Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/606684
8 NOVEMBER 25 - DECEMBER 1, 2015 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Community Murder Rate Falls by JEFF THOMPSON Homicides in rural Cumberland County are occurring at an average annual rate this year, according to Sheriff 's Sgt. Sean Smith. In Fayetteville, they're down dramatically. Or- dinarily, murders occur most often in populated urban areas. Homicides include all killings of humans such as murder and manslaughter, which violate criminal laws. Smith tells Up & Coming Weekly that there have been 12 murders in unincorporated areas of the county so far in 2015. Four of them remain unsolved. Fayetteville Police Lt. David McLaurin says 16 homicides have taken place in the city, and all but two of them have been cleared with arrests. Spring Lake has had one murder so far in 2015; Hope Mills none. According to Dr. Joe Gorton, associate professor of criminology at North- ern Iowa University, most often, murders result from firearm violence. Circumstances resulting in murder usually include domestic violence, il- licit drug deals, robberies and gang activity. Fayetteville has seen a double- digit reduction in violent crime over the last two years. Coincidentally, Police Chief Harold Medlock was hired two years ago. North Carolina has the 17th highest statewide murder rate in the U.S., 5.9 with 567 homicides, according to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention. On a per capita basis, Durham is North Carolina's murder capital. It's a city similar in population and demographics to Fayetteville, but has recorded 35 homi- cides so far this year. The Pew Research Center published a report in 2014, which found that while Chicago had seen a lot of murders in raw numbers, smaller cities had a higher rate, adjusted for population. Using FBI data — with the ca- veat that it is reported by local police agencies and not always consistently — the Pew Center determined that the top cities in 2012 for the murder rate were Flint, Michigan; Detroit, Michigan; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Jackson, Mississippi. Chicago came in 21st. An August 2013 CDC report looked at rates for gun homicides in the 50 most populous metropolitan areas. It found that for 2009-2010, the top gun murder rate areas were, in order: New Orleans; Memphis, Tennessee; Detroit; Birmingham, Alabama; St. Louis, Missouri; Baltimore, Maryland; Jacksonville, Florida; Kansas City, Kansa; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Chicago. So by any definition, New Orleans is the murder capital of the nation. In a summary of studies on murder and prior records of violence, Don Kates criminologist and constitutional lawyer associated with the Pacific Research Institute, San Francisco and Gary Mauser criminologist and uni- versity professor at Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia in Canada, found that 80 to 90 percent of murderers had prior police records, in contrast to 15 percent of American adults overall. In a study of domes- tic murderers, 46 percent of the perpetrators had had restraining orders against them at some time. Dr. Laura L. Hayes, a psychologist in Bethesda, Maryland., writing in Slate said "Violence is not a product of mental illness. Nor is violence gen- erally the action of ordinary, stable individuals who suddenly break and commit crimes of passion. Violent crimes are committed by violent people, those who do not have the skills to manage their anger." "We are a culture awash in anger," she added.