Juanchella Francis just released this Decatur Police Alert…
On Tuesday, July 28, 2009 at approximately 11:10 AM the Decatur Police Department was notified of an armed robbery which had just occurred. The victim stated she was stopped at the intersection of Spring Street and Adams Street when her vehicle was blocked in by a white sedan (make and model unknown). One of the two occupants of the vehicle approached her and produced a handgun. The suspect demanded she exit the vehicle. The victim complied and the male entered the victim’s vehicle and drove away. Both suspects drove southbound on Adams Street towards West Pharr Road.
The victim’s vehicle is described as a dark green 1998 Honda Accord bearing GA license plate AGL1211.
The suspects are described as follows:
SUSPECT #1 – Gender: Male Race: African-American Age: Early 20’s Hairstyle: Braided Clothing: White t-shirt & Jeans
SUSPECT #2 – Gender: Male Race: African-American Age: Early 20’s Hairstyle: Short Clothing: Jeans
Anyone having information about this crime is asked to contact the Decatur Police Department at (404) 373-6551. If the victim’s vehicle is observed the Decatur Police Department request you contact 911. Do not approach the occupants as they are reportedly armed.
Well, that’s bloody scary.
Absolutely horrible.
This is the way I walk to pick up my son everyday and it’s about three blocks from my house.
I traveled that way to drop off the kids for Summer camp. It’s hard to believe such a crime happened there. …I suppose that what makes it the perfect spot.
That’s practically in front of my house (I live on Adams right across from where Lenore dead-ends). That’s really scary. Time to start carrying the police-grade pepper spray my husband bought a few weeks ago.
In light of the early Sunday afternoon robbery on Sycamore near two churches, the library, and the Rec Center, I am downright dismayed. Not sure my 13 year old can walk around Decatur alone anymore, even in broad daylight on main thoroughfares, and it’s not always easy to identify a pack to join him. You have to walk to join the pack!
I vote for even more of a proactive community police presence and less WiFi.
“I vote for even more of a proactive community police presence and less WiFi.”
They really have nothing to do with each other.
I’m interested in how you would implement “even more of a proactive community police presence”. We already have more dense police presence than almost any other community in the metro area.
Really? Based on what facts? Even if this is true, it’s always possible (and in this case, desirable) to increase proactive policing. It’s not as if there’s a patrolman on every corner here, so your question merely begs another question: if increasing proactive policing is not a feasible solution, what would you suggest?
I didn’t say it wasn’t feasible, I merely asked for suggestions on how to implement it.
Re dense police force: Evidently not dense enough! This is not a dig on our wonderful, friendly, and competent city police. We think they’re great. We just want more of a great thing.
Re WiFi: That was a rhetorical comparison. Substitute about any other budget item and I’m fine with it. None of the amenities of Decatur count for much if you don’t feel safe. I’ve been living in Decatur since the early 1990s and I’ve seen it improve in safety a lot over time. I probably wouldn’t still be living and loving it here if that improvment hadn’t occurred. I’ve lived in Manhattan and Los Angeles, during fairly high crime eras, and loved both at the time. But the edgy urban atmosphere is not where I choose to locate my family now.
“In light of the early Sunday afternoon robbery on Sycamore near two churches, the library, and the Rec Center”
Can you give some more info? I live in that general vicinity and hadn’t heard about that. And I also take my daughter to McKoy pool pretty often as well. SCARY.
Marla, she’s referencing this.
Unfortunately, not a lot of detail on CrimeReports.
Thanks DM.
Weak, I play softball in McKoy Park.
WTH is happening here??? Is it just me, or does there seem to be a significant hop up in the reported crime rate around here in the past 6 months? The incidents listed on CrimeReports.com start out with mostly property/”quality of life” offenses, and have been escalating into the more serious. Robbery?? Carjacking??? What’s next? Having lived in very large metropolitan areas and “bohemian” neighborhoods, I do realize that there’s no such thing as no crime at all, but these latest incidents are starting to make me wonder where we’re headed, and if the City needs to find room in the budget for a few more police officers/patrols. I don’t believe I’m overreacting– I’m just starting to get pi$$ed. Pi$$ed that I’m starting to feel unsafe when I never used to, that now my fellow citizens have to wonder whether they can allow their kids to walk by themselves anywhere, or even if they themselves can.
The crime rates in Decatur have steadily decreased over the past several years. More officers could be a part of a solution, but they still aren’t going to be everywhere, and the issue of identifying and hiring is just as large.
We’ve been sort of spoiled over the years by our low crime rate, so almost everything seems amplified. In case you didn’t notice, Atlanta had 3 carjackings in the same neighborhood on the same night. This is the first in Decatur in quite some time.
Crimereports.com is a great tool, but it’s only been around for a few months so any attempt to compare its data to anything else is not valid, unless you have the details of month-to-month historical trends over the years.
We are in the unfortunate position of being immediately next to the City of Atlanta and that makes for some spill-over.
I agree with Steve. There is a perception that violent crime is on the rise, but an objective view of the facts doesn’t really bear this out. It’s more about our increased information about crimes like this, which makes us more conscious of it.
