12-02-2020, 01:53 PM
(12-02-2020, 12:52 PM)Vas Deferens Wrote: There’s nothing else happening currently that could be affecting lower income bands of the population? Hmm.
Excellent question, let's examine that. What has changed that could potentially cause such a huge spike in crime rates, not only in Minneapolis, but throughout the country?
Higher unemployment due to pandemic shutdowns? I find this unlikely. While lack of money can certainly drive criminal conduct it's very rare to find a person who used to hold down a steady job to make ends meet suddenly turn to violent crime to earn money. Simply put, law abiding citizens don't generally turn into violent criminals because they are unemployed.
Quarantine lockdowns affecting the mental status of people? More likely than above, but still not a likely determinant. Statistics routinely show that most criminal activity is committed by a hard core of recidivists. This data was precisely what led to the "three strikes" laws, and similar laws. While the efficacy of such laws is certainly up for debate, the data that promoted their enaction is not. So, again, I don't think a huge spike in criminals conduct can be attributed to this.
Shutdown of schools/community centers? This would certainly help explain a rise in crