Category Archives: Crime

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The Editors of The Philadelphia Inquirer just can’t wrap their heads around the notion that criminals simply don’t obey the law.

In a surprise to absolutely no one who reads The Philadelphia Inquirer, the editors decided to use the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse to call for more gun control. Frist, Adam Garber, executive director of CeaseFirePA Education Fund, a gun violence prevention advocacy organization, was given OpEd space:

Amid a spike in shootings, Pa. legislators are giving us the kinds of gun laws that we don’t need

Gov. Wolf is expected to veto a bill that would allow state residents to carry concealed handguns without a permit. That the measure made it this far should alarm us all, writes Adam Garber.

by Adam Garber | Monday, November 22, 2021

Each year, roughly 1,500 Pennsylvanians lose their lives to a rapidly rising epidemic of gun violence. In our city, these deaths are hollowing out a generation of Philadelphians with 60% more shooting victims under 18 so far this year than in all of 2019. There isn’t a part of the commonwealth from York to Erie to Pittsburgh that isn’t seeing the same deadly violence. But instead of debating numerous evidence-based solutions, the Pennsylvania General Assembly voted this month to make our commonwealth an even less safe place to live.

Senate Bill 565, known as permitless carry, would allow anyone over age 18 to carry a loaded, concealed handgun in public without a permit.

Let that sink in a minute.

The person next to you on the subway, at the deli counter, or at the grocery store could have a hidden firearm. Such a law would dismantle the existing concealed carry permit process, which includes enhanced safeguards to help law enforcement ensure concealed firearm carriers do not endanger public safety. It would also allow for open carry of a firearm without a permit in the City of Philadelphia.

There’s more at the original, but Mr Garber’s statement that “The person next to you on the subway, at the deli counter, or at the grocery store could have a hidden firearm” ignores the obvious: in the City of Brotherly Love, the person next to you on the subway, at the deli counter, or at the grocery store might already have a concealed firearm, and not give a hoot that he doesn’t have a permit; he has his weapon because he wants his weapon.

Then there is this, from the Editorial Board:

In Kyle Rittenhouse’s acquittal, a lesson about laws that allow more guns to be carried in public

Advocating for more people to be armed in more situations does nothing to make Pennsylvania safer.

by The Editorial Board | Monday, November 22, 2021

The story of the night of Aug. 25, 2020, in Kenosha, Wis., is the story of an American dystopia — one that is induced by guns and one that Pennsylvania’s Republican lawmakers seemingly want to move the commonwealth closer toward by allowing permitless concealed carry of firearms.

It’s the story of a nation armed to the teeth.

It’s the story of, in the words of the Black sociologist W.E.B. Du Bois, a “double system of justice, which erred on the white side by undue leniency and the practical immunity of red-handed criminals.”

In the midst of a summer marked by Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd at the hands of police in Minneapolis, Kenosha police shot and severely injured Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man. The shooting sparked protests nationwide. Two days after the shooting, Kyle Rittenhouse, a 17-year-old white resident of Illinois, arrived in Kenosha armed with an AR-15-style automatic rifle. By night’s end, Rittenhouse had shot three people who’d participated in a protest, killing two.

Another bit of lying by not telling the whole truth. Yes, Joseph Rosenbaum, Anthony Huber, and Gaige Grosskreutz “participated in a protest”, but Mr Rittenhouse did not shoot them for “participat(ing) in a protest”; he shot them in self-defense because they chased him down and attacked him! Mr Rittenhouse was legally armed; Mr Grosskreutz, who has a concealed pistol, was not; his concealed carry permit had expired. Mr Rittenhouse was there, with his AR-15, because the Mostly Peaceful Protesters had not been quite so peaceful the previous two nights.

Then again, who knows: perhaps the Editorial Board believe, as David S Cohen seems to imply, that arson is a legitimate part of a “racial justice protest.” The Inquirer did, after all fire get Executive Editor and Senior Vice President Stan Wischnowski to resign over the “Buildings Matter, Too” headline.

In Pennsylvania, there are more than 1,000 people serving life without the possibility of parole despite never having killed anyone — about 70% of them are Black.

Well, that’s true. It is also true that, in 2020, black victims accounted for about 86% of the city’s 499 homicide victims, and 84% of the 2,236 shootings. That 70% of roughly 1,000 people currently serving life without the possibility of parole are black doesn’t seem terribly out of line with the homicide rate among black Philadelphians is so high. The city is just three killings behind 2020’s 499, with five weeks left in the year!

Inquirer reporter Anna Orso reported on a double homicide we mentioned Sunday:

Police are questioning a suspect in the killing of a pregnant woman in Northeast Philadelphia

Authorities said Jessica Covington, 32, was shot multiple times in the head and stomach. Detectives believe she had just left her own baby shower.

by Anna Orso | Monday, November 22, 2021 | Updated: 7:14 PM EST

Philadelphia police were questioning a suspect Monday in the weekend killing of a pregnant woman and her unborn child, but investigators say they were still collecting evidence and charges were not yet filed.

Also see: Killadelphia Update, by Robert Stacy McCain.

Authorities said Jessica Covington, 32, was shot multiple times in the head and stomach just after 8:30 p.m. Saturday on the 6100 block of Palmetto Street in Crescentville, where she lived. Detectives believe she had just left her own baby shower and was unloading gifts from her vehicle when shots rang out.

Joanne Pescatore, assistant supervisor of the homicide and nonfatal shootings unit in the District Attorney’s Office, said Monday that police had identified a suspect, but she would not identify the person or comment on a potential motive. She said investigators had recovered video footage from the block where the shooting occurred, but said several streetlights were out, and the video is “extremely” dark.

Police Chief Inspector Frank Vanore said homicide detectives were conducting “a lot of interviews,” but could not confirm a suspect was among them. He said they were executing search warrants and analyzing other evidence and described the investigation as “very active.”

According to District Attorney Larry Krasner, who said during a news conference that the slaying made him “sick,” it is “very likely” that whoever is charged in connection with the killing will face two counts of murder, one each for the mother and her unborn child. He said homicide detectives “have been working nonstop and doing an amazing job with this case.”

There’s more at the original, including a notation by the reporter that six people had been murdered in Philly over the weekend. According to the Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page, there had been only five homicides, but perhaps the police were not counting Miss Covington’s unborn child, where Miss Orso, perhaps influenced by Mr Krasner’s statement, did.

But there’s an obvious question for the Editorial Board: do they think that the only reason Miss Covington could be murdered like that was because her killer had a concealed carry permit? If he didn’t have a permit, would that have meant that he wouldn’t have had a gun?

This is the point that seemingly baffles the left. It’s as though they just can’t wrap their heads around the idea that criminals don’t obey the law, and that if someone was willing to go out and deliberately murder Miss Covington and her unborn daughter — remember: she was shot in both the head and the abdomen, so the unborn child was targeted as well — that someone wouldn’t care one bit that he was carrying his firearm illegally.

—————————–

Update: Tuesday, November 23, 2021 at 8:20 AM EST

The Philadelphia Police Department’s morning tally has city homicides up to 497.

In looking at the Inquirer’s website this morning, I found no stories about anyone being murdered in the city yesterday, so it’s possible that the increase to 497 includes Miss Covington’s unborn daughter, but I don’t know that. What I did find was this ending paragraph from an overnight story by Robert Moran:

Gregory Keleman was charged with murder, attempted murder, and unlawful possession of a weapon.

It seems that Mr Keleman, assuming he is guilty of the charges, didn’t care much about not having a permit to carry a weapon. You’d think that the editors of the Inquirer would notice such things, and they would inform their opinions, but if you did think that, you’d apparently be wrong.

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At what point do purposeful omissions become deliberate lies? The Lexington Herald-Leader, the McClatchy Mugshot Policy, and the attempt to deceive the public

On The First Street Journal, I frequently refer to journolism. The spelling ‘journolist’ or ‘journolism’ comes from JournoList, an email list of 400 influential and politically liberal journalists, the exposure of which called into question their objectivity. I use the term ‘journolism’ frequently when writing about media bias.

I have done several searches, over time, to find the McClatchy Mugshot Policy written down as an official communique from the company, without success. I have found it specified in this tweet from Nicole Manna, who described herself as an “Investigative reporter for the @StarTelegram focusing on criminal justice. Dog mom. Florida native. Olive enthusiast. Tip me, please: nmanna@star-telegram.com”. I have reproduced the photo of the e-mail, and you can click on the image to enlarge it for easier reading.

The Kansas City Star, a McClatchy newspaper, noted in this article that “The Star’s parent company, McClatchy, announced this summer that it would stop publishing mugshots unless approved by an editor”, but while I was able to copy that much from a Google search, the article is “subscriber-only content”, so I cannot access it. My digital subscription to the Lexington Herald-Leader, another McClatchy newspaper, does not give me access to other company sites.

The Columbia Journalism Review published an article by Cory Hutchins on October 24, 2018, “Mugshot galleries might be a web-traffic magnet. Does that justify publishing them?“, asking if the publication of mugshots of accused but not convicted criminal suspects is ethical; this was before the McClatchy Mugshot Policy went into effect.

On October 20, 2021, the American Press Institute welcomed Kamaria Roberts to the fold, saying in part:

During her time at McClatchy, Roberts served as a co-chair to the news division’s first Advisory Team, which focused on diversity and inclusion efforts in newsrooms and in the content that they produce. In that role, she and nine other colleagues delivered significant recommendations of many consequential initiatives, including McClatchy’s mugshot policy and the company’s style change to capitalize Black in references to people and culture.

Without an official link to the policy from McClatchy itself, that’s the best documentation up with which I can come, but I believe it sufficient to prove the point.

I documented in “The Lexington Herald-Leader does race-based reporting” how the newspaper’s digital version of “2 died in a robbery, gunfight spree in Lexington. Shooter pleads in 1 case” declined to print the mugshot of Jemel Barber, who pleaded guilty to “one of two fatal shootings during a string of robberies and gunfights in Lexington,” while, in “Hour-long standoff at Stanton gas station leads to arrest of sexual assault suspect“, published only four minutes after the update on Mr Barber’s conviction, the paper did publish the mugshot, a very disrespectful looking photo, of Craig Worm, 50, an arrested but not convicted sexual assault suspect.

It was on that story that I left a comment noting that the Herald-Leader has been publishing the photos of white suspects, but not black convicted murderers. Peter Baniak, the editor, certainly has noted the point, as have reporters Chris Leach and Jeremy Chisenhall, but, as of Monday, November 22, 2021, the photo is still on the story.

The paper did not stop when notified: on Thursday, November 18th, the web edition had Christopher Leach’s story, “Kentucky woman ran to neighbor for help. Boyfriend charged over what happened next.“, with this photo of suspect Mark Anthony Hoover, while on Friday, November 19th, Mr Leach’s story “Corbin man charged after allegedly beating father with pipe” included this photo.[1]For documentary purposes, I have included both the original link to the picture as well as my download of it, stored on this site. I do this in case the paper deletes the photo.

This is hardly something that has happened in just the past week or so. I noted, half a year ago, that the Lexington Herald-Leader does not like posting photographs of accused criminals, even when the suspect is an accused murderer and is still at large, and publishing the photo might help the police capture him. something which ought to have triggered the “Is there an urgent threat to the community?” exception in the mugshot policy.

The McClatchy policy states that any exceptions to the general policy of not publishing mugshots “must be approved by an editor.” The newspaper lists four (non-sports) editors who might be responsible for taking such decisions:[2]This list may be out of date; looking at it, I noted that reporter Daniel Desrochers, who has moved on, is still listed, while Christopher Leach, a recent hire, is not.

  • Peter Baniak, Executive Editor and General Manager;
  • Deedra Lawhead, Deputy Editor, Digital;
  • Brian Simms, Deputy Editor, Presentation:, or
  • John Stamper, Deputy Editor, Accountability

So, who is approving printing all of the mugshots of white suspects, or white convicted criminals, yet not wanting those of black suspects or convicted criminals published?

But more important than the “who” is the “why”. The answer to that may be found in The Sacramento Bee, the lead McClatchy newspaper, which led the way on the no mugshot policy. While much of the current policy, as stated, can be found in this article, this paragraph includes something not in the stated policy:

Publishing these photographs and videos disproportionately harms people of color and those with mental illness, while also perpetuating stereotypes about who commits crime in our community.

It’s that last, “perpetuating stereotypes about who commits crime in our community,” that is the key. The Herald-Leader, or so it seems to me, does not want to perpetuate those stereotypes, and, whether intentionally or otherwise, seems to be trying to reverse those stereotypes. From the Bee again:

(T)he San Francisco Police Department earlier this month announced it will no longer release mugshots, unless the public is in imminent danger.

“This policy emerges from compelling research suggesting that the widespread publication of police booking photos in the news and on social media creates an illusory correlation for viewers that fosters racial bias and vastly overstates the propensity of Black and brown men to engage in criminal behavior,” Police Chief William Scott said in a statement.

I will admit it: I fail to see how publishing the facts “overstates” anything.

The Lexington Police Department’s Shooting investigations page reports, as of November 19, 2021, 120 non-fatal shootings in Fayette County. That page lists the race of the victims, something the Homicides page does not.

Of 120 shooting victims, 19 are listed as white, 11 as Hispanic, leaving 90 victims being listed as black. That’s an even 75.00%, in a city that the 2020 Census lists as being only 14.7% black. While the number of shootings which have resulted in arrests is really too low from which to draw numbers, we do know that most murders and attempted murders are intraracial, not interracial, in nature. In the vast majority of cases, white people kill other white people, and black people kill other black people. Unless there has been a substantial deviation from that norm, something which neither the Herald-Leader nor any other Kentucky media have reported, 75% of all shootings in the city having black victims means that a similarly high percentage of the shooters are black as well.

So what are the editors of that newspaper doing? Whether intentionally or otherwise, the paper’s coverage of crime and their choices in which photos to use appear to be aimed at persuading readers that the perpetrators of crimes in the region are primarily white. While in the eastern Kentucky areas of the Herald-Leader’s circulation area, that’s probably true, given that the percentage of the population in that area is very low, when you get to the city of Lexington, the numbers say that no, that’s not the case.

This is journolism, not journalism, this is the skewing of information to produce a false impression. If the editors are aware of what is being done in the newspaper and website they control, they are deliberately lying to their readers; if the editors are somehow not aware of what they have been doing, then they are not competent in doing their jobs, and need to be replaced.

 

References

References
↑1 For documentary purposes, I have included both the original link to the picture as well as my download of it, stored on this site. I do this in case the paper deletes the photo.
↑2 This list may be out of date; looking at it, I noted that reporter Daniel Desrochers, who has moved on, is still listed, while Christopher Leach, a recent hire, is not.
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Killadelphia A Philadelphia woman and her unborn child are deliberately murdered

I am stunned that this story is still listed on the main page of The Philadelphia Inquirer’s website, but, then again, ‘innocents’ appear to be the victims in this case, and I’ve often said that the inquirer editors only care about homicides in the City of Brotherly Love if an innocent, a “somebody“, or a cute little white girl is the victim:

    Pregnant woman fatally shot; her unborn child also dies

    The 32-year-old woman, who was seven months pregnant, was shot in the head and stomach around 8:30 p.m. on the 6100 block of Palmetto Street in what police say appears to have been a targeted hit.

    by Diane Mastrull | Sunday, November 21, 2021

    A pregnant woman and her unborn child were killed Saturday night in a shooting in Philadelphia’s Crescentville section that police say appears to have been a targeted hit.

    The 32-year-old woman, who was seven months pregnant, was unloading baby shower gifts from a Kia Soul when she was shot in the head and stomach around 8:30 p.m. on the 6100 block of Palmetto Street, police said.

WPVI-TV had a longer report. The victims were shot multiple times, something the Inquirer story does not make clear. One witness said he heard seven shots, while the Philadelphia Police collected eleven shell casings. And while the police said that they did not have a motive, shooting a seven-month pregnant woman in the head and stomach, apparently several times each, means that it was definitely intended to kill the unborn child as well.

Mayor Jim Kenney, a Democrat, under whose regime the city has gone from the 280 homicides in Michael Nutter’s last year, 2015, to 277, then 315, 353, 356, and 499 last year, is having the city offer a reward, but notice his wording: he refers to “the victim’s loved ones,” not “the victims’ loved ones”. In this, he betrays the fact that he sees this as only one homicide, and not two. But, then again, he’s a Democrat, so an unborn child doesn’t really count.

