From Decatur Police Sgt Jennifer Ross…
On 09/02/14 at approximately 7:11 pm, Decatur Police responded to a burglary in progress in the 200 block of Mountain View Street. The complainant reported witnessing four young black males knock on a neighbor’s door and then walk to the rear of the house. He heard glass breaking and called 911. Another neighbor yelled at the suspects and they fled in a black Jeep Cherokee. Additional neighbors also witnessed the suspects fleeing. Officers observed the rear door to the home to be forced open and the glass of the rear door to be shattered. No items appeared to be missing. The witnesses were able to provide physical and clothing descriptions and a tag number for the Jeep Cherokee.
A Decatur officer located the Jeep in the 300 block of East Ponce de Leon Avenue and observed a juvenile male running from the area. Another Decatur officer located and detained the juvenile in the 200 block of East Ponce de Leon Avenue. It was later determined the Jeep had been stolen from a driveway in the 700 block of South Candler Street sometime after 5:45 pm but the owner had not yet noticed the Jeep was missing until officers contacted them about recovering the vehicle.
Witnesses positively identified the juvenile detained by officers as one of the suspects. The juvenile was found in possession of a large screwdriver and empty magazine for a handgun. The juvenile, a 14-year-old male from DeKalb County, was charged with burglary and theft by receiving stolen property.
GREAT neighborhood watch and prompt police response! Go Decatur!
Presumably the other 3 suspects got away?
14??!!! That is likely a middle-schooler! GEEZ! We’ve got to find these kids some better after school activities!
yeah, like san quentin
1. San Quentin doesn’t have room for petty criminals
2. Even if it did, the petty criminals would come back out with new and improved criminal skills which would be used against us
3. At age 14, there is still a chance that this developing brain and personality could be turned around towards something good for himself and the rest of us around him
4. According to “Orange is the New Black”, the average minimum security inmate with no therapy, no medical care, no anything else costs the taxpayer at least $30,000/year just for a multi-occupancy cell. I’ll bet prisons for minors cost more, plus the educational costs which I hear don’t even buy a diploma for most incarcerated teens. I wish that we could get something out of that investment besides a more damaged and more criminally skilled older teen.
Not arguing your points, but when you cite a FICTIONAL television show as your authority, you lose most, if not all, credibility. Hopefully you were kidding. I certainly was.
It’s an autobiographical book. I’m reading it. It’s a TV show, too? I don’t watch TV much, so wouldn’t know.
Its a great tv show on Netflix. Doesn’t follow the book very well, but if you like the book, you’ll love the series.
Now this is interesting. One person didn’t know it was a non-fiction book. The other person didn’t know it was a fictional show based on said book. I’d guess you’d be in the minority on this one, AHID. I’m guessing neither of you is a media junkie like I am.
I’m in the minority on everything but race. And eventually that too.
Maybe we use some of the $100k from the other thread to provide some compassion to these guys and get them the help they need.
Or we could use the $100k as a fund to pay people not to steal. They could submit a proposal to the city outlining the value of the items they plan to take. Then we could cut them a check for 80% of the value. They wouldn’t have to worry about fencing fees or going to jail and they will likely spend the money locally – maybe at one of the yogurt out of the wall places. It’s a win/win.
I will be happy to submit a proposal to the city to facilitate the new program for a small consulting fee.
Now we are talking! Sort of like the plan to pay people 80% of what that would make if they were working. It’s all good. We could cal them “eighty percenters”, sort of like the “forty-niners”.
7pm?? That would seem to be prime time for people to be home, eating dinner, or on their way in/out. I would have thought even the dimmest criminals would have picked a better time to break into someone’s house….
Criminals at all levels are not noted for intelligence or logical thinking.
Any time of day nobody answers the door is a good time to break in.
14 years old?? Good grief. This is just incredibly sad–and frustrating.
+ 1
I wonder where the other part of that handgun is. If you live in this area you might do a quick search of creeks and flower beds.
