Shootings around Franklin--at least 4 in the past four days

I am writing to try to bring the extreme gravity of this situation to everybody's attention. There is no media coverage, and our lives are seriously at risk to even be walking down the street. At least two of these shootings occurred in broad daylight. I have spoken with a few of the police on the streets, and everytime I've come home in the past few days, I've heard about yet another shooting. This is happening on Franklin, Lincoln Place, and other nearby streets. Meanwhile, landlords are charging exorbitant rents for what is really an extremely unsafe area. We need to bring this to the attention of the right people--the media who will make sure that the greedy landlords push to get the police presence we need. I suggest posting this info widely in Brooklyn blogs, and trying to get the word to other media outlets. There was not just one shooting. Or two. Or three. There have been at least four.

if you could, will you list the other shootings
(date, approx time & location)
so that when people call the 77, media, etc they can mention them specifically.

and if anyone reaches the precinct, please ask about the cause of the fire (http://www.brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5194) on 9/15 on St Mark's as well.

i believe we do need attention and that action has to come from many directions:

constant contact with our precinct:
Detectives Raton or McClean
718-735-0634
yes the number is always busy, you HAVE to keep trying
Det. McClean gets in at 7, try 7:30-8:30
she leaves around 3, Det Raton is on until 7.

a meeting with our council member: Letitia James
perhaps we can all start now by emailing her our concerns (or use the link from her council page) and once we get together, try to organize a meeting with her and the community

community participation
go to the community meetings & activities that are currently in place
77th precinct community council meeting: 2nd monday of each month at 7:30, i'll try to post the location of the next one
crow hill community meeting: http://www.brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5188
***since this is already in place this might be a good time for us all to meet up***

inform the media:
I did call NY1 after tuesday's shooting (212-691-6397)
there is also news 12: http://www.news12.com/BK
but we need a "story"
and all of us getting together to find solutions to these problems will make a story

talk to your neighbors
get a sense of who on your block will be willing to get active
and start a contact list.

i just moved here too, but despite all of this, i have a desire to stick it out and make it work. i feel a bit strange being so vocal so quickly, before i really understand the whole picture but...

I just sent e-mails to the newsdesks of both News 12 and NY1 informing them of the recent issues in CH. We should all take a minute to drop them a line or write them in hopes they'll bring some coverage or at least keep their ears open to the recent escalation in violence. Strength in numbers? We'll see.

Lox wrote: I just sent e-mails to the newsdesks of both News 12 and NY1 informing them of the recent issues in CH. We should all take a minute to drop them a line or write them in hopes they'll bring some coverage or at least keep their ears open to the recent escalation in violence. Strength in numbers? We'll see.

Oh. Here are their e-mail addresses:
News 12: [email hidden]
NY1: [email hidden]

Annie, can you give us the details of the four shootings to which you refer? thanks.

Subject: shooting details--

Hi,

I don't have the police reports or anything, but this is what I've learned from talking to cops everyday on the street on my way home, and from having a job with hours irregular enough to mean I'm around at odd times. The first shooting is the murder on Franklin Avenue, which took place in broad daylight. There was another shooting on Lincoln Place, and then two other shootings in the immediate vicinity, but I don't have the exact locations on those. My advice: talk to the beat cops, they'll often tell you that there's been a ahooting--they won't necessarily give you details, however.

My fear is that the information I'm getting is or will be suppressed. Is there any sort of daily Brooklyn paper that would record these events?
Another thing I learned from a cop is that you can look on the NYC.GOV website, and look up the 77th precinct on the crime statistics page. Frankly, it's awful. The neighborhood has quite a history of murder and violence, and there has been a recent resurgence of murder specifically that is astounding. Any notion that this place is 'getting safer' is optimistic at best, I am afraid. Still, I used to live in Fort Greene, and I arrived just two years after a similar murder/shooting wave. Can Crown Heights be made safe? I'm really not sure, but I do know that it can only happen if people are extremely aggressive about this.