I wonder whether the Philadelphia Police Department will count this as one or two killings.
___________________________

Updated: 5:10 PM EST

The Inquirer story was updated at 4:25 PM:

    While police did not update Philadelphia’s official homicide tally over the weekend, the fatal shooting on Saturday night would bring the total slain so far this year to about 494 — a toll already 13% higher than as of the same date last year.

    With murders running at an average rate of more than 50 a month this year, there is little doubt that the total number killed in Philadelphia in 2021 will exceed 500. This would be a grim milestone, topping the previous highest tally of 500 in 1990 when crack was new and turf wars among dealers were unusual.

Actually, there’s little doubt that they’ll top 500 by the end of November! But at least the Inquirer has noticed.

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A Drexel law professor claims that Rittenhouse verdict enables shooting “racial justice protesters”

David S Cohen is a professor Thomas R. Kline school of law at Philadelphia’s Drexel University, and perhaps that explains things; he’s getting too much of his information from the wildly slanted Philadelphia Inquirer. In addressing the verdicts in the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse, he wrote, in Rolling Stone:

    The Rittenhouse Verdict and a Supreme Court Case Could Spell an ‘Open Season’ on Protesters

    After the ruling, it’s clear that anyone who protests against racial injustice risks being killed without consequence

    by David S. Cohen[1]At least to judge by Mr Cohen’s Twitter entries, he’s a very hard-left liberal. | Friday, November 20, 2021 | 5:45 PM EST

    Today, Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted on all charges after killing two people and wounding another while he was conducting his own armed vigilante patrol of Kenosha, Wisconsin, in response to Black Lives Matter protests. Earlier this month, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case about whether people have a constitutional right to concealed-carry permits.

    Why am I talking about these two things together? Because in combination, these two cases could mean that it is soon going to be open season on racial-justice protesters around the country.

    The Rittenhouse verdict is obviously very concerning for racial-justice protesters. Rittenhouse said he went to Kenosha the night of Aug. 25, 2020, to protect property. He did so by openly brandishing a semi-automatic rifle through the streets of the city in the midst of unrest over the shooting of Jacob Blake. While patrolling the streets, there was gunfire that resulted in some of the Black Lives Matter protesters thinking Rittenhouse was attacking them. They charged Rittenhouse, and he opened fire, killing Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber and injuring Gaige Grosskreutz.

In this, Mr Cohen admitted that the shootings of Messrs Rosenbaum, Huber and Grosskreutz were not because they were “racial justice protesters,” but because they “charged” Mr Rittenhouse. Mr Cohen omits, of course, the fact that they did more than “charge” toward Mr Rittenhouse, but they assaulted him as well. Mr Rosenbaum yells, “F*** you!” and dove for Mr Rittenhouse’s weapon. Mr Huber, after Mr Rosenbaum falls wounded and dying, charges at Mr Rittenhouse, and, after Mr Rittenhouse falls to the ground after being struck by an unidentified person in a white shirt, Mr Huber starts to beat Mr Rittenhouse with a skateboard. Mr Huber grabs the barrel of Mr Rittenhouse’s weapon, and Mr Rittenhouse then pulls the trigger, killing Mr Huber. Mr Grosskreutz then charges at Mr Rittenhouse, and, according to his own testimony, pointed his handgun at Mr Rittenhouse, who then shoots Mr Grosskreutz in the arm.

Mr Cohen equates all of that with simply being a “racial justice protester.”

Unless, that is, what the Left is really against is law enforcement, per se. — Robert Stacy McCain.

In the infamous screen grab from CNN, with the chyron “Fiery but mostly peaceful protests”, we can see that the “racial justice protests” are not just marchers carrying signs, but some are criminals committing arson. If all the “racial justice protesters” had been peaceful, had just been carrying signs and chanting, there wouldn’t have been any perceived need for people to defend their property. Remember: Mr Rittenhouse’s actions were on the third day of the protests, not the first.

Mr Rittenhouse was not tried for shooting someone throwing a Molotov cocktail, or someone marching and carrying a sign, or someone yelling or chanting slogans or screaming into the night; he was tried, and acquitted, for shooting three people in self-defense. Does Mr Cohen believe that people should lose their right to defend themselves just because there is a “racial justice protest” somewhere in the neighborhood? Does Mr Cohen believe that arson is a legitimate part of “racial justice protests”?

Well, being in the Philadelphia area, maybe he does, given that The Philadelphia Inquirer, the nation’s third oldest continuously published newspaper, fired Executive Editor and Senior Vice President Stan Wischnowski for entitling an article “Buildings Matter Too”, in reference to the arson being committed in the City of Brotherly Love during the “racial justice protests” following the death of drug-addled convicted felon George Floyd during his arrest in Minneapolis. Many of the buildings damaged or destroyed in the Philadelphia “racial justice protests” were in the more heavily black areas of the city.

In one regard, Mr Cohen was using the Rittenhouse case verdict as his lead in for his real message: he is very concerned about the Supreme Court case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen, in which the petitioners were denied permits to carry firearms in New York outside of one’s home. New York allows only restricted reasons as sufficient for such permits, and simply living in a high crime area is not considered a sufficient reason.

Mr Cohen makes the specious argument that, if the Court rules in favor of people’s Second Amendment rights rather than state restrictions, everyone will be armed and peaceful protesters at “racial justice protests” will be in grave danger:

    What this means in conjunction with the Rittenhouse verdict is very scary for all, but especially for racial-justice protesters everywhere. With a proliferation of concealed-carry permits and a sense among the far right after today’s verdict that they have the freedom to patrol racial-justice protests and act as vigilantes, the court system’s message couldn’t be clearer — anyone who protests against racial injustice risks taking their lives into their own hands.

Of course, the Rittenhouse case was not about that at all. Mr Rittenhouse was legally armed, under the laws of the state of Wisconsin, without the Court having decided on the New York case, and Mr Rittenhouse did not simply open fire on “racial justice protesters.” He defended himself against assailants, after having first retreated and been chased. Rather, it was Mr Grosskreutz who was armed illegally, carrying a concealed weapon after his permit for such had expired. It was the “racial justice protester” who was illegally armed, not Mr Rittenhouse.

Mr Cohen does not seem to like people being legally armed, and claims that they will kill people, and target “racial justice protesters.” However, as of the end of Thursday, November 18th, in Philadelphia, where Mr Cohen works, 491 souls had been sent untimely to their eternal rewards, the vast majority — if not all — of them by people who did not have concealed carry permits, the vast majority of them possessing firearms illegally. 491 ÷ 322, the number of days elapsed so far in 2021, = 1.5248 homicides per day, not in any “racial justice protests,” but in criminal acts, in intentional murders. 1.5248 x 365 days in the year = 556.552 projected homicides for the city for the year.

And it gets worse. Despite the long, hot summer having reached its traditional end after the Labor day holiday, there have been 128 homicides in Philadelphia since the end of Labor Day, September 6th, 128 homicides in 73 days, 1.7534 per day, meaning that the pace of killings has gotten even worse, and you can bet your bottom euro that very few, if any, of those homicides were committed by someone who possessed a firearm legally. We have already noted the very personal Inquirer OpEd piece by Temple University Hospital trauma nurse Ruqiyya Greer, pointing out that the vast majority of homicide victims in the City of Brotherly Love are black, while on Friday, Inquirer columnist Jenice Armstrong noted the same thing, and how four black female juvenile students attacked Asian female students on a SEPTA train in a racially motivated incident.

Of course, the “racial justice protesters” in Kenosha were mostly white, simply because Kenosha County population is roughly 87.2% white, and 75.4% are non-Hispanic white. The assailants who attacked and were shot by Mr Rittenhouse were all white, though “Jump Kick Man,” if the identification of him as Maurice Freeland is correct, is black. The problem for Mr Cohen’s argument is simple: it has been the “racial justice protesters” who have been the violent ones, the criminal ones, in the vast majority of the cases. Unless Mr Cohen believes that arson and attacking bystanders or opponents, as the mostly white Antifa protesters did for much of the summer of 2020, are legitimate parts of “racial justice protests,” then his arguments completely fall apart. And if he does believe that such actions are legitimately part of such protests, then there’s just no help for him.

References

References
↑1 At least to judge by Mr Cohen’s Twitter entries, he’s a very hard-left liberal.
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Hold them accountable! Why shouldn't a Parole Board which released a violent criminal early be punished when the criminal raped a young woman?

We have previously said that the problem is not, as the left tell us, “mass incarceration,” but that not enough people are incarcerated, for not a long enough time. We noted yesterday that had the criminal justice system treated Aramis Murray seriously in the multiple times he had been arrested between July 27, 2017 and February 22, 2018, he might have been behind bars on April 23, 2018, the day he murdered Jason Lemer Smith, and wouldn’t now be looking at spending 25 years behind bars. Had the criminal justice system treated Mr Murray seriously, Mr Smith might still be alive today.

In the end, the criminal justice system did Mr Murray no favors; by treating him leniently, they gave him the opportunity to get himself in worse trouble.

And so we come to the case of Cody Allen Arnett, whom we have previously mentioned. Mr Arnett was convicted for two robberies in Lexington, on August 7, 2015, and sentenced to fifteen years in prison. As early as June 26, 2018 he was recommended for parole, and was scheduled to be released on August 1, 2018. This would mean that he served a week less than three years for his fifteen year sentence. Within 76 days of his release, Mr Arnett was arrested for the forcible rape at knifepoint of a Georgetown College coed, at a time in which he could have and should have still been in prison. Mr Arnett had five violent felony offenses on his record. Mr Arnett was only able to rape his victim because the Parole Board let him out early.

Mr Arnett’s trial had been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but he was finally brought before the bar in July of 2021.[1]I would have caught this story earlier, but the Lexington Herald-Leader, which reported on the original charge, never reported on Mr Arnett’s trial or conviction.

    Jury hands Arnett six consecutive life sentences

    By Kyle Woosley | Georgetown News-Graphic | July 30, 2021

    Cody Allen Arnett

    Cody Alan Arnett was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences after jury found him guilty on seven charges relating to the rape of a Georgetown College student in 2018.

    After less than two hours of deliberation, a jury found Arnett guilty on seven counts — one count of first-degree burglary, three counts of first-degree rape, two counts of first-degree sodomy and one count of first-degree tampering with physical evidence.

    Following the verdict, the jury went back into deliberation for 15 minutes and found Arnett guilty on an additional first-degree persistent felony offender charge. State law prohibits the jury of knowing prior convictions as it might prejudice the jury, therefore these charges were not presented prior to the other charges. Arnett had previously been convicted of three felonies.

    The trial concluded Tuesday afternoon after emotional testimony from the victim and her parents. Previously the victim’s roommates, first responders, investigators and forensic experts testified. Arnett also testified as his defense team’s one and only witness.

