Category Archives: Crime

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The real way to keep your kids out of trouble Doing the right things teaches your kids to do the right things

We have previously noted the homicide rate in St Louis, which, with an even 200 murders in 2022, and a Census Bureau estimated population of 286,578 as of July 1, 2022, yields a homicide rate of a whopping 69.79 per 100,000 population. When Philadelphia says that it’s the murder capital of the United States, St Louis laughs and says, “Hold my beer!”[1]With a Census Bureau estimated population of 1,567,258 as of July 1, 2022, and 516 murders that year, Philly’s homicide rate works out to a measly 32.92 per 100,000 population.

More specifically, with 45 of the homicide victims so far this year in the Gateway City being black males, black males in St Louis are bearing a homicide rate of a staggering 179.93 per 100,000 population.[2]The math: 286,578 total population, times 0.448, the percentage of the population listed as being black, times 0.487, the percentage of the population who are male, yields a black male population of … Continue reading

Now, why do I raise that subject? It is due to an article I saw in the St Louis Post-Dispatch:

Archbishop of St. Louis closes 35 parishes, reassigns 155 priests in Catholic church reorganization

by Blythe Bernhard | Pentecost Sunday, May 28, 2023

SHREWSBURY — The Archbishop of St. Louis will close 35 parishes and reassign 155 priests in the most sweeping reorganization of the Catholic church in St. Louis history.

After 18 months of waiting, Catholics learned on Saturday the fate of their priests and parishes in the downsizing of the archdiocese called “All Things New.”

The changes, which will reshape the archdiocese from 178 individual parishes into 134, were announced Saturday by Archbishop Mitchell Rozanski in a press conference and in a letter read by priests during vigil Mass.

“I wish these changes were not necessary, but it is what we are called to do at this moment,” Rozanski said Saturday.

The archbishop maintained that the plan affects the entire region, although nearly half of the closures are in north St. Louis and north St. Louis County and only one, St. John Bosco in Maryland Heights, is west of Interstate 270 in St. Louis County.

There’s more at the original.

One thing really jumped off the page at me: in the very areas in which St Louis was suffering the greatest number of murders, the “North Patrol,” are also the areas in which Mass attendance has declined so greatly that the Church is having to close parishes.

Let me be perfectly clear here: if you want your children not to grow up to be gang-bangers, not to be getting into situations in which gunfire or other serious violence is going to be the result, take them to church! Don’t send them to church, but take them to church. Don’t find excuses to sleep in, don’t say, “Oh, we’ll go next Sunday,” but take them to church every Sunday.

Some readers will complain that I have been overly simplistic in this, that there are so many other factors involved, but I really don’t see it that way. Taking your kids to church, every Sunday, teaches them that you believe religion and reverence are good and important things. Taking them to church every Sunday shows them that you are willing to make the effort to get out of bed yourself, to do the right thing. Taking them to church every Sunday exposes them to other kids and other families, also being taught the same lessons.

And taking the kids to church every Sunday encourages parents to do the right thing as well.

Is this the only thing that parents need to do? No, it isn’t, but it is the one thing which will help them get started, help them to do better, which does not require a lot of money or some complicated organizational effort. All you need to do is get the kids, your spouse, and yourself out of bed in the morning, and go. Yeah, it’s nice if you can drop some money in the collection basket, but if you don’t have the money to spare, the priest will still be happy to see you, other families will be glad you are there, and soon enough you will be able to manage to contribute something, anything, to the church. Doing the right thing very often brings the right rewards, even if it doesn’t always seem obvious.

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↑1 With a Census Bureau estimated population of 1,567,258 as of July 1, 2022, and 516 murders that year, Philly’s homicide rate works out to a measly 32.92 per 100,000 population.
↑2 The math: 286,578 total population, times 0.448, the percentage of the population listed as being black, times 0.487, the percentage of the population who are male, yields a black male population of 62,524. 45 black male victims divided by 0.62524 equals 71.97236, divided by 146, the day of the year, and multiplied by 365 days in the year yields 179.93.
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Killadelphia: Could Philly see ‘only’ 450 homicides in 2023?