Anniewild, You should attend the monthly 77 precinct meetings. It will give you some more insight into the crime in the area. Murders are up city wide not just here.
I have emailed both TV stations and I will email ERROL LOUIS, the Daily News reporter, who covered the Chanel Petro-Nixon murder a few months back. I am asking them to find out if this is gang related and exaclty how many shootings there have been.

I too wrote to NY1 and News 12, and shared info about upcoming commuity meetings, and our forum discussions.

I will be at the Crow Hill meeting Sep 19.

Meg

I will absolutely attend on the 19th. I'm a visiting scholar at Columbia and a new tenure-track fac at CUNY, and I'm working 120% of full time, but I'm very interested in this issue. I made the jump from teaching at Harvard and Skidmore, turned down a job at NYU, and decided on CUNY precisely because I had yuppie/elitist fatigue. Similarly, I voted for Crown Heights over the slope.

I am beginning to wonder, however, if I might, after all, be more like the park slope nimby-ers than I'd like to think. Is it really possible to have a funky, hip, multiracial/cultural neighborhood with all income levels, and have it be crime free? Not that there are necessary connections (at all) between race and criminality--it's obviously much more about social class and education--but it is striking and chilling to see how culturally acceptable the culture of "don't snitch" is around here. Bob Herbert had a fantastic recent editorial in the NYT op-ed about this--check it out, all y'all...

Annie

Subject: safety of neighborhoods in Brooklyn

anniewilde, I'm speaking here just from personal experience, but in my seven years in this borough dealing with the rental market in Brooklyn, you have to pay for the luxury of living in a safe neighborhood - either in higher rent, or in commuting time. There's a reason why Bed-Sty and Crown Heights, and other areas are cheap (hahaha relatively speaking).

I've lived in Greenpoint, Brooklyn Heights, Sunset Park, Bay Ridge and Park Slope. I've researched many areas of Brooklyn except for those way way out at the edge like Canarsie and Sheepshead Bay. I still haven't found a decent living situation: one where I have an affordable rent relative to my income, enough space, and where I feel reasonably safe. It's exhausting.

- C

Despite the recent shootings in our immediate neighborhood, I would assume crime stats are for the entire 77th, which extends way up into Crown Heights. No offense to anyone further in, but it can resemble "Night of The Living Dead" up there, and I would guess most of the crime is committed closer to the precinct.

Umm, well. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but right on Eastern Parkway, in the direction of the Brooklyn Museum, this morning, there was another shooting in a top-floor apartment building. A woman was sitting in her apartment and heard glass shattering, only to discover her 8-year old son had been shot in the chest. There was an ambulance there (this morning), and the child was taken away, still alive at this point, but who knows. Bystanders said that the child had been shot from a distance with a high-powered automatic weapon of some kind which fired through the window. This is not "further in"--all of these shootings are taking place within a few blocks, in fact, of the most "gentrified" blocks around! I really hope people aren't in such denial that they're imagining that this kind of violence is somehow contained or containable.

Subject: check out the post in the Prospect Heights board.

A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason.

http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5207

Subject: Re: check out the post in the Prospect Heights board.

cythren wrote: A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason.

http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5207

I think the guy is saying he was shot at, not shot. fwiw.

Subject: Did you read my post?

:P

Subject: Re: check out the post in the Prospect Heights board.

alafairnadia wrote: [quote=cythren]A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason.

http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5207

I think the guy is saying he was shot at, not shot. fwiw.

Being "shot at" is still NOT ok.

Um, just for the record - I *did* write "shot at". I omitted a "the" in the sentence, but not the "at" in "shot at". Maybe the missing "the" confused you?

Original: "A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason."

Correction: "A guy walking home was shot at in THE vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason."

- C

An interesting interactive map of murders, from the Prospect Heights board:

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/20060428_HOMICIDE_MAP.html

cythren wrote: Um, just for the record - I *did* write "shot at". I omitted a "the" in the sentence, but not the "at" in "shot at". Maybe the missing "the" confused you?

Original: "A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason."

Correction: "A guy walking home was shot at in THE vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason."

- C

I understand what you wrote. My comment was intended to communicate that being "shot at" is just about as bad as actually being shot. That's all.

