Boston battles surge in gun violence

Boston battles surge in gun violence

December 12, 2005 edition

As the murder rate hits a 10-year high, community leaders combat illegal guns and gang culture.

By Sara Miller Llana

Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

BOSTON – City leaders across the country have been reassured by declining rates of violent crime during the past five years. But in Boston, they are shaken by daylight gun battles and a disturbing trend of youth-on-youth killings.
Shootings are up 33 percent from a year ago. And in the 18-to-21 age bracket, firearm-related arrests are up 38 percent. The murder toll has set a 10-year-high.


At 67, the number of homicides is still low compared with other major American cities, but half of the victims were 25 or younger. The spike in gun violence - particularly among youths - is a setback for a city that led the way in combating youth violence last decade.

Community leaders say increasing numbers of teens without job opportunities, including a growing number of high school dropouts, are turning to illegal firearms, which activists say are too easily accessible. Fewer police officers on the streets have also caused alarm. And, many say, the coalitions of community activists, clergy, police, and academics that united in the 1990s to cut back on youth homicide - giving rise to the so-called "Boston Miracle" - have fragmented, leaving them ineffective today.

"It took ten years for the Boston Miracle to erode," says Pastor Bruce Wall of Global Ministries Christian Church in the Boston neighborhood of Dorchester, who has worked for decades to stop youth violence.

More:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1212/p03s02-ussc.html

...we are deciding this with systemic apathy.