I have not been posting nearly as many ‘math’ stories about the homicide rate in the City of Brotherly Love this year, because that math is so different.

According to the Philadelphia Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page, there have been 165 total homicides through 11:59 PM EDT on Wednesday, May 24, while the website Broad + Liberty has the total at 168. The 24th was the 144th day of the year, which leads to a homicide rate, using the ‘official’ PPD number, of 1.1458 homicides per day, on pace for 418 murders for the entire year.

Of course, that ignores the normal increase in homicides during the long, hot summer!

The number of homicides is 12.23$ lower than the same day in 2022. If we multiply that over the course of the year, that would yield a total homicide number for the year of 452.87, certainly a vast improvement over 2022’s 516 killings. Doing the same math, using 2021’s record-setting pace, the math works out to 450.15 homicides.

But then I look at 2020’s official homicide total of 499 — though there’s reason to believe that 502 is the correct figure — and the math works out quite differently. The current numbers are 12.24% higher than 2020’s homicide pace, which works out to 560.10 murders for 2023.

So, why is this significant? Because today, May 25th, is the third anniversary of the unfortunate death of the methamphetamine-and-fentanyl addled convicted felon George Floyd while he was resisting arrest for passing counterfeit money in Minneapolis. With that, the American left went absolutely bonkers, and killings soared. The idiotic #BlackLivesMatter protests led to more black people being killed!

The death of Mr Floyd was hardly the only tragedy of 2020, as the COVID-19 panicdemic[1]No, that isn’t a typographical error: the spelling of ‘panicdemic’ reflects exactly how I see it as having been. hit, the economy was trashed, and our civil rights unconstitutionally restricted.

But life has returned to (mostly) normal now, and with the numbers working out as they do, I have to wonder: absent another monumental stupidity like we saw three years ago, could Philadelphia see well under 500 homicides this year? Is something around 450 a reasonable projection?

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↑1 No, that isn’t a typographical error: the spelling of ‘panicdemic’ reflects exactly how I see it as having been.
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In trying to avoid calling street gangs gangs, The Philadelphia Inquirer has again beclowned itself

We have expended some bandwidth mocking The Philadelphia Inquirer for its statement that there are no real gangs in the City of Brotherly Love:

In Philadelphia, there are no gangs in the traditional, nationally known sense. Instead, they are cliques of young men affiliated with certain neighborhoods and families. The groups have names — Young Bag Chasers, Penntown, Northside — and members carry an allegiance to each other, but they aren’t committing traditional organized crimes, like moving drugs, the way gangs did in the past.

We also mocked the George Soros-sponsored defense mouthpiece who is now the city’s District Attorney, Larry Krasner, when his office decided to refer to them as rival street groups. And we pointed out, at the end of last year, that what I have frequently called The Philadelphia Enquirer[1]RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but, reminiscent of the National Enquirer as it is, I thought it very apt. was still using euphemisms to refer to gangs those cliques of young men, though the word “gang” in one article, apparently for prosaic reasons, since the term “street group” had been used previously in the same sentence.

Since then, we have noted the newspaper’s adoption of the term “street groups.”

And now? The Enquirer Inquirer is taking a silly effort to justify it!

North Philadelphia street group ‘BNG’ members have been charged in multiple shootings

Prosecutors say four men committed a string of shootings in 2021 that left two people dead and five others injured.

by Ellie Rushing | Tuesday, May 23, 2023

The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office on Tuesday announced charges against four young men affiliated with a North Philadelphia street group that investigators say committed a string of shootings in 2021 that left two people dead and five others injured.

Following a more than year-long investigation, prosecutors charged four men they say are affiliated with the group “BNG” or “Big Naddy Gang” — named after a 15-year-old boy known as “Naddy” who was fatally shot in April 2021.