Now…Let’s talk about gun control… I’ll pull my gun on the hoodlum thug (be they white black or purple… Just so I’m not accused of racial profiling) that kicks my door in and as long as I can hold onto that gun while he’s (or she.. Just so I’m not accused of being sexist)..in my home…that’s “gun control”!! It’s a fact of life that perps are younger and more violent as they think they’re invincible … There’s no reasoning with a teen staring you down with a gun in his/her hand.. They’ll rob you AND shoot you! If someone is so brazen as to break into your home during dinner shouldn’t you just pull out another dining chair and ask him to join you? Hell no…so all of you who are coming into Decatur and tearing down the trees to put up a McMansion be sure to build a ‘safe room’ or learn to defend your home and family … This crime spree in Decatur is going to get a lot worse before it gets any better!… The Decatur cops are heroes and super … But not SuperHeroes… Make a plan! Practice it… And use it if the day comes! WITSHTF
Why is this forum so overwhelmingly old and grumpy? I keep hearing stuff like…”back in my day, we shot first and asked questions later” Can you look no further than the front of your nose and ask
why we have middle school children committing crimes? If we were really so patriotic, we’d be
trying to solve those kinds of problems instead of threatening anything that moves with a bullet.
What an insightful solution.
DM has definitely evolved from snarky to old and grumpy. So where/how are all the cool young adults communicating these days–on what device, via what platform, about what?
I’d be interesting in knowing what the median age is here. Like most local newsy sites, I’m guessing it skews pretty old.
This needs to be ascertained by anonymous poll!
Old and snarky are not mutually exclusive. I’ll call myself exhibit A.
So you’re saying I’m B?
I’d love to know how old people think I am. I might even tell…
I’ll give you a hint. Not old enough to have owned a Woolworth Lunch Counter in 1960. You are welcome, Warren Buffet.
Walrus, I hope you didn’t miss Warren Buffett’s apology to you awhile back. He seemed sincere. (If you did, I’ll try my best to locate it as you surely deserved it.)
“DM has definitely evolved from snarky to old and grumpy.”
After some of the posts on this thread, I’m starting to think you’re right. How did this happen? Is it like how all the old people eventually discovered Facebook?
What can I say other than, “Get off my lawn of drought-tolerant native weeds and fresh produce!!”
Why do WE have middle school ‘children’ committing felonies???? I don’t .. My teens are boring and respectful! Hmmm could it be because the perps haven’t been taught or shown R-E-S-P-E-C-T?…I can’t fix that… ‘Mr Hope & Change’ was taking care of that .. My philosophy is this … The disenfranchised are tired of waiting for change…they’re angry and I can’t argue with that… And they’re coming for YOUR stuff. They now feel entitled as well…do they need help? Yes! So what are YOU doing to effect change? I grew up without many material things.. But was filthy rich with respect and family values… Can YOU instill that into those angry teens? You can call me grumpy and old-fashioned all day long…I won’t even sue you for defamation!
Property crime rate for U.S.:
Year 1980- 5353 per 100k inhabitants
Year 2012: 2859 per 100k inhabitants
It’s the aging of America. Testosterone levels drop with age.
That makes it simple… Change the demographics in Decatur to ‘old and grumpy’… Voila!
The lower crime rate of the old and grumpy is definitely a plus. On the other hand, they rank low on potential years of future productivity. If they would only cooperate and kick the bucket by around age 67, they could maximize their economic value.
Property crime has also dropped significantly in Decatur over time, as can be seen here:
www.decaturmetro.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/decatur_crime_trend_1999-2013.png
Yeah, but the rent’s too damn high.
Now you have to run for Mayor.
State your source please…as the old and grumpy require proof of statistics and always balance their check books to the penny!
So you get to go off on a baseless rant about R-E-S-P-E-C-T and family values, with the implication that “things were better in my day”, but I have to back up my stats by providing a link? I r-e-s-p-e-c-t-f-u-l-l-y decline.