    As the verdict was read, Arnett was chewing gum and grinned when the persistent felony offender charge was read. Commonwealth Attorney Sharon Muse also said Arnett winked and smiled at the victim as he exited the court room following his sentencing.

    In her opening statement to the jury at sentencing, Muse said she was seeking maximum sentencing on each charge. Because Arnett was found guilty of the persistent felony offender charge, she was able to ask the jury to sentence him to life in prison on six of the seven charges he was facing. This excluded the tampering with physical evidence charge, which could only be a maximum sentence of 20 years. The jury went with this recommendation and gave Arnett the maximum 20-year sentence.

    Arnett’s defense team attempted to blame his rough childhood, having several family members and a close friend testifying during sentencing on his behalf. The defense begged for “empathy” and “mercy” to the jury.

Oh, the poor baby! He had a “rough childhood!” Well, now he’s going to have a rough rest of his worthless life, living behind bars and barbed wire, which is exactly what he deserves.

There’s more at the original, including a parole officer’s statement that, regardless of the sentence, Mr Arnett would be eligible for parole in twenty years. But, perhaps if the previous parole board hadn’t shown Mr Arnett “empathy” and “mercy,” he’d have still been in prison on September 23, 2018, when he broke into the coed’s apartment and raped her, repeatedly, at knifepoint. The victim would not have been harmed, not have been raped, and Mr Arnett would not be looking at spending the rest of his miserable life in jail.

The Kentucky Parole Board failed! They failed to protect the victim, and they did no favors for Mr Arnett. If they hadn’t let him out early, he would still be looking at a future in which he’d eventually be released. The Parole Board members who decided to release Mr Arnett, despite his previous, violent record, should be held accountable for their decision. Quite frankly, they need to be locked up right beside him!

As for Mr Arnett’s victim? She’s a strong young woman, who has come forth to fight!

    ‘I’m ready for my voice to be heard’: Georgetown rape survivor discusses trial and resilience

    Woman speaks publicly for first time since attack

    by Leigh Searcy | August 2, 2021 | 7:00 PM EDT | Updated: August 3, 2021 | 11:22 AM EDT

    GEORGETOWN (LEX 18) — In the nearly three years since a rape was reported at Georgetown College, the name of the woman who was attacked had not been released. Now, after the man accused was convicted on multiple counts, Ava Stokes says she wants to show the public — and others who’ve been through a similar nightmare — that she’s a survivor, not a victim.

    Leigh Searcy (L) interviews Ava Stokes. From LEX18.com. Click to enlarge.

    On the night of Sept. 23, 2018, Stokes, then an 18-year-old Georgetown College freshman, told police she was held at knife-point and raped multiple times by a stranger who wandered in through the unlocked door of her student housing unit.

    As is typical in sexual assault cases, Stokes’ name was kept largely private during the investigation and the trial that followed. A recent interview with LEX 18 was the first time she’s spoken about what happened publicly outside of a courtroom.

    “Now I’m ready for my voice to be heard,” Stokes said. “I want other survivors to know that you are allowed to be proud of yourself for surviving something like this, you’re allowed to feel angry and want justice.”

    Stokes survived not only the rape but the reliving of the gruesome details of that assault in front of a courtroom of people as she took the stand at 35-year-old Cody Arnett’s July jury trial.

    “I’m not gonna lie, that was the hardest thing I ever had to do, especially with my family in there and describing the awful things he did to me for hours,” Stokes told LEX 18.

There’s more at the original, including the video of Leigh Searcy’s interview with Miss Stokes. She’s a strong woman, and is trying to help other women who are victims of monsters like Mr Arnett. Miss Stokes survived the rape because she was able to seize the knife and she stabbed Mr Arnett a few times. As he fled the apartment, wounded, he was apprehended.

And Miss Stokes asks the obvious question: why did the Parole Board release Mr Arnett so early? Why did they release a man with five previous violent felony convictions and think he’d somehow straighten up and fly right? She didn’t ask the question I have asked: why shouldn’t the members of the Parole Board who decided to let that cretin out early be held accountable for the consequences of their decision? Why shouldn’t they be locked up right next to the violent criminal they set free, the rapist they helped to create?

A crime like this leaves all sorts of chaos in its wake. Miss Stokes has alleged that Georgetown College did not do enough to protect students, and her volleyball coaches and other staff wanted to minimize the fallout from the crime. Why, Heaven forfend! it might have discouraged some other potential students from matriculating there!

There have been a whole lot of people who have not done the right thing in this case, when the right thing to do has been so blatantly obvious.

References

References
↑1 I would have caught this story earlier, but the Lexington Herald-Leader, which reported on the original charge, never reported on Mr Arnett’s trial or conviction.
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Killadelphia A trauma nurse laments over all of the bodies which are brought into her emergency room

As I do every weekday morning, I checked the Philadelphia Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page, and I saw that three more people had been sent untimely to their eternal rewards yesterday. 486 homicides ÷ 320 days elapsed = 1.51875 per day x 365 days = 554.34375 projected homicides for the year. With only 14 more killings needed to tie the record of 500, at the current rate that should happen in just 9 days, or on November 25th, which is Thanksgiving Day.

Philadelphia Inquirer writer Robert Moran reported, briefly, on one of the killings:

A 67-year-old woman was fatally shot during an attempted robbery inside a check-cashing store Tuesday afternoon in the city’s Ogontz section, police said.

About 1:10 p.m., the woman, who was believed to be the owner, was shot in the chest inside Any Checks Cashed at 5812 Old York Rd., which is next door to a day-care center. She was pronounced dead at the scene by medics.