So, the “street group” members call themselves a “gang,” but the Inky can’t? 🙂

After the teen was killed, prosecutors said, his friends — seeking retaliation and local notoriety — formed BNG and committed at least five shootings in the next six months, chronicling the violence along the way on social media, in rap songs, and in texts to one another.

District Attorney Larry Krasner said Tuesday that the young men wrote in one text that they “put the ‘h’ in homicide.”

“Today, we’re going to put the ‘j’ in jail,” the DA said.

One does wonder whether Mr Krasner had the opportunity to put the ‘j’ in jail for the accused previously, but declined to do so.

Mugshots via 6ABC News, because the Inquirer would never publish them.

The story went on to describe the crimes allegedly committed by the members of the gang, Dontae Sutton, then 17, Jamir Brunson-Gans, 18 at the time, Elijah Soto, then 16, and Khalil Henry, then 17.

Brunson-Gans and Soto have each been charged with murder, attempted murder, and related crimes.

Henry has been charged with murder, two counts of attempted murder, and related offenses.

Sutton has been charged with murder, four counts of attempted murder, and many additional crimes.

Since three of the four were under 18 at the times of their alleged offenses, the obvious question becomes: will Mr Krasner charge them as adults, or juveniles? Mr Soto has already had that break previously:

Soto was arrested in January 2022 and charged with conspiracy and simple assault after court records say he and three others attacked, kicked, and stabbed a juvenile. A court spokesperson said the adult charges against Soto were withdrawn and the case was transferred to juvenile court.

Here’s where the Inky gets funny:

This is the third sprawling indictment of a Philadelphia street group in just the last six months, as the District Attorney’s Office, in partnership with local and federal police, try to crack down on the numerous street groups across Philadelphia.

Those groups — which prosecutors call gangs, a label sometimes contested by community members given the groups’ small size and fluid structure and membership — are often made up of a small group of friends, mostly young men, largely from the same neighborhood. Many are involved in the drill rap scene, and their music and social media posts often chronicle — and fuel — shootings, authorities say.

So, even the District Attorney calls them gangs now, but The Philadelphia Inquirer will not? One wonders: what is the minimum size at which a “street group” becomes a “gang” as far as the Inky is concerned? Maybe when they call themselves Bloods or Crips?

At what point do the editors and the publisher of the Inquirer realize just how foolish they look? Everyone reading the Inky’s stories knows that they mean “gang” when they write “street group,” so it isn’t as though the newspaper is somehow fooling anybody.

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↑1 RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but, reminiscent of the National Enquirer as it is, I thought it very apt.
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Killadelphia: Lies, damned lies, and statistics

Sometimes, reporters for The Philadelphia Inquirer don’t really pay attention to their sources. Dylan Purcell wrote:

Through midnight Friday there were 155 homicides citywide, a 14% decline from the same date last year.

Well, that’s what the Philadelphia Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page said on Saturday, but, as the website states, the figures are only updated Monday through Friday during normal business hours. The 155 figure is actually from Thursday, May 18th, but Mr Purcell was apparently unaware of that. Since Mr Purcell describes himself as “a local investigative reporter specializing in data and documents that expose wrongdoing”, one would think that he’d understand his data sources better.

And I note that the template still states that the percentage change is compared to 2021, but it’s actually the change compared to 2022.

Multiple weekend shootings in Philly leave four dead, and a 17-year-old in critical condition

A 21-year-old man was killed in the triple shooting in which two teenagers were wounded

by Dylan Purcell | Saturday, May 20, 2023

Multiple shootings Friday night and early Saturday in Philadelphia left four people dead and five others hospitalized, including a 17-year-old who was in critical condition, police said.

A 21-year-old man died after suffering multiple gunshot wounds in a triple shooting on the 5600 block of Baltimore Avenue in West Philadelphia about 8:45 p.m. Friday, according to police. The victim was identified as Michael Goodwin, of the 1200 block of South Greylock Street.

