The insanity of Baltimore's 'disrespect' killings

Baltimore Sun ^ | 1/19/2014

[Altura Ct.]

Two years after someone fired 18 bullets into his body, we finally know the reason Gregory McFadden died such a brutal death at the age of 27 in West Baltimore. He turned his back on a guy.

It was disrespect, a malady that inflames the male ego and makes young men do terrible things. Disrespect has been around for centuries, of course, but its consequences have been particularly lethal in the age of the high-powered handgun. Killing someone because he disrespected you is a phenomenon that no amount of police power or community vigilance can seem to stop.

Some interventions — Safe Streets in the Leon Faruq days — have been effective when beefs between young men became known. But what do you do to stop a killing like McFadden's?

All of the following facts come from testimony in a murder trial last week in Baltimore Circuit Court. The shooting occurred on Tuesday night, Nov. 15, 2011, in Harlem Park.

McFadden was part of a group of young men on the street at 11 p.m. in the 700 block of N. Carrollton Ave., near a beautiful old stone church.

Maybe it's not a good idea to be on Carrollton Avenue at that hour, but until we declare martial law, a citizen is allowed to visit with friends on the sidewalk. That's what McFadden was doing.

The problem developed when a couple of guys approached him on the sidewalk.

McFadden had flirted with the girlfriend a couple of weeks earlier, and now Baker wanted to have a word with him about that on Carrollton Avenue.

McFadden declined the opportunity for conversation and turned his back.

Baker took offense. So did Moore.

They felt they had been disrespected.

[Bigg Red]

I don’t see that as the popcorn guy “disrespecting” him.

I think that’s how the shooter saw it.

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I agree, Albion. Same sort of thing, IMO.