2 years ago, very few of us would have heard of this crime, because a blog like DecaturMetro didn’t exist, and we weren’t combing through police and crime reports.
And Steve is also correct in noting that we’ve got some very bad neighborhoods bordering our fair town. There is going to be some spillover, unfortunately – it’s not like the bad guys observe municipal borders.
Another thing – this crime sounds like some criminals on the run, switching cars as the opportunity presented itself. i.e. not locals. Similar to the holdup of that little convenience store at 2nd and Oakview a few months back, by a group travelling through town with NY state license plates. Not that the randomness should make anyone feel better, but it is important to note crimes that are endemic to the area vs. those that are not.
Just an FYI though- last week, a house in Oakhurst had its front porch furniture stolen. The thief is well known to police and apparently pretty much steals anything not nailed down. The furniture was found at Kudzu antiques. Another neighbor had some household items stolen from the back of her house and found them at Kudzu as well (none of this is necessarily Kudzu’s fault- antique dealers often buy merchandise from random folk who scour garage sales, trash piles and even other people’s porches) . Yet another neighbor’s garage was broken into and his lawnmower taken not long ago. There has definitely been some sneak thieving going on in Oakhurst lately. Heck, these three incidences happened within a block of each other.
Actually, Steve, crime of all kinds is up in Decatur.
Up 25% in the SW and SE zones from 2007 to 2008. Don’t have the numbers for 2009 to see if the upward trend has continued this year.
City Hall needs to realize this and take action. Festivals, wi-fi, storybook budgeting is great and all, but if they do not get the crime situation under control what does it matter?
Please cite your sources by category.
Steve, see DM’s link to Decatur’s police statistics in his post at 2:17 (just below this particular string). It does tend to refute your earlier statement that crime has been steadily decreasing over the past several years.
Here is a link to the 2008 vs. 2007 crime comparison statistics.
http://www.decaturga.com/cgs_citysvcs_pspolice_statistics.aspx
Crime was actually up a whopping 43% in the SW zone.
Ah the other edge of the “better-communication” sword.
Here’s a summary of the data I can find about Decatur robbery trending…
2009 to-date: 9 (based on Decatur counts for Jan and CrimeReports for Feb-July)
2008: 25
2007: 29 (missing December)
2006: 41
2005: 29
2004: 33
DM- is this armed robbery or theft by taking or both?
That’s just robbery Nellie, which essentially is taking by force, threats or intimidation. Burglary is illegally entering a structure and stealing. Theft is NOT illegally entering a structure and stealing (except in the case of motor vehicles).
Well, I went to that link you posted, and the abbreviated data you recount here doesn’t really tell the whole story. The data on the year-end summaries for 2007 & 2008 show an actual upward trend:
Robbery & Other theft crimes – 2007 (I left out murder, rape, battery, & arson):
533 (if you add the “Entering Auto” offenses, that’d be an additional 271offenses)
Robbery & Other theft crimes – 2008 (again excluding murder, rape, battery, & arson):
696 (if you add the “Entering Auto” offenses, that’d be an additional 304 offenses)
The 2009 figures only go through the end of January (not surprising, since this is a summary report), but the totals for that month are (for the same offense categories) 61 (with 35 EA offenses). So, I’m no math genius, but this doesn’t look like a downward trend to me.
If you want to put theft and burglary on the same level as robbery, be my guest, but I think that distorts things a bit. I was only looking at robberies to keep us on topic.
Yes, thefts are up year to year, but violent crime (including robberies) were down 2008 to 2007. I believe I’ve written a post to that effect.
And THAT’S what we’re talking about here. Violent crime. Not a stolen flat-screen.
Thanks for the clarification.
Do you really believe theft offenses don’t provide a wider reflection of an area’s overall crime rate? And who’s to say that someone stealing your flatscreen wouldn’t do something violent to you to get at it if you happened to be home when the intruders arrived? There’s not that much of a fine line when it comes to someone breaking into your home, and mugging you– you just happen to be present in one tpe of incident. I’ve been mugged, and I’ve had my home broken into, and I can tell you, I was just as furious about my home having been invaded as I was about having a knife thrust at me (plus, when I was mugged, at least my homeowner’s insurance didn’t go up). A statement was made by another poster that there’s been a decrease in crime here (NOT just violent crime) over the past few years– my post was more in response to that than to address just robberies (which, as I pointed out, are only part of the overall picture). It’s also interesting to note that burglaries, which are differentiated from “mere” theft by this same report, increased exponentially from 2007 to 2008. Do you really believe that a drop in the number of robberiesof 6 means that crime overall is trending downward here?
When did I state that “crime overall is trending downward”?
I brought up robberies because you asserted with this sentence that the nature of crime was becoming more violent.
“The incidents listed on CrimeReports.com start out with mostly property/”quality of life” offenses, and have been escalating into the more serious. Robbery?? Carjacking??? What’s next?”
But now you seem to be saying that lesser offenses like thefts and burglary be rolled into robbery #s to get a true look at the city’s problem. It seems like we went from discussing the severity of crime to just the pure count.