The two other victims — a 17-year-old who is in “extremely critical condition” and a 16-year-old reported in stable condition, were taken to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center.

Of course, Mr Purcell deleted what was actually reported, that a 21-year-old black man died, because reporting all of the news is against the Inquirer’s editorial guidelines.

Less than an hour earlier, a shooting inside a barbershop in the 2000 block of Kensington Avenue took the life of a 43-year-old man. The victim, Adinson Suarez-Marte, of the 3000 block of Hartville Street, was taken by police to Temple University Hospital for several gunshot wounds to his torso. He was pronounced shortly after arrival.

Police are seeking information on as many as eight men who they said were seen wearing dark clothing and masks. No arrests were made, or weapons recovered from the barbershop scene.

As many as eight men being sought? In other words, a gang shooting, not that the Inky uses the word “gang” anymore.

Mr Purcell also noted an apparent murder/suicide that was found shortly after midnight, which would place it under Saturday’s statistics.

The website Broad + Liberty maintains its own homicide tracker, because, quite frankly, a lot of people do not believe that the city’s statistics are completely reliable, and that site documents 160 homicides through Thursday, May 18th. B+L has a third homicide listed for the 19th, beyond the two the Inquirer reported, and does not, as of 12:40 PM EDT on Sunday, May 21st, include the reported murder/suicide.

Broad + Liberty is very careful in its collection of statistics, and includes links to its documentation of homicides; while a few of the reports are listed as media reports, the vast majority are from Philadelphia Police Department news releases or emails. This is a source Mr Purcell needs to consider, but if the Inquirer has ever questioned the PPD statistics, I’ve yet to see it.

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Killadelphia: The city is losing population, and not just to murder!

In news that should surprise exactly no one, Philadelphia is losing population, and it’s worse than every other city among the twenty most populous in the United States.

Most large U.S. cities reversed or slowed pandemic population drops. But not Philly.

New data released by the U.S. Census Bureau Thursday shows 19 of the 20 most populous American cities either gained residents or slowed pandemic-era population declines — Philly being the exception.

by Ximena Conde | Friday, May 19, 2023 | 5:24 AM EDT

Nineteen of the 20 most populous American cities reversed or slowed pandemic-era population declines — Philadelphia being the notable exception — data released by the U.S. Census Bureau Thursday shows.

Not to worry: the blurb means exclusive article for subscribers to The Philadelphia Inquirer, not The First Street Journal. As Robert Stacy McCain would put it, I read the Inquirer so that you don’t have to! 🙂

Does this spell a period of gloom for the city? Hard to say. Experts have consistently cautioned against reading too much into year-to-year population changes.

“One year of data is not a trend,” said Katie Martin, project director at Pew Charitable Trusts’ Philadelphia research and policy initiative.

What’s more, the census numbers only tell us the number of people arriving or leaving; they don’t tell us what’s driving the changes or if they’re permanent.

The start of the COVID-19 pandemic prompted Americans to spend a lot more time at home and reevaluate their priorities, mulling whether it was better to live in cities or the suburbs. Trend stories emerged of Brooklynites moving to nearby cities like Philadelphia because of the bang for-your-buck housing prices. At the same time, other stories told of families retreating to the suburbs out of fear that packed city living brought about more risk of contagion and concerns over rising gun violence in major cities, including Philadelphia.

Let’s tell the truth here: the homicide numbers have been worse in Philadelphia than the other large cities, and Philly is the poorest city of over a million people in the US. And while reporter Ximena Conde said that there were 33,000 residents lost between July 2020 and July 2022, I’m a bit more of a numbers geek than she is, so I looked up the numbers from the Census Bureau’s website, and saw listed the official Census number from April 1, 2020, and population guesstimate for July 1, 2022: 1,603,799 and 1,567,258. That works out to a loss of 36,541 souls, or 2.28%.

