Posted on 12/03/2005 9:21:18 AM PST by kiriath_jearim
Summit targets gun crimes, intimidation
By Donovan Slack and Suzanne Smalley, Globe Staff | December 2, 2005
Boston's top law enforcement officials emerged yesterday from an emergency summit meeting called by Mayor Thomas M. Menino, vowing to take tougher measures to stem a rise in homicides, shootings, and other violent crime.
Police Commissioner Kathleen M. O'Toole said she is ordering officers in the next several days to sweep every neighborhood in the city and arrest people with outstanding warrants. Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said he plans to start new court sessions that will focus on gun crimes. Menino said he wants to halt the sale of ''Stop Snitching" T-shirts.
''We're going to go into every retail store that sells them, and we're going to take them off the shelves," he told a phalanx of reporters waiting outside his City Hall office after the hour-long meeting.
But the mayor said he is not allocating any more money for the efforts or pledging to hire more police officers, saying the city cannot afford to do so. The warrant sweeps could further stretch the Police Department, which is already down some 200 officers in recent years.
Officials said that patrol officers will be used for the sweeps and that other city employees will also have to turn their attention to crime-fighting efforts.
''When it comes to resources, we're thin," Menino said, referring to state and federal budget cuts in recent years.
The number of shootings in Boston so far this year is up 34 percent over the same period last year, O'Toole said yesterday. The homicide count, 66 so far this year, has already tied a 10-year high. Police have arrested or identified suspects in only 20 of this year's homicides, the lowest rate in at least a decade.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
"he wants to halt the sale of ''Stop Snitching" T-shirts.
''We're going to go into every retail store that sells them, and we're going to take them off the shelves,"
I can see getting tough on crime, but isn't this a first amendment issue? Will folks that wear such a shirt be in trouble? I don't support the idea of not helping police, but this is a bit odd. Maybe I'm missing something?
I guess he should be put in charge of patrolling every tourist area T-shirt shop because the stuff they put on some of those things makes my head spin. Who'd wear that stuff anywhere, much less in public?
I would say the police in Boston have every right to go into all store and take the T-shirts away.....as soon as they pay for them! To do otherwise will be like Eddie Compass ordering the confiscation of firearms in New Orleans after Katrina. It was a gross violation of the gunowners' Constitutional rights. To take T-shirts seems to violate the Fourth Amendment. Oh!!! I'm sorry!! I just realized that the administration of Boston is Democratic.....
I'm sure Kathy has the bad guys shakin' in their boots.
Body slam the violent criminals, execute the murderers, leave everyone else alone.
Yeah, that'll have a HUGE impact.
So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men.
--Voltarine de Cleyre
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