NEWS & POLITICS ARCHIVES A Heat Wave, a Crime Wave
by John Surico
As mentioned on the newspaper front page in Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing,” while Bed-Stuy burned in the 1989 summer heat, it looks like a helter swelter out there. And it’s a damn bloody one.
In the past five days, with temperatures averaging well over 90 degrees, New York City has seen a spree of 16 murders – five of which have happened since Friday night. Although 2012 is continuing to attract record-low numbers of homicide, and crime, in general, for that matter, this quick blip on the radar is an outlier that runs parallel with the extreme weather.
We knew that the heat wave could cause our social media and respect for law at the McCarren Park Pool to collapse. But this shocking statistic and the stories behind some of them have convinced us that one thing is for sure: the heat is making New York go insane.
The first tale comes to us from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, where, unfortunately, a majority of these deaths occurred. When a passerby realized that Valentino Fashion on Fifth Avenue was still open with the lights on way past its closing time, the spectator called the police to investigate. Soon after, Mohamed Gebeli was found dead in his own store, with a bullet wound in his neck. As of now, cops are unsure as to what the motive was behind Gebeli’s death.
Next, it is hard to mention that two of the murders were child-related. Two days ago, a Brooklyn mom with a bad past beat her 9-year-old son to death and then tried to kill herself by engulfing a bunch of pills. This atrocity came a day after a Bronx mother fed her two young children toxic wiper fluid, imprisoned them in a gas-filled apartment and attempted to kill herself by slashing her wrists. Both parents are now in custody.
The last story we will talk about happened on a quaint Queens block late last night. It wasn’t a store owner or child-related – no, instead, this murder was gang-related. After tensions that boiled at a nightclub nearby, a group of AK-47-strapped nuts followed their rivals back to Springfield Garden. While the unknowing targets were sitting in an SUV, the thugs sprayed the vehicle with 63 bullets, killing three and wounding one. According to the Post, one neighbor said that “their heads were practically blown clean off.”
What the hell is going on in New York right now?