And, Killadelphia being what it is, I also added up the homicides from April 1, 2020 through June 30, 2022. Between those dates, there were 403 of the total of 499 homicides in 2020, 562 in 2021, and 257 of the 516 in 2022. Of the 36,541 people lost in the city during those dates, 1,222, or 3.34%, were lost to being murdered.

Southern and Southwestern cities like Phoenix, San Antonio, and Jacksonville continued to experience population growth, which those regions were experiencing long before the pandemic.

Meanwhile, New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago saw smaller population declines than the first pandemic year.

Does Miss Conde mean cities in mostly Republican governed states, with far fewer panicdemic[1]Panicdemic is not a typographical error, but reflects what is actually the case: governments and people reacting in mindless panic! restrictions? One point she did not mention is that foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia under Mayor Jim Kenney and Commissioner of Health Cheryl Bettigole kept COVID-19 restrictions, including indoor mask mandates, far longer than most cities, and the city’s teachers union — you know: the teachers who concealed a fellow teacher’s sexual abuse of a student for years — kept resisting reopening the public schools. Americans really don’t like authoritarian controls.

Of course, those Southern and Southwestern cities don’t have Pennsylvania winters, so I can’t blame Philly’s population loss solely on the city’s government and culture.

A lot of my Philadelphia friends are reacting positively to the Cherelle Parker Mullins having won the Democratic mayoral nomination: she’s at least somewhat moderate for a Democrat, and at least appears to be more active and energetic than outgoing Mr Kenney. Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw will almost certainly be not just toast, but toast which has fallen on the floor, buttered side down, once Mr Kenney’s term ends at the beginning of 2024, and that can only be good news for the seriously undermanned Philadelphia Police Department.  The city will still be afflicted with the George Soros-sponsored, police-hating defense lawyer now ensconced as District Attorney at least through 2025, but perhaps, just perhaps, Philly can become greater than what it has been.

Even the homicide rate, though far, far, far too high, appears to be coming down, though is still above the 2020 pace which resulted in 499 — or was it 502? — homicides.

There are a lot of reasons to appreciate Philly, for its architecture and its history. The restaurants are great, and nothing can top a hot, fresh Philadelphia pretzel. A lot of people like (ughhh!) Philly cheesesteaks, though I think that they’re vile. But the current culture of the city is terrible, and that has to be driving some people away. Yes, 1,222 of the people who ‘left’ the city did so because someone else killed them, but that still means that 35,319 souls left for other reasons.

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↑1 Panicdemic is not a typographical error, but reflects what is actually the case: governments and people reacting in mindless panic!
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Darwin Award winner recaptured in Philadelphia

We have previously noted the jailbreak of Nasir Grant, 24, and Ameen Hurst, 18, from Philadelphia’s Industrial Correctional Center, and how other people are now facing charges for aiding them. Mr Grant, who was not previously facing charges which would have kept him locked up for life, was recaptured by federal marshals just a few miles from the jail, and now Mr Hurst, who was looking at life in prison, is back behind bars:

The second man who escaped from a Philadelphia jail last week was captured Wednesday morning, police say

Ameen Hurst was arrested by U.S. Marshals on the 6100 block of Washington Avenue in West Philadelphia, Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said.

by Chris Palmer | Wednesday, May 17, 2023

The second of two men who escaped from a city jail last week was captured in West Philadelphia on Wednesday morning, police said, ending a 10-day search for a murder suspect whose unprecedented breakout had become an ongoing concern for law enforcement.

Ameen Hurst, 18, accused of committing four homicides as well as other crimes, was arrested by U.S. Marshals on the 6100 block of Washington Avenue, Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said on Twitter.

Well, at least Mr Hurst was further away from the jail than was Mr Grant when he was captured, but just how plain stupid do you have to be to have been hanging around the city in which you are being sought? Yeah, life would be tougher for someone like him in a place he didn’t know, but you’d think that he’d have headed for Baltimore or Tuscaloosa or a rural area in Mississippi, someplace to blend in and not really expected to be. And if it would have been tougher for him someplace with which he was unfamiliar, it probably wouldn’t be as tough as jail!