Sorry if I wasn’t clear– and I don’t mean to seem as if I’m jumping on you. And before I saw the report you linked to, it did seem to me that more violent-natured crimes are escalating (and frankly, since the report doesn’t show totals for 2009 except for January, we don’t know for sure yet, do we?). But to me, the fact that the very crimes that people are more likely to be affected by simply as a statistical probability (you’re much more likely to be the victim of a burglary or a theft than you are of a battery or murder) is not something I can disregard, even in lgiht of a slight drop in 2 or 3 categories. The “overall” remark I made was in response to your (implicit) statement that “stealing a flatscreen” was nothing akin to being robbed. It’s small comfort to me that in 2008, there were 6 less robberies, but over 75 more burglaries (which are, as the report designates, different from your garden variety theft crimes).
I agree that burglary, theft and robbery all go hand-in-hand, and ultimately I wouldn’t be surprised if we see increases in all three by year-end, but we haven’t seen data to confirm that yet.
Also, I am always hesitant to embrace the “things are much worse” theory, when as E pointed out, we didn’t have DPD email alerts or blogs to blast this info out to the population. To me it sounds like most people here think things are A LOT worse than they used to be, and I really don’t believe that’s true. At worst, they’re a little worse and people just have a lot more info available to them.
But maybe I’m just particularly sensitive to this, since I’m directly responsible for it’s proliferation.
Bastards, seriously, this is the second altercation this year at a park where parents frequently take their children. (Earlier this year, it was Oakhurst Park.) I’ve been walking with the kiddos to McKoy Park for over 4 years now and never felt the need to look over my shoulder. Thanks a lot, scum. You unmade my day.
Exactly how I feel! We walk in the neighborhood a lot (as many Decaturites do), both for exercise and going to restaurants, bars, etc. We’ve always been conscientious, but now I’m really freaked out about taking a walk down the street, not to mention stopping at a stop sign on my way to the house in the middle of the day!
Shocker…
The suspects are described as follows:
SUSPECT #1 – Gender: Male Race: African-American Age: Early 20’s Hairstyle: Braided Clothing: White t-shirt & Jeans
SUSPECT #2 – Gender: Male Race: African-American Age: Early 20’s Hairstyle: Short Clothing: Jeans
Oh? What, specifically, is the “shocker” here? Ahhhh, I get it. I reckon we’ll have to find a way to deal with them there peskitty Neeeeegroes, won’t we?
Yes, you are correct! Is Dirty Harry still a cop in SF?
Nah. He was replaced by Axel Foley. 😉
Actually, I think that was L.A. 🙂
I know– you’re right! But I couldn’t think of another ubiquitious black police officer/character, so I had to move Axel to SF…
I think the “shocker” here refers to the nature of the crime and not the description of the perps.
Maybe the crime rate will decrease a little when school starts again. I’m not buying the “early 20s” guesstimate.
Sorry– that should be “ubiquitous”. Can spell, can’t type.
When I was in graduate school, I live on a street that was considered totally unsafe by most of my fellow students, who – if they could afford it – lived in a tonier section of town. As it turned out, we never had any problems, whereas there were frequent muggings of joggers, car break-ins, and other property crimes over in the “good” neighborhood. Apparently, the bad guys figured out that there was better stuff to steal over there. I never made assumptions about what was a “good” neighborhood again.
FWIW, I saw DPD at least 10 times this morning walking my son through Oakhurst to College Heights around 8 am this morning. While this crime happened a bit later in the morning, I can’t imagine having more police presence on the streets without literally having an officer standing at every corner…
I believe part of the issue is not how many cops we have in Decatur but how many cops surround us in Dekalb and Fulton counties. If they take care of their bad guys, I think some of our problems are avoided. Not to be classist, but I suspect most of the carjackers don’t live in $600,000 bungalows off the square.
This is the first time I have written in on a blog but I feel compelled to reassure our community that we take crimes against people very seriously as well as other crimes. People should feel safe in their communities and we are charged with trying to provide a safe and non threatening environment for the citizens of Decatur.
The robbery earlier this morning troubles me a great deal. The officers of your police department are working diligently to identify and apprehend the persons who committed this terrible crime. I understand the fear and apprehension a crime like this causes in the community and I want to reassure each of you it is being given the highest priority by all members of the Decatur Police Department. We are pursuing several investigative leads at this time and have been in contact with neighboring jurisdictions to ensure the description of the suspects and the victim’s vehicle are disseminated.
I have noted in several comments that some of you feel the City should devote more resources to the police department. I can tell you the City has been very supportive of the police department during my tenure as Police Chief. Actually, it is not the financial support of the city which limits the number of police officers in the City, but rather the rigid standards we have in the department. We recognize that men and women who serve as police officers are given great authority and with that authority comes responsibility. The officers who serve in the City of Decatur must meet our qualifications and adhere to a higher standard.
I hope to be able to report the apprehension of these two suspects very soon, but if that is not possible, rest assured the members of the Decatur Police Department will pursue every lead available.
I know this is just one comment on this blog but I hope you all know that we are deeply concerned when this type of crime occurs in our city. Thanks for allowing me to share this with all of you.
Chief Booker
City of Decatur Police Department
Thanks for weighing in Chief. We appreciate all you and your officers do.