Oooooo touchy about your ‘sources’ ey?…. You must be a reporter … Or a government employee?
Not touchy at all about sources, but definitely quick to bristle when people make spurious claims about root causes, while implying that some imagined past was better than now, but with nothing to back up those claims. So how about this: you show me your sources and I’ll show you mine.
You’re living in a fantasy world if you don’t think the crime in Decatur has gone up in the last couple of years
Yeah, I better get to building my safe room, stocking it with hand grenades and pork and beans, and burying my gold.
That’s how it’s felt to me–like crime has increased in the last couple of years. But I don’t believe the data support that perception. It may be an artifact of better local reporting/blogging/gossiping. Back in the 90s, there was evidently tons of drug dealing and related crime in Oakhurst but I never heard about it living up in the north side bubble. The Oakhurst newsletters didn’t make it up to us and local news sources like The Champion or Decatur Focus didn’t report that kind of news. I don’t even remember the AJC reporting it much.
Regardless of whether or not there’s been a bump the last couple of years, the level is still much lower than it was 15-20 years ago, both in absolute terms and per capita.
… You hang onto those stats and maybe you can pile them up in front of your door to shore it up… Well I’m outta this mess just sold my house to a mcmansioner made a fortune bought a cave in the Appalachians gonna live off the grid and eat bear and grubs and learn to play the banjo…
Signed… Spur E. Us
Good luck to you, and hopefully that grid you mentioned includes the internet.
Or perhaps you can find a bridge to live under.
Here’s my purely anecdotal response to the idea that crime is down in OA since the 90’s: As far as I’m aware, we have not had neighbors dealing crack out of their porch window, or who were embezzlers, bank robbers, or prostitutes for several years now. Property crime seems about the same, perhaps an uptick of breaking and entering houses (but not an uptick for b&e cars). I can’t recall any reports before last year of people jumping out of cars to rob people walking home from pubs.
Also, no one got robbed for their phones in the 90’s (when dinosaurs roamed the earth).
Also, in the olden days nobody got their door kicked in by burglars seeking laptops, tablets, and flat-screen TVs. It actually felt more predictable to me–and therefore more comfortable–in the early 2000s when most of the miscreants were my neighbors who were unlikely to prey on me. Their criminal activities were just that, criminal, and it’s better to have those kinds of shenanigans banished. But I rarely, if ever, felt personally threatened. (Unlike the past 1-2 years, when it got a lot more creepy to move around the neighborhood at night on my own.) Once enough of the n’hood baddies got replaced by enough well-to-do households, and conspicuous consumption reached a certain threshold, then the ‘hood became attractive to smash-and-grab burglars and smart phone robbers coming in from other places. To me, that was scarier. At the same time, the sharing and reporting of every incident has been accelerated and amplified far beyond what any of us thought about (if we thought about it) 15 years ago. And finally, folks who moved into OAK in the past few years have substantially different visions and expectations about what they were buying into, compared to people who moved in (or were already there) in the ’90s.
“Also, in the olden days nobody got their door kicked in by burglars seeking laptops, tablets, and flat-screen TVs.”
If by the olden days you mean the early 2000s you referred to, I’m not sure about that. If DPD’s numbers are to be believed, the burglary rate was higher then. The targets might have been different, but certain items, like stereo equipment, had more resell value then than they do now. And some items, like tools and guns, were just as desirable to thieves then as they are now.
I’m speaking anecdotally. Saying “nobody” got their door kicked in was a bit hyperbolic. But we didn’t start seeing the kick-in/grab-and-go burglaries targeting high-end electronics until there was a critical mass of loot to be had.
TVs, etc. have also gotten a LOT easier to carry. You try stealing a 42″ TV from the 90s, you’re gonna throw your back out.
Plus, who even had room for a 42″ TV back in the day? Big screens came in with big houses, so if you think about it, this is really one more thing to blame on untrammeled development!