Of course, the same could be said about the people who, allegedly, helped the two goons escape in the first place: they are just plain stupid!

Further down:

Hurst is accused of killing four people and critically injuring two others in three separate shootings in less than three months. One of those homicides occurred near the front gates of another city jail: the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility. Police say in March 2021, Hurst killed 20-year-old Rodney Hargrove an hour after Hargrove had been released from the facility, and while he was waiting outside for relatives to pick him up.

Authorities now believe the shooting was a case of mistaken identity. In an affidavit of probable cause for Hurst’s arrest, prosecutors said that while he was facing charges for an earlier murder, he essentially confessed to shooting Hargrove while talking to a relative on a recorded phone line.

Anyone who has ever watched a cop show on television knows that calls from prison can be recorded, yet Mr Hurst allegedly confessed to a murder on a recorded telephone call. Yeah, he’s just plain stupid. Unfortunately, his stupidity has (allegedly) sent four other men untimely to their eternal rewards.

And Hurst is accused of shooting four men sitting in a car on the 1400 block of North 76th Street in March 2021 — a crime police believe was tied to an ongoing feud between neighborhood groups. Naquan Smith, 24, and Tamir Brown, 17 were killed, and two others were seriously wounded.

And here we go again, with The Philadelphia Inquirer being too stupidly #woke to tell the truth! “(A)n ongoing feud between neighborhood groups”? Why can’t the Inky just use the work gangs, because everyone knows that’s what they are.

There’s more at the Inquirer’s original, with more details about Mr Hurst’s alleged crimes.

Who knows, the two escaped and recaptured criminals could have a dozen illegitimate spawn out in Philly’s rowhouse neighborhoods, and the three who helped them escape could have reproduced as well, but at least Mr Hurst seems to have removed himself from any further pollution of the gene pool.

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What about the right to a speedy trial?

The escape of Nasir Grant, 24, and Ameen Hurst, 18, from Philadelphia’s Industrial Correctional Center last Sunday has caused both concern and amusement in the City of Brotherly Love, concern that two dangerous men, especially Mr Hurst, charged with four homicides, were on the loose, and amusement that the seriously understaffed jail didn’t even know that the two men had bolted for three shifts.

Xianni Stallings booking photo, via Steve Keeley on Twitter. Click to enlarge.

Just a few days later, 21-year-old Xianni Stallings, who had been “released from jail earlier this year after charges connected to a stabbing she was accused of participating in fell apart due to a lack of evidence,” decided that she wanted to go back behind bars for allegedly helping Mr Hurst escape, and the expression on her face in her latest booking photo clearly shows an, “Oh, what the f(ornicate) have I done?” look.

Mr Grant, who was not facing charges that would have kept him locked up for the rest of his miserable life, was recaptured by federal marshals after just four days on the lam. He didn’t even ‘lam’ very far, as he was picked up in North Philly.

And now a second person has been charged with helping Messrs Grant and Hurst escape:

Suspect in fatal beating at Pat’s Steaks allegedly helped inmates escape prison

Jose Alberto Flores-Huerta is expected to be charged with crimes including conspiracy and escape, police said.

by Chris Palmer | Friday, May 12, 2023 | 5:38 PM EDT

José Alberto Flores-Huerta, via Metro Philadelphia. Click to enlarge.

A 35-year-old man jailed on murder charges is expected to face new charges for serving as a lookout for the two men who escaped from a Philadelphia jail this week, authorities said Friday.Jose Alberto Flores-Huerta — incarcerated for allegedly participating in a fatal beating outside Pat’s King of Steaks in 2021 — is expected to be charged with crimes including conspiracy and escape, the Police Department said in a statement.

Police declined to provide additional details about Flores-Huerta’s alleged role in the breakout. He is the second person in two days to be accused of helping Nasir Grant, 24, and Ameen Hurst, 18, break out of the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center on Sunday. The pair sneaked out through a hole in a chain-link fence, police said.