Thanks, Chief.
Thanks, Chief — and please comment on DecaturMetro more often… it helps us to know the city cares enough to check in on this blog and keep us updated.
I hope you know that this post from you, Chief, whilst not completely assuaging my concerns, has ratcheted up my respect for you and the Department even higher than it was, simply because it’s nice to know you care. Oh, and you didn’t blow smoke up our collective…well, you know.
Thank you for reaching out!
While this is an incident that rises to a whole new level, this sort of discussion has been going on since December on the Oakhurst Yahoo group. When we were having our doors kicked in in broad daylight, people were ready to take up arms and justice among themselves. It bordered on absurdity because people simply didn’t have the knowledge of what actually goes on with our police department, its hiring capabilities, how it is funded by the city, and most importantly the education opportunities it offers to the citizens it has sworn to protect.
I fully support and thank Chief Booker for his leadership and willingness to respond to the concerns of the community. I think he has gone way beyond what is required of him by actually responding on this blog.
Therefore I ask all of you who are so concerned to find out what you can do to assist the DPD, and that starts by signing up for the Citizens Public Safety Academy (CPSA). The next class starts this fall. You get to meet Chief Booker, Assistant Chief Lee, and many of veterans our Public Safety department. Most importantly you learn how our PD works and how you can assist them. We are incredibly lucky in how willing our PD is to work with the citizens. We have an auxiliary, Citizens Assisting Public Safety (CAPS), that has formed out of graduates of CPSA. I understand such programs may not be known to all of the Decatur community, so that is why I am taking this opportunity to let everyone know about them.
DPD (and most importantly Chief Booker) listens to its citizens. I was a critic of the lack of communication from DPD back during the holidays when we had a rash of break ins. Since then I have seen an unprecedented use of electronic communication by our PD to get alerts out to us within hours of many incidents. I have seen innovative measures, some obvious and some not so obvious, by our PD to respond to the rash of home invasions dating back to the holidays.
As you will learn in CPSA, the citizens are the best eyes and ears that DPD has. They can’t be everywhere at once, but reassured they are doing an incredible job. Do what you can to help them to do even a better job.
I am pretty surprised that on a blog dedicated to life in a progressive city such as Decatur, someone was allowed to make bigoted comments about “Neeeegroes” and it not receive any sort of rebuke.
I am an African-American Ivy League educated father and husband who’d been considering moving to Decatur from North Dekalb. I guess I should consider this move carefully…
Mongoose,
I would encourage you to go back and reread the back and forth again. It’s not Cuba’s response that’s in question, it’s the implied racial profiling stated before it. I’ll admit it’s a bit edgy, but she lays out on the table what he skirts.
I admit that I thought long and hard about moderating that piece of the conversation, but most of the time it’s better to let the site moderate itself. One method of the mob is to ignore, the other is to go for the jugular. Both occurred in this instance.
Mongoose, Mongoose, Mongoose– I can NOT believe you could’ve taken my pointed response to Rusty Diamond’s post as anything except a not-so-subtle calling him out on the “shocker” comment. I myself am mixed-race, and while I don’t believe that gives me carte-blanche to say what I please, I have to admit it does make me very sensitive to remarks that I perceive as racist or having racist implications (hence, my follow-up post, which Diamond then tried to deflect with humor, and I responded in kind, because I didn’t want to keep ratcheting up the dialogue– I’d made my point that such remarks were not going to go unchallenged).
Ivy League education? I’m impressed, but I would’ve thought it would’ve enhanced, rather than blinkered, your ability to perceive sarcasm– especially when it’s actually being used to challenge bigotry. If you’re only going to skim the surface of a particular conversation, then you should probably expect to be offended more often than not.
Mongoose, if you are truly “Ivy League educated”, I must assume that you went to Cornell, Penn or some other second tier Ivy school where English is not a required course.
Dear Mr. Mongoose,
You must know gentle Decaturites do not get into arguments with the intolerant or the bigoted. We merely look down on them from our city of great tolerance and diversity and hope they receive enlightenment in the future.
No, I check this website pretty often and the person who commented, cubalibre, posts here often.
And I thought the ignorance was all OTP. Ignorance, like crime, apparently knows no bounds.
I should probably stay my black butt up in Northlake/Briarcliff before I get “Skip Gates-ed” in Decatur.
“And I thought the ignorance was all OTP. Ignorance, like crime, apparently knows no bounds.
I should probably stay my black butt up in Northlake/Briarcliff before I get “Skip Gates-ed” in Decatur.”
Please do.
The fact that you state your own intolerance and elitism in one sentence while espousing your assumption that ALL ignorance is OTP, clearly illustrates that you wasted at least $120,000.
As Buckley stated brilliantly:
“I won’t insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.”
Cubalibre’s comment was in jest-she was responding to the previous post which did strike me as racially insensitive.
If you are looking for a perfect colorblind world, well, good luck with that. If you want to live in the next best thing to perfect, move to Decatur.
Thanks Chief Booker!
The comments were racist, plain and simple. And I doubt there would have been the collective silence on the blog had it been written about other “protected class” demographic groups.