A high powered rifle? This is really out of control! Poor kid!

I meant the crime stats as a whole cover a much larger area than just our beleagered corner of it, and those parts are even worse, and have been for a long time. What the hell is going on right now?

I am supposed to sign my lease this week but what the F.

This is really really really intense.

Subject: Rifle Stuff

Is that really true? I just did a search and could find nothing about that. I'd assume that would certainly be news after Arizona and D.C. a few years back. Where is this info coming from and is there anything to back it up?

:?

Subject: Rifle again

I mean about the shooting on the 8th floor of a building with a high powered rifle. I want to see an article or something.

I think that there's a difference in opinion on what constitutes a 'high powered' weapon.

When the poster mentioned "high-powered automatic weapon of some kind," they weren't talking about a sniper rifle - those certainly are NOT automatic. The poster most likely meant something more along the lines of a sub-machine gun - like the crappy little uzi which is horribly inaccurate, but puts out a lot of rounds. The shooting described is most likely an accident, not the conscious act of a highly-trained individual with a weapon capable of killing from a mile away.

Subject: Re: check out the post in the Prospect Heights board.

cythren wrote: A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason.

http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5207

Grain of salt. I didn't hear anything, although the shots were supposed to have gone off within a block or two of my paper-thin walls. Usually when a firecracker goes off we get three or four worried posts, but for this, nothing. It wouldn't be the first time someone's trolled the board.

Subject: Re: check out the post in the Prospect Heights board.

cythren wrote: A guy walking home was shot at in vicinity of Prospect and Vanderbilt, for no apparent reason.

http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5207

Now a long-time poster who was at soda that night disputes the claim that the guy ran in there to "spread the word" immediately after the shooting.

With all the gun violence I hope you will take a moment and look at this link

http://tinyurl.com/q75mb

and sign the petition.

thanks for that link,
every one should follow it and take a moment to take action

Subject: is this for real??

Now I'm wondering if this is really believable. If this had really happened, surely it would be on the news, or in one of the papers. It seems like the perfect NY Post subject matter.

anniewilde wrote: Umm, well. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but right on Eastern Parkway, in the direction of the Brooklyn Museum, this morning, there was another shooting in a top-floor apartment building. A woman was sitting in her apartment and heard glass shattering, only to discover her 8-year old son had been shot in the chest. There was an ambulance there (this morning), and the child was taken away, still alive at this point, but who knows. Bystanders said that the child had been shot from a distance with a high-powered automatic weapon of some kind which fired through the window. This is not "further in"--all of these shootings are taking place within a few blocks, in fact, of the most "gentrified" blocks around! I really hope people aren't in such denial that they're imagining that this kind of violence is somehow contained or containable.

Could anniewilde be doing some sort of sociological experiment on this board, posting alarming comments and them observing to see how people respond?

granted, i'm at park and nostrand... not in the posh digs of franklin and closer to the park... but really the gun violence these days has gotten COMPLETELY out of control. i've been here for five years, and this summer has just been beyond the pale. there was literally nothing in my general area in all those years, up to this summer, what the fuck is going on?

do i have to rail on about the south and its cheap accessible guns again? can't we sue those motherfucking states for gun laws that ruin our quality of life? i mean for fucks sake, they can enact laws that prevent us from assisting some unfortunate young woman from getting an abortion, but they can flood us with automatic weapons?

regulated milita my ass.

</rant>

I'm amused that Cythren would suggest I'm doing a "sociological" experiment. Quite the opposite. I'm a POC (person of color) and perhaps it's easier for me to talk to the people in the neighborhood than some of you? Most of my information, though, has been gleaned firsthand from the police. As far as the shooting with the automatic weapon through the window, I saw the ambulance and spoke to people on the street right after it had happened. Unless the police and the inhabitants of Crown Heights are collectively taking acid, a few things are happening: there are shootings going on and they aren't being reported in the paper, and there are a fuck of a lot of shootings going on, by any standard. I think the only sociological experiment going on here is the one which has produced the extremely dysfunctional conditions which have led to this violence.