The announcement of the impending charges came just hours after Grant was captured in North Philadelphia on Thursday night by U.S. Marshals while disguised in women’s clothing. Grant was arraigned on a new count of escape Friday morning, and bail was set at $10 million.

There’s more at the original, and at least from the story, and the charges he faces, it would seem that Mr Flores-Huerta isn’t necessarily a great guy. But a few paragraphs further down, I found this:

Flores-Huerta, of South Philadelphia, has been jailed since 2021, when he was charged with taking part in the fatal beating of Isidro Cortes outside Pat’s Steaks in South Philadelphia. Authorities said Flores-Huerta and several other men also assaulted Cortes’ father and another man during the brawl, which followed a CONCACAF Champions League soccer game in Chester between the Philadelphia Union and Club América, a team from Mexico City.

At a preliminary hearing last year, Flores-Huerta’s lawyer contended that two other men — who have not been caught — were primarily responsible for striking Isidro Cortes. But a judge was not persuaded, and she ordered Flores-Huerta held for trial on counts including murder, conspiracy, and aggravated assault. He was denied bail, and a trial is scheduled for the fall.

Why, exactly, is Mr Flores-Huerta scheduled for trial two years after he was arrested? What about his right to a reasonably speedy trial? Did the prosecution, which apparently presented enough evidence that the judge ordered the suspect held without bail, delay proceedings, of was it the defense? What if, after he is finally tried, Mr Flores-Huerta is acquitted? If that is the case, he will have spent two years behind bars for a crime he didn’t commit!

This is one of the travesties which has occurred in this country as a result of the COVID-19 panicdemic: the judicial system pretty much ground to a halt, and prisoners all across the United States were held in legal limbo, and some of them in jail, because trials were so greatly delayed, and it seems as though nobody cared.

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Killadelphia: How do you define a “mass shooting?”

On May 7th, Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Helen Ubiñas suggested that our definition of what constitutes a “mass shooting” needs to be changed.

The Inquirer defines a mass shooting as one that occurs in public and kills three or more people.

The FBI classifies mass shootings as four or more deaths in a single incident.

Meanwhile, Congress has used the definition of three or more, and the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks mass shootings, defines them as any incident in which four or more people are injured or killed, a classification also used by some national media outlets. (I often wonder why any shooting with more than one victim isn’t considered a mass shooting, but that may be a column for another day.)

Well, this isn’t a mass shooting under the Inquirer’s definition, bit I’m pretty sure that, if it was, there’d be a mass shooting in Philly almost every day of the year.

Quadruple shooting in East Germantown kills 17-year-old boy, wounds 2 other teens and a 7-year-old

Three people were injured and one was killed in the shooting.

by Jason Laughlin and Beatrice Forman | Thursday, May 11, 2023 |7:49 PM EDT

A shooting in East Germantown killed one teenager and injured three other youths, including a 7-year-old child, on Thursday night, the Philadelphia Police Department said.

Police said they received a report of the shooting on the 5900 block of North 21st Street shortly before 6 p.m. A 17-year-old boy who was shot in the face was transported to Einstein Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

The other three victims — ages 7, 15, and 16 — were also transported there, where police said they are all in stable condition.

The 7-year-old was shot once in the upper thigh. The 15-year-old boy was shot twice in the head and twice in the back. The 16-year-old boy was also shot once, in the right shoulder.

NBC Channel 10 stated that the 7-year-old was not part of the group, but struck by a stray bullet.

That’s all the Inquirer had, one boy killed, and three others, at least two of whom were male, wounded.

In the meantime, Philly Crime Update tweeted, at 7:59 PM EDT, “🚨TRIPLE SHOOTING at 4800 Tackawanna St. possibly a 4th victim at Einstein stand by”.

The 4800 block of Tackawanna Street, in the Frankford section of Philadelphia, is a mix of older rowhomes and some housing project looking multi-family buildings. The 5900 block of North 21st Street consists of older rowhomes, some of which have been updated and flipped.