But because the “joke” was made about “Neeeegroes” and the context is about the race of the perpetrators of a carjacking, no one feels compelled to stand up and say: “Hey, that’s inappropriate.” Not even the editor of the blog.
It’s like someone says something racist at a dinner party and folks keep picking at their brie.
My last point…I would think that such a community with such a reputation for racial tolerance would not tolerate such intolerance. That’s the whole point of being tolerant.
And I don’t think cubalibre or rusty diamond were joking.
Please…stay away.
Tell you what, Mongoose– if you really and truly cannot read the response I gave to Rusty, that says more about you than it does about me. You’re right– I wasn’t making a “joke”, what I was essentially doing was throwing down the gauntlet, and the racially insensitive commentary got stopped in its tracks & diffused by humor. Even though it’s difficult to catch a tone in a soundless medium, it seems just about everyone here was able to get what was really being said– except you. I call ’em the way I see ’em, and I can’t be mad at you for calling it the way you perceived it, but I can tell you that you’re absolutely wrong.
Feel free to lecture us, but only after you respond to our retorts. I stated my reasons for not moderating the comment. Please detail what about that didn’t convince you.
You may see both comments as racist (I inclined agree with you on the first, not the second) but you’ve made a lot of assumptions to get to the conclusion that everyone looked the other way. First and foremost was cubalibre’s retort, which I read as calling Rusty out for his comment. You read it as something else…I’m not sure what. Gleeful affirmation?
Also, please let me know how you are so certain of the intention of a written comment. In my experience, much is lost on the page. Facial expression, tone, inflection, etc. All I have is my past experience with a commenter. If I have no experience, I take a harder line, but in this case, I’ve read and had countless conversations with this person, so I can say fairly certainly that she was using sarcasm to combat his statement.
And PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DM, do not spend another second on this. It is either a troll leveling us, or else someone [edited: no personal attacks]. Either way he/she has already gotten what he/she was looking for!
Let me step down from the soapbox now that I have everyone’s attention. Glad that my comments have achieved their provocative goals.
DM – I took cubalibre’s comments as a slight jest to rusty diamond. I sort of got the attempt with the Axel F replacement for Dirty Harry, but if the purpose was to shoot him down, that was a mild attempt. A simple “what do you mean…’shocker’?” would have sufficed. Something direct and bold. Like I have been.
Cubalibre – I took liberty with a literary phrase “the leviathan stumbling out” to symbolize an unintended but consequential happening that is both surprising and disturbing. That’s how I felt about the “peskity Negroes” response and the “shocker” racial profiling comment by rusty diamond. On a blog that mentioned a recent carjacking, we took this detour to discuss race…which I still don’t understand as relevant to the blog topic. And I don’t purport to speak for any A/A but myself. But my race does significantly inform my opinion and I have stated it.
JT – no offense taken, but at Harvard, we engaged in these kinds of fierce intellectual battles…sorry if I’ve raised everyone’s blood pressure…but racial profiling is a hot topic these days…and the words “peskity Negroes” always sends me over the edge.
How about we all meet over a beer like Obama is doing with the officer and Gates?
I second the beer suggestion. And I further apologize for impugning your educational pedigree with the suggestion of Penn or Cornell 😉 Hell, I went on scholarship to Penn State. I just hated to see Cuba impugned when she was the one who initially called out the racist idiot! This is certainly nothing that a good Belgian at the Brick Store wouldn’t cure (as long as they don’t try to put mayo on my fries!)
Translation = some of us in Decatur don’t like being challenged when the bigoted leviathan stumbles out. Please, teachable moment, teach me.
Sorry…if you didn’t learn anything in school you aren’t going to make up for it in a blog.
What should I have learned in school? I was taught to address insensitivity whenever I saw it. I correct my friends all the time when they make anti-gay jokes…it’s not funny, and it’s a distant cousin of hate activities.
I’m still amazed that only one person on this blog found those comments offensive. Appreciating diversity of opinion means that if someone talks about being tough on crime or stiffening sentences or other traditional conservative notions, you should engage and debate even if you disagree.
But there’s no place for comments like “peskity Neeeegroes” on a blog that usually has such otherwise thoughtful comments.
Someone who drops a name like “the bigoted leviathan” really doesn’t have any room to talk about insensitivity. You’re still amazed that only one person (you) found those comments offensive? Maybe that should tell you something (and no, it isn’t that your perception of bigotry is more finely-tuned than everyone else’s here).
“Appreciating diversity of opinion means that if someone talks about being tough on crime or stiffening sentences or other traditional conservative notions, you should engage and debate even if you disagree.” Physician, heed thine own words.
“But there’s no place for comments like “peskity Neeeegroes” on a blog that usually has such otherwise thoughtful comments.”
Who are you to decide what there’s a place for? I can appreciate that you’re sensitive to what you perceived as racially bigoted remarks, but honestly– do you think you’re the arbiter of all that is politically/racially correct? Do you imagine that you speak for ALL people of color? You don’t! I’ve tried to let you know, in the most earnest way I can, that your initial perception of the remarks I made was incorrect, and you’ve chosen to ignore that. Sorry, Mongoose, but you don’t get to decide what’s appropriate for everyone else. You’re belaboring a point that never existed except in your own mind, and you don’t want to hear or even consider that you might have overreacted or jumped the gun. Black people are not some monolithic body with one head that speaks for the entire corpus– so please get down off your soapbox.