That’s it, that’s all, a 67-year-old woman’s life, and death, reduced to two paragraphs. There were a couple more which told readers that the police had very little information thus far. The story had been superseded by others, and was not visible on the Inquirer’s website main page.

But it was this article, blurbed on that main page as “I wake up every day knowing that I will have to watch another Black man take his last breath. And over what?” that caught my attention, though the title, when I opened it, was different:

A trauma nurse’s letter to a Philly shooter | Opinion

I wish you would wait before you pick up that weapon. I wish you could come talk to me. I would’ve begged you not to do this.

by Ruqiyya Greer, For The Inquirer | Wednesday, November 17, 2021

Dear Gunman,

When the alarm goes off, I know that first responders are on the way with your target.

We stand outside, dressed in plastic gowns, gloves, and bonnets. We are sweating profusely as we wait for your target’s arrival. We hear the sirens from a distance. They get louder as they get closer. They race down the hill and come to an abrupt stop. We can smell the burning rubber of the tires. The door swings open and there lays your target, bloody and unconscious.

We struggle to pull his lifeless body, covered with bullet holes and blood, out of the car. It becomes a struggle to get him out as the moisture from the blood makes it difficult to get a tight grasp.

We get your target to the trauma bay as we empty several code carts full of medical supplies, injecting several lifesaving medications into his still body. Techs stand in line taking turns performing chest compressions. The trauma team cracks his chest open to manually compress his heart to keep what little blood he has left circulating.

After we have exhausted all measures, the attending doctor announces, “time of death.” The techs bag his cut-up clothes as well as his body. Two tags are applied, one to his big toe and the other to the outside of the body bag.

There’s more at the original, describing what Ruqiyya Greer, the author and a trauma nurse in the emergency room at Temple University Hospital, sees and feels, practically every day, on the job. And she points out what Mr Moran’s brief stories, the Inquirer in general,[1]We have noted previously Elizabeth Hughes, publisher of The Philadelphia Inquirer, and her determination to make her newspaper “an anti-racist news organization,” has turned it into exactly … Continue reading and the Police Department figures, obscure, because it’s inconvenient reporting: the vast majority of the homicide victims in the City of Brotherly Love are young black males, sometimes men, and sometimes still boys.[2]The Philadelphia Tribune, a publication for the city’s black community, noted that, in 2020, black victims accounted for about 86% of the city’s 499 homicide victims, and 84% of the 2,236 … Continue reading

She concluded:

There’s so many times I want to walk away, but if I do, I will be deserting my community and my culture. I can’t do that. But these days it feels like I am a nurse in the middle of a war. I wake up every day knowing that I will have to watch another Black man take his last breath. And over what?

Our ancestors fought for our freedom; they were murdered for our freedom. I don’t think they risked it all for us to murder each other.

Please, before you pick up that gun again, placing your life at risk, risking your freedom and ending another life, talk to whoever plays a significant role in your life. A parent, uncle, pastor. You are about to make the worst mistake of your life.

I really don’t like quoting so many paragraphs from an Inquirer article, but Miss Greer’s concluding point is important: she is asking the potential shooters out there — people who will almost certainly never read her ‘letter’ anyway — to think before they act.

But they don’t think, at least they don’t think about the act itself. Oh, they may well think, and plot, and plan about how they are going to get away with it, but seem to give little thought or care about what will happen if they do get caught, very possibly spending the rest of their miserable lives locked up.

Miss Greer has been far more honest than most. While so many Philadelphia politicians want to blame the guns, she noted the people who “pick(ed) up that gun,” the people who shot, and frequently killed, other people, most often members of their own communities.

References

References
↑1 We have noted previously Elizabeth Hughes, publisher of The Philadelphia Inquirer, and her determination to make her newspaper “an anti-racist news organization,” has turned it into exactly that, a newspaper more concerned with racial identity and sorting out its news coverage that way than it has been about the “public’s right to know.” The vast majority of homicide victims in Philadelphia are black, but when one black gang banger kills another black gang banger, it isn’t really news anymore, not to the Inquirer. Instead, the paper paid more attention to the accidental killing of Jason Kutt, a white teenager shot at Nockamixon State Park, an hour outside of the city. That’s four separate stories; how many do the mostly black victims get?
↑2 The Philadelphia Tribune, a publication for the city’s black community, noted that, in 2020, black victims accounted for about 86% of the city’s 499 homicide victims, and 84% of the 2,236 shootings; non-Hispanic black Americans make up only 38.3% of the city’s population. The current statistics for this year I have not been able to find.
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The Lexington Herald-Leader does race-based reporting A white man accused, but not convicted, has his photo published; a black man who has pleaded guilty to killing a man, no mugshot published

Jemel Barber. Photo by Fayette County Detention Center, and is a public record.

Jemel Barber is not a nice guy. The Lexington Herald-Leader reported this afternoon that Mr Barber has pleaded guilty to manslaughter:

    2 died in a robbery, gunfight spree in Lexington. Shooter pleads in 1 case

    by Jeremy Chisenhall | November 16, 2021 | 7:44 AM EST | Updated: 4:16 PM EST

    A Central Kentucky man has pleaded guilty in one of two fatal shootings during a string of robberies and gunfights in Lexington.

    Jemel Barber, 22, pleaded guilty last week to manslaughter and second-degree robbery more than four years after he shot and killed 40-year-old Tyrece Clark, according to court records. He was initially charged with murder and first-degree robbery, but his charges were amended down after a plea agreement was reached.

    Barber told police after the deadly shooting on July 23, 2017, that he showed up at a Lexington motel with a rifle, intending to rob Clark of narcotics and/or money, according to court records.

