I’m adapting the title of this article from Robert Stacy McCain’s series “Crazy People Are Dangerous,” because the ‘suspect’ in this case almost certainly is crazy. Really, don’t you have to be a bit nuts to pull out a knife and start stabbing someone else?
Philly DA charges man with assault for stabbing in SEPTA’s 15th Street Station
Jason Howard, 33, was charged with aggravated assault and related crimes for allegedly stabbing another man around 4 a.m. Thursday.
by Rodrigo Torrejón | Friday, January 19, 2024 | 2:58 PM EST
A 33-year-old man who authorities say stabbed a man in the back multiple times in the 15th Street SEPTA subway station on Thursday morning has been charged with aggravated assault and related crimes.
Jason Howard attacked the 28-year-old victim after a confrontation around 4 a.m., a spokesperson for the District Attorney’s Office said Friday.
Both men were experiencing homelessness and likely taking shelter in the subway station when they apparently got into an argument and Howard pulled out a knife, authorities said.
I do so love the newspaper’s stylebook, which tells us that both the victim and (alleged) perpetrator were “experiencing homelessness,” rather than just saying that they are homeless. CBS News tells us that they were “unhoused.”
The following video report is from Fox 29 News, because The Philadelphia Inquirer would never, ever publish photos or other material which would show the image of the suspect!
Police reviewed surveillance footage and a SEPTA police officer later spotted Howard at the station, wearing the same clothing as the assailant in the video, as he stepped off a train on the Market-Frankford Line, said SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch. Philadelphia police arrested Howard on the 1500 block of Walnut Street shortly after, he said.
The Market-Frankford Line, huh? I’ve suggested before that it should be called the MF Line, because nothing good happens on it!
The Transit Police recovered a knife from the suspect, though it has not been reported whether that knife was the one which was used to stab the victim. Mr Howard is currently being held in lieu of $275,000 bail, something which a homeless man is unlikely to have or be able to raise.
We have previously noted that the city is far behind on its payments to privately-run homeless shelters, and it’s January, so yeah, the “unhoused” will seek shelter from the bitterly cold wind chills.
Former District Attorney Seth Williams tweeted, “Why drive when @SEPTA is so easy today! @SEPTAPHILLY“, and a lot of people replied with comments about how unsafe the system is. It wasn’t just this stabbing; Tyshaun Welles, an apparently good kid, was killed at the very same SEPTA station, allegedly by Quadir Humphrey, who just started shooting, apparently not aiming specifically at young Mr Welles, but just because he’s a thug with a criminal history who decided to be stupid.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, a federal government agency that, with a name like that, shows how serious the problems are just by its existence, reported that, in 2022, 21% of “individuals experiencing homelessness” reported having a serious mental illness, and 16% reported having a substance use disorder. They also reported a 16% increase in “individuals experiencing chronic homelessness between 2020 and 2022,” which tells us just how much President Biden’s claims that the economy is doing just great are lies.
Let’s be honest here: homeless people are dangerous! With a (probably underestimated) 21% being seriously mentally ill and others besides that 21% — though there is certainly some overlap in these percentages — being alcoholics and junkies, that’s a lot of people you do not want to be around.
This is serious stuff. New Mayor Cherelle Parker Mullins has promised to clean up the blatantly public drug market and the homeless encampments in Kensington, but that leads to the obvious question: if she kicks the homeless out of their camps, where will they go? One of the obvious answers is that they’ll go into the SEPTA train and subway stations!
Mrs Mullins is absolutely right: Kensington has to be cleaned up, but it’s not just that neighborhood. Kensington’s Allegheny Station is right along the MF Line, and the junkies will go where they know.
SEPTA needs increased ridership, and a $1.00 fare increase, to pay its bills and a city concerned about ‘climate change’ wants more Philadelphians to use public transportation, but Philly can’t get there if SEPTA stations become nothing but shelters for homeless junkies and crazy people. Over seventy years of unbroken Democratic Party and trade union rule has turned the City of Brotherly Love into what it is today. Mrs Mullins should be given a chance to do what she promised, but the problems in Philly are far greater than anyone is willing to admit.