Can I get an “Amen” ?!?
But I guess the community here wants to preserve the right to engage in that kind of insensitivity. That does not comport with what I generally hear about Decatur and its respect for diversity. I would hope that respect means more than posting an Obama sign in your yard.
Definitely Penn….
[edited]
I just can’t believe that after all this, the only thing that got edited was my mocking of Penn and Cornell. It’s true, I don’t know enough about Cornell to mock it. But I lived in Philadelphia and stand wholeheartedly behind my statements concerning the ignorant racists there!
On a completely serious note, between Chief Booker weighing in and the verbal sparring amongst Mongoose et al,. this is why I love Decatur so much. Can’t we all just get along? Maybe, maybe not, but we should at least have fun trying!
And since we apparently have a critical mass of sarcasm impaired readers out there, DM feel free to edit my remarks and chastise me as appropriate. I just couldn’t help myself. I do hope Mongoose was just having as much fun as me, and not actually offended, because that would just validate my remarks!
Wait…wasn’t this story originally about an armed carjacking near McKoy Park?
And I wanted to add my thanks to Chief Booker for his honesty and concern about our fears in his very well-written post.
All I have to ask is this…
Will each of you accept me as your neighbor sometime next year? Think of all the stimulating conversations we can have and verbal land mines we can acrobatically avoid in our discussions of race, class and crime in Decatur?
I found this exchange quite engaging and hope that we can have similar debates in the future.
Despite you guys trying to rough me up, I still think Decatur is a cool place, even if there was a wee bit of sensitivity about being “PC arrested” among my progressive brothers and sisters.
Peace and hair grease – Mongoose
“Despite you guys trying to rough me up, I still think Decatur is a cool place, even if there was a wee bit of sensitivity about being “PC arrested” among my progressive brothers and sisters.”
Hmmmmmm…we tried to “rough you up”? I beg to differ. You came kamikaziing in, making completely misguided (and self-righteous) accusations of racism, and despite the best efforts of most of those who responded to you, you crossed your arms & stomped your foot, insisting that everyone was looking away & picking at their brie instead of answering racist comments (nevermind that I actually answered them in one of my first posts on this thread). If some people here are mistaking you for a troll, maybe it’s because your statements are so imperceptive as to appear deliberately that way. In other words, it’s hard to take someone seriously who’s made the kind of remarks you have.
I’m with you Eric. And to think, not two hours ago, I was really moved by the things expressed after the Chief’s remarks.
But I’ve pretty much come to the conclusion that you have less of a chance of controlling an open blog than you do your own life. At least in life you can lock your door! So, you just gotta roll with it.
And DM, mad props as a moderator…let the debates rage. As long as it’s respectful…Seriously, this is a wonderful resource for people interested in Decatur. I have read DM for months, but this is my first post. Just like the political heckler said “don’t tase me bro!”…I have to beg…”don’t ban me bro!” Blog to you all soon. Mongoose
Thanks Mongoose. Anyone that can take all that verbal abuse in less than an hour and still come back smiling is OK in my book.
Welcome to the discourse.
Like me, I hope you’ll find it even more engaging than collegiate discourse.
You guys were totally duped by a troll! It was total flame bait all along.
Ummm, I called it first!
Swanny – sorry, but I’m real. I have been reading DM and been impressed for the past 6 months. I am actively looking to move to Decatur in about a year. So I am looking for any and all data points that will give me clues about what kind of community my family and I would be joining. This website has been a very good resource. I will be raising a daughter in this community and frankly many parts of Georgia are not welcoming for African Americans. Decatur appears to be the exception where a progressive intellectual can find a home and an enjoyable lifestyle.
Didn’t mean to harm any of the regulars…I’ll be back on the site for sure.
If you want to truly learn about Decatur, then go read up on DBA, DPA, DEF, CCSD, and many others; even better why don’t you come out and volunteer for the MLK, Jr. Service Weekend.
Me thinks you are still a troll as you obviously have put no effort into learning what Decatur is really about.
I go to church in Decatur and lead our men’s ministry, so I’m ok on the volunteer front. Please don’t be so defensive about the city. It is what it is…I am interested in learning what Decatur is about through the many lenses that I view life: a father, a husband, a homeowner, an intellectual, a professional, a 30-ish African American and someone who likes walkable neighborhoods with an inclusive community.
From what I know about the town, I’m sure it’s capable of being challenged on its merits by a newcomer.
Trolls are cute. Thanks for the compliment.
***********************
I wonder if crime reports are just being broadcast more in the media and thus, it creates this sensational effect. The ajc, for instance, has become nothing more than a police blotter and a politics blog. No other major newspaper leads with that much emphasis on crime. It seems like the crime numbers in the city of Decatur have not gotten dramatically out of whack…could it just be the media overhyping this?