    But Clark started shooting after Barber knocked on his door, Barber told police, so he shot back. The plea agreement was reached after attorneys disputed whether or not Barber could claim self-defense. Barber maintained that Clark was the aggressor and his attorneys continued to blame Clark as the court case played out.

Prosecutors recommended a sentence of 15 years on manslaughter, and 10 years on the robbery conviction; sentencing is scheduled for February 11, 2022. Not yet determined is whether the sentences will run concurrently or consecutively.

There’s more at the original, but what is not at the original is the convicted killer’s mugshot. The McClatchy Mugshot policy holds that:

Publishing mugshots of arrestees has been shown to have lasting effects on both the people photographed and marginalized communities. The permanence of the internet can mean those arrested but not convicted of a crime have the photograph attached to their names forever. Beyond the personal impact, inappropriate publication of mugshots disproportionately harms people of color and those with mental illness.

Mr barber, however, is not someone who has been arrested but not convicted; he’s guilty.

Nor was he a very nice guy prior to his latest arrest. The Fayette County Detention Center page on Mr Barber had five separate mugshots of the malefactor, dated September 28, 2017, November 14, 2017, February 14, 2018, April 19, 2018, and then his last arrest, on May 2, 2018. Born November 25, 1998, he was just 18 when he was first arrested, at least as an adult, and wasn’t yet 19 when arrested the last time. He was still 18 when he killed Tyrece Clark.

However, while the Herald-Leader kept Mr Barber’s mugshot out of their website, they applied their mugshot policy rather inconsistently in the next story:

    Hour-long standoff at Stanton gas station leads to arrest of sexual assault suspect

    by Christopher leach | November 16, 2021 | 4:20 PM EST

    Craig Worm, photo by Stanton Police department, and published in the Lexington Herald-Leader, November 16, 2021.

    A sexual assault suspect from South Dakota was arrested at a gas station in Powell County after a nearly hour-long standoff with police Tuesday morning, according to a Facebook post by Stanton Police Department.

    Police said they were called to Airport Market in Stanton just before 8:30 a.m. for reports of a man who was firing a gun inside the store. When police and deputies with the Powell County Sheriff’s Office arrived, they found a man with a handgun inside a vehicle.

    That man was later identified as Craig Worm, 50, of South Dakota, according to police.

    Worm asked to buy cigarettes before firing at the store’s ceiling and saying, “now call police,” the store owner told WAVE 3.

    Worm barricaded himself inside his vehicle for approximately one hour before surrendering, police said.

There’s more at the original, including Mr Worm’s mugshot.

Unlike Mr Barber, who has been accused of a serious crime, but not convicted of anything, the editors at the Herald-Leader decided to publish his photo, despite their concern about “those arrested but not convicted of a crime hav(ing) the photograph attached to their names forever”. Mr Worm could still be acquitted.

The difference? Mr Barber, now a confessed killer, is black, while Mr Worm, accused but still innocent until proven guilty of sexual assault, is white. If there is another distinction, it certainly isn’t obvious.

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Philly ties for 3rd place!

It wasn’t really that much of a stretch to guess that 475 wouldn’t be the final homicide number for Thursday, and it wasn’t: the Philadelphia Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page shows that 476 Philadelphians have been murdered so far this year, up from ‘just’ 428 on the same day last year. Last year being a leap year, the gang bangers had an extra day to hit that 428 number.

The numbers are ugly: 476 homicides in 315 days works out to 1.5111 per day, or a projected 551.5555, rounding up to 552 for the year.

With 50 days left in the year, and ‘only’ 24 murders needed to tie the all-time record of 500, set in 1990, the homicide rate would have to drop to slightly less than a third of what it is right now, and, at this point, only God could make that happen. At the current rate, the city should tie the all-time high in just 16 days, or Saturday, November 27th.

Mayor James Kenney (Democrat-Philadelphia), District Attorney Larry Krasner (Soros stooge-Philadelphia), and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw (Kenney Puppet-Philadelphia) have certainly done a fine, fine job, haven’t they?

But hey, Philadelphians must like all of those bodies stacked up like cordwood, because they just re-elected George Soros stooge District Attorney Larry Krasner. No one can say that they didn’t know what they were getting.

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Killadelphia

This brings the homicide total in the City of Brotherly Love to 475 for the year; one more, and Philadelphia ties 1989’s Bronze Medal for most murders! Of course, as of this writing, Thursday isn’t over, and the police could still report more killings.

    Nicetown fire that killed 2 ruled arson

    The fire occurred on the 1400 block of West Jerome Street shortly before 4 a.m. Thursday.

    by Robert Moran | Veterans’ Day, November 11, 2021

    A predawn house fire Thursday that killed two men in the city’s Nicetown section has been ruled an arson and is being investigated as a homicide case, police said.

    Firefighters and police responded to the blaze just before 4 a.m. on the 1400 block of West Jerome Street. Two men in their 50s were found in an upstairs bedroom and were transported to Temple University Hospital and Einstein Medical Center. Both were pronounced dead shortly before 5 a.m. Their names were not released.

    Investigators from the Philadelphia Fire Department and the ATF Arson Task Force found an accelerant was used inside the front door.

    Police said the motive for the arson was unknown.

One thing is certain: whoever started this fire didn’t care for anyone’s life. The 1400 block of West Jerome Street consists entirely of Philadelphia row houses. The Google Maps street view shows them as primarily brick buildings, presumably with brick firewalls between each unit, but there’s still plenty of century-old wood involved, and the arsonist could have burned down a whole side of the street.