Yeah small town Gal! It’s all those debaucherous McMansion dwellers faults!
Those are McCraftsmans, not McMansions. We are soon to become a town of McCraftsmans, McArtisans, McFroyos, and McGrowlers with our children in McIB schools.
Just kidding. Real life in COD is no where near as old and grumpy and snarky as life on this blog.
True Dat At Home in Decatur. I suppose I am just a McSnarker.
Smalltowngal what you’ve said here makes more sense than anything said by any one of us!… There’s that euphemism “build it and they will come”… “Like ants to a picnic” is another
How many times does it have to be said on here:
Crime is not up in Decatur. Crime reporting is up in Decatur.
Ad nauseum, apparently. And you know the crime reports always bring out the fearful old folks who get a steady diet of crime news elsewhere too.
Somebody should really inform those folks that had their car stolen or were robbed at gunpoint that the crime problem has been solved.
Nice straw man argument there, Pyt. Demonstrating that crime is down is no more comforting to them than ranting and raving about family values and entitlement, but at least it puts things in perspective.
Randomn thoughts: The kids breaking in are probably in a gang. I don’t think the kids really care about organized after school activities. Decatur isn’t a bubble, we have some sketchy areas that aren’t too far away from our zip code.
So I moved to Decatur from SWAT about 2.5 years ago. A place that statistically has way more crime than Decatur in just 2 weeks (or along those lines). However, I feel less safe in Decatur for some reason than when I lived in SW Atlanta and then it hit me. When I lived in SW Atlanta we didn’t really have a tightly knit community or communication forum and open police force. I have felt this way because I’ve become more informed since living in Decatur.
Just my 2 cents…
Ignorance is bliss… If you pretend it’s not there then it must not be
Ignorance can also equal unreasonable fear. If crime occurred at a rate even close to the proportion of coverage it receives in the local media, particularly tv news, then one would indeed do well to hole up in a safe room and never come out!
But, from your perspective, isn’t it a good thing people keep pretending there’s no crime so you can make that big profit off your McMansion?
Don’t get my message all wrong Mr Cheerful Shark.. I am Pro Gun and a licensed carrier. I am pointing out the basic problem that we get from Media and a consistent bombardment of bad news. And not just on the Decatur blog. When we are bombarded with nothing but . crime, crime, crime, crime, crime, yeah you tend to fell like your going to be a victim as soon as you walk outside.
Maybe Decatur post should post how many people didn’t get broken into or mugged every day.
BREAKING NEWS. 20,148 Decatur Citizens were not mugged today. No houses were broken into.
If you wonder why liberal people get all hysterical and their panties in a wad about gun control. Well, it’s because of the people that badly represent it.
“When we are bombarded with nothing but . crime, crime, crime, crime, crime, yeah you tend to fell like your going to be a victim as soon as you walk outside.”
Yep. But when you point out that crime rates have been falling for decades, they’ll simply say the facts are wrong and cite all the horrible crime they heard about. I have little doubt that people who watch Nancy Grace every night would swear that child murders have never been more common. The audience for that type of show and local tv news tends to be old, as does the audience for the fictional crime series like NCIS, which offer a completely distorted view of criminality. An we all know that older people have a disproportionate influence on politicians, so it’s not an insignificant problem.
our anxiety is proportional to the quantity, speed, and locality of our media
What to do with all that $$…? I know! I’ll start a foundation! I’ll call it “Give A Thug A Hug”……Brianc I nominate you to be the Head Hugger in charge! …:. Our motto will be “hugs not slugs”..Mr Julian notify the paparazzi!…(Mel .. What a guy…!)
High anxiety…it’s always the same!
Who’s going to do something about the rise in exclamation points on this blog?
😀 !!!
Or … ellipses …
Thanks for the update Sgt Ross. It appears that the DPD acted in a professional manner, demonstrating compassion in rapidly responding to the needs of Decatur residents.
Ten years ago the only people who would have known about this crime were a few neighbors on that block. Times have changed.