Mongroose, I agree with the last part of your first statement. I currently live and grew up in Decatur. I love it. I grew up in Oakhurst and know it seems that the online gossiping and assuming is allowing more to panic. I remember, and I’m only 30, calling the police while coming home from school and no one came. You had to call 3 or 4 times. They are a whole lot better and we must give them the honor that’s due. Calm down everyone and watch out for your neighbors, call the non-emergency police line to report things and attend meeting (commission meetings are on tv.) I remember in high school we were required to attend the meetings to allow us to view how the government operates and get a different view.
I am not a troll b/c I began reading this post with a keen interest in crime in Decatur. I am the father of a 2 year old and frankly, there’s not much crime where I live. So, I did not intend to disrupt the conversation from crime to a sidebar on race. But I felt compelled to challenge both the comments and the silence from the community about them.
“I will be raising a daughter in this community and frankly many parts of Georgia are not welcoming for African Americans. Decatur appears to be the exception where a progressive intellectual can find a home and an enjoyable lifestyle.”
Mongoose, [edited: no personal attacks]. Might I suggest your amazing intellect and charm be better appreciated someplace other than Decatur. I for one would not like your pompous posterior as a neighbor. Oh and just so you know, there are a few horrible, conservatives in Decatur. I wouldn’t want you to accidentally bump into one of us on the street, for we may offend your hyper-sensitive, politically-correct, disposition.
BEL – cmon guys, why the hostility? Every black family I know has to take the pulse of the neighborhood they live in. Sorry, bud, but this is America and I’ve got the right to live anywhere I want. And you know and I know…Decatur LOVES overeducated people who who are sticklers for quality in the schools, zoning, and other neighborhood issues. I may not fit in with this blog, but I think I’ll fit just fine in the community. LOL
See you next year in a neighborhood near you. I’ll be the one hanging the Harvard flag during Harvard/Yale weekend.
Oh, I get it now. One has to be over-educated to make sure their community’s schools and zoning are acceptable.
Guess my state school educated white butt doesn’t belong here. OTP, here I come. If I stay, see you next year. I’ll be the one driving by your house with that state school’s bumper sticker, unsuccessfully dealing with my massive inferiority complex when I see your Harvard flag.
I am home with the flu for a couple of days, so I apologize if I blow up the blog. DM – you know I might be provocative, but I keep it in the lines.
How do we respond to crime? I was looking at a home near Glenlake Park, but heard about the mother with stroller getting mugged. The park is a big draw for us and that could be my wife and my 2 year old. And I couldn’t care less about the race of the perpetrator. My wife and I have had very intense discussions about who we should react to when we “undesirables” near us. What is an undesirable? Is always black men? Is it always young men? I lock my doors at every intersection b/c data suggests that it’s when your car is stopped that carjackings most occur. I do this in Buckhead, Bankhead, and when I pull out of golf course parking lots.
So the question remains…how do we respond to crime? And is it based on facts? Is it sensationalized? Or, what are the real risks we face in our neighborhoods, and pragmatic approached do we have to deal with that.
OK, I tried (unsuccessfully) to steer this conversation back to its original point. So I’m falling into my own trap with this response to Mongoose. But I can’t let Mongoose’s statements “an intellectual, a professional, a 30-ish African American” and “progressive intellectual” and “I should probably stay my black butt up in Northlake/Briarcliff before I get “Skip Gates-ed” in Decatur” go unremarked upon.
And my response is…just what Decatur needs; another over-educated, over-sensitive elitist who looks for every chance to yell “racist.” We Decaturites couldn’t care less about about your race, your education or your career. We love our city, and we don’t need a Henry Louis Gates Jr. clone to judge us from afar, no matter how long you’ve been reading DM and the other information sources.
But “the community” wasn’t silent, Mongoose. The minute I read Rusty’s “shocking” comment, I responded with a very pointed riposte. Using explicit, barbed rhetoric to point out the implicit bigotry in another’s comment isn’t being racist, it’s called sarcasm. Yes, what I said was offensive– it was meant to be, to make my point. No one else followed up to Rusty’s comment because I basically called it like it was, and it was therefore unnecessary. Everybody knew what he meant, and everybody (except you) knew what I meant. Fortunately, we were able to diffuse those comments with humor, until you dropped in with your misplaced righteous outrage. You want to be welcomed as a neighbor? That’d be great, as long as you can try opening your mind a tiny little crack.
DM ought to close this thread.
Please don’t, DM. We’re having fun! 🙂
In all seriousness, this is an important discussion.
Here’s what’s happened: on a blog dedicated to a city known for its tolerance and diversity, a discussion about crime included a comment which racially profiled the perpetrators. A poster (me) interested in moving to the city, reads the post about crime, sees the racial comment, and reacts to it.
Using the community on the blog as a data point for the larger Decatur community, he wonders out loud whether this is an isolated comment or a part of a larger issue. He muses whether the community’s reaction to crime will involve an unhealthy and unrelated sidebar on race or be an informed and pragmatic approach (community policing, city budget, neighborhood watches, etc.).
