thought about.

Labels: City Paper

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 22, 2006 at 12:45 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.