Now why aren’t these mass shootings? They aren’t not mass killings, but seven, and possibly eight, people were shot, and I have to wonder: how many of the victims were deliberately targeted? According to the Philadelphia Shootings Victims Dashboard, there have been 603 shootings in the City of Brotherly Love through May 8th, 118 of them fatal. May 8th was the 128th day of the year, and if fewer people have been killed this year than last, that’s still 4.71 people shot per day in Philly.

At least the way I would count it, that’s a mass shooting every day, but let’s tell the truth here: since the vast majority of the victims are black, and the vast majority of the shooters are also black, it’s way, way, way too politically incorrect to call that carnage a mass shooting.

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Killadelphia: Campaign canvassers for Helen Gym Flaherty prove the futility of gun control laws

As we noted on Tuesday, two ‘progressive’ campaign canvassers in Philadelphia, both carrying concealed weapons, got into a shootout on Monday. The Philadelphia Inquirer had more on the story late on Tuesday:

Family mourns loss of canvasser, as gun violence intersects with a common campaign practice

The shooting, which remained under investigation, underscored the relevance of the most important issue in the election: the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis.

by Jesse Bunch, Sean Collins Walsh, and Ellie Rushing | Tuesday, May 9, 2023 | 9:41 PM EDT

Eddie Brokenbough was struggling to make ends meet.

The 46-year-old, whom relatives described as a dedicated father of 10, experienced difficulties finding a good-paying job because, like many Philadelphians, he had a criminal record.

To supplement his income as a construction flagger, Brokenbough sometimes worked as a political canvasser, knocking on doors for organizations trying to get out the vote.

On Monday, Brokenbough was fatally shot while canvassing for the progressive group One PA by another canvasser from the same organization after the two men had an altercation.

The previous Inquirer story reported that Staff Inspector Ernest Ransom, the head of the Police Department’s homicide unit, said that the two men “had always had a beef” with each other, though what that “beef” was about has not been reported.

The shooting also underscored the relevance of the most important issue in the election: the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis. Both men involved were armed, police said, and the shooter, 22, told investigators he was acting in self-defense.

The unnamed 22-year-old shooter, with whom Mr Brokenbough apparently had an ongoing dispute, was licensed to carry a concealed weapon, and claimed that he only fired in self-defense after Mr Brokenbough drew his weapon first.

Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore stated that all of the interviews have been submitted to the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office, and that office said the incident was still under investigation. Thus far, no charges have been filed, and the shooter has been released. He had a permit to carry, so there is no gun charge against him.

But next comes the real beef — pun most definitely intended — of the story:

One PA said guns are not permitted in its offices or during canvassing, and it has temporarily suspended its canvassing efforts.

Brokenbough was prohibited from legally carrying a firearm because of an earlier conviction on charges of aggravated assault and illegal gun possession, after he shot a man in the arm for speaking to his girlfriend in 2012, according to court records.

He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 11 ½ to 23 months in prison, plus five years’ probation. His conviction prohibits him from possessing a gun.

So, what happened? Mr Brokenbaugh, a previously convicted criminal with an illegal gun conviction in the past, was legally barred from owning a firearm, but did so anyway. One PA, a ‘progressive’ organization, prohibits its employees and contract canvassers, yet both of the campaign workers were carrying firearms. In a setting in which neither man, at least before they ran into each other, should have had any need to be armed, and one of which was committing a felony by carrying a weapon, both were.

Mr Brokenbough knew that he was breaking the law, and chose to do so anyway. The unnamed 22-year-old, who wasn’t breaking the law, was still violating the rules of the organization which hired him.

So, if both the convicted felon, and the law-abiding citizen, were violating the rules, why would anyone believe that passing more gun control laws would stop anyone who wanted to own and carry a firearm? And remember: these weren’t evil reich-wing Republicans here, but men working for a hard-left, socialist organization, canvassing for Helen Gym Flaherty!