The community responds pretty aggressively and repeatedly encourages the poster to “stay away,” “don’t move here,” etc (poster rereads civil rights laws re: housing and is comforted). The community puts much more of a smack down on the “pompous elitist Skip Gates, Jr.” than it does the poster who made the arguably racially insensitive remark. Rusty Diamond was met with sarcasm; I have been met with “stay away.” LOL
What has been missed by many is the fact that living in a community where there might be casual racial insensitivity (albeit by a couple of people on a blog) is very nearly as important to me and my family as whether there is a possibly significant uptick in crime in the area. I might get over someone stealing my car, but the incessant drip of racial insensitivities me and my family might face…well, that’ll drive you crazy.
I”m a black man in America, living in Georgia. Sensitivity is a survival skill, Jack.
Mongoose.
“a city known for its tolerance and diversity” has diversity of opinions and tolerance of them. You seem to advocate a narrower band of opinions and little tolerance of outliers. Maybe this place isn’t for you.
Why have there been so many personal attacks? Why have there been so many saying stay away? I have not attacked anyone on the blog. I have raised questions about the city and these have been taken as personal by many posters. Why didn’t my comment about being “Skip Gates-ed” get treated as the same sarcastic humor as cubalibre’s comments?
OK, now I’m really fed up with this.
“Here’s what’s happened: …a discussion about crime included a comment which racially profiled the perpetrators. A poster (me) interested in moving to the city, reads the post about crime, sees the racial comment, and reacts to it. Using the community on the blog as a data point for the larger Decatur community, he wonders out loud whether this is an isolated comment or a part of a larger issue. He muses whether the community’s reaction to crime will involve an unhealthy and unrelated sidebar on race or be an informed and pragmatic approach (community policing, city budget, neighborhood watches, etc.).”
Horsehockey. Read: A poster who failed to take the remarks that were made in the context in which they were offered overreacted with bombast and accusations of bigotry condonation, even after it becomes clear that his initial impression was incorrect, and people explained that no offense was offered.
“The community responds pretty aggressively and repeatedly encourages the poster to “stay away,” “don’t move here,” etc (poster rereads civil rights laws re: housing and is comforted). The community puts much more of a smack down on the “pompous elitist Skip Gates, Jr.” than it does the poster who made the arguably racially insensitive remark. Rusty Diamond was met with sarcasm; I have been met with “stay away.” LOL”
The community reacted in kind to the poster, whose invocation of Dr. Gates’ situation was both inapt and gratuitous. Failing to evoke the collective guilt that the poster assumed should ensue, he dug himself in further, and received yet more responses in kind.
“What has been missed by many is the fact that living in a community where there might be casual racial insensitivity (albeit by a couple of people on a blog) is very nearly as important to me and my family as whether there is a possibly significant uptick in crime in the area. I might get over someone stealing my car, but the incessant drip of racial insensitivities me and my family might face…well, that’ll drive you crazy.”
The poster attempts to color his reactions as a litmus test of whether he can live where there are people whom he deems racially insensitive (completely ignoring the irony that his previous assumptions of the collective racist mindset of the community are, themselves, insulting and insensitive). A distinct minority of the blog community react with more vehemence, but the poster insists upon tarring all with the same broad bruch (again, ignoring the irony of such a response).
“I”m a black man in America, living in Georgia. Sensitivity is a survival skill, Jack.”
And I have family members & dear friends who are black folks living in America, where oversensitivity and leaping to conclusions aren’t survivial skills, they’re what’s keeping us from moving forward. We get back what we put in, Mongoose– you included.
Mongoose.
Well, it HAS taken everyones mind off the smelly dumpster crisis!
And for what it is worth, the local crime statistics show a large percentage of perps ARE African American. Hope I am not being “racially insensitive” in observing the crime statistics. If so, mea culpa.
The reasons for that statistic is where the true discussion should be, but I am not knowledgeable enough of the facts/sociology/economics to start such a discussion…not that any one would even WANT to discuss that here.
I am a white man, living in Atlanta. Sensitivity is a survival skill, Mongoose.
Let’s take this issue for a minute. And no, I don’t think that’s racially insensitive. It might be an incomplete analysis, however.
I would venture to say that there are other characteristics of the “typical perpetrator’ in addition to race. They might mainly dress in baggy clothes. They might mainly be under 30. They might mainly travel in packs of 2 or 3.
The question is – what are you going to use to determine whether you are unsafe? The race of the perpetrators? That’s an unreliable marker, in my opinion.
[edited: no personal attacks]
BEL – they LOVE me up here! LOL I live across from a wonderful Republican activist and we have great, healthy debates. He watches my mail, vice versa. We had dueling McCain and Obama signs in our yards.
To quote Bush, I guess I “misunderstimated” the affinity for debate on DM. My bad!
Mongoose, while I appreciate your suddenly cool head, you’re really going out of your way to hijack this thread.
If you really were upset about the original comments, you would be responding to cubalibre first and foremost, but instead you keep treating her as an after-thought and latching onto other random comments and probing deep into the racial profiling side of a single comment.
I’m beginning to think you were just looking for an opening to “teach” us all and not really all that interested in understanding why the original comments were made.
I’m not sure why crime threads always bring out the know-it-alls, be it on gun control or racial profiling, but it sure is tiring.