I keep thinking I am reading comments on Creative Loafing. What the heck is going on this week?
Some folks here seem to be salivating at the chance to shoot another human being, that’s what.
Ya, I am one of those liberals who gets my panties in a wad about gun control and the comments here are getting my panties, ‘waddier’. Keep your guns locked in their safes and away from us and our children.
Between this thread and the one about ‘Compassion being Tabled’ it seems we have a lot of Decatur angst popping up on DM. Maybe we should give DM the $100K to help facilitate the conversations people want to have?
So this kid is 14. He’s a dumbass, and that’s actually probably more dangerous than an older, “hardened” criminal, insofar as an older character with a couple of these under the belt is less likely to do dumb things like break into houses in the early evening when people are home.
If you’re gonna boost people’s stuff, at least be competent at it.
I’ve always maintained that 14-15 year old males with guns are particularly scary because they are still in the process of developing metacognition and are no where near as predictable as the average older gun-wielding criminal. Some don’t even have much facial hair yet and are probably in the midst of hormonal storms. Usually this statement is countered with someone claiming that their 14-15 year old is incredibly mature and law-abiding. That’s all well and good and I’m happy for that parent. 99.9% of 14-15 year olds are not scary. But I’m still real scared of that fraction of a fraction that are.
(So Many Books– Thinking of you and smiling! :0)
So there seems to be some confusion as to the meaning of all of this. All of our cynicism has gotten way out of control and is getting us nowhere. I for one am NOT for strapping on my weapon and parading the neighborhood vigilante style, i’m not hunting people and this ain’t no Hunger Games. The point I’m trying to make is this, I will protect my family and myself to the utmost letter of the law if someone anyone breaks into my home while me and mine are at home. I will call 911 with any and every opportunity to do so prior to pulling my weapon. I have lawfully obtained a concealed carry license, purchased and registered all weapons legally, taken multiple gun safety courses and keep my weapons locked out of the reach of children. It would be horrible to have to take a human life, anyone’s life even that of someone means me harm. That being said, should I feel no alternative but to pull and use my weapon, I would rather spend the rest of my life living with the consequences than to have no life to live or allow harm to come to my family. Owning a weapon is not for everyone and I respect those choices. I would say to those who don’t choose to have a weapon, make a plan as to what you would do if some adrenaline- filled criminal comes to kick in your door while you’re home just as you should likewise plan for the what-if you awake to your house being engulfed in flames. Being prepared is not just for Boy Scouts anymore…. Actually it never was!
“So there seems to be some confusion as to the meaning of all of this”
Seems like the friction you encountered (confusion to you) had less to do with your stance and was more about how you personally came across.
I was googling my situation from September 2nd.
My house in Decatur was robbed at 8:30 AM after me and my boyfriend left for work.
Our front door was kicked in and our flatscreen tv and all of my jewelry was stolen. They completely destroyed my room looking for valuables that I don’t have.
My neighbor called the police because he saw them with our TV while he was backing out of his driveway. Dark Gray SUV with an out of state license plate “512 NVG or NVD”. I also read about this same vehicle hitting other places near me. I wonder if these teenagers stole a new car and kept going since it sounds like my situation on the same day…….
AmandaH, I’m really sorry to read what happened to you. Very glad that your alert neighbor called it in. The more active we all are in doing our part to look out for each other and help out DPD, the better our chances of discouraging criminals from seeing our neighborhoods as easy pickins’.
Thank you Deanne,
It’s sad that something like this is what finally made me realize I need an alarm system and possible secutiry camera system. I’ve been uneasy ever since it happened and I thought my neighborhood was so peaceful. Now I’m suspicious of every car that drives by and person walking in front of my house. ESPECIALLY the teenagers. If you know you’re going to be out of town or your driveway is empty while everyone is at school/work, get neighbors to look out for you! I really don’t like being scared in my own neighborhood. Yeah, they took over $1000 of our items, but really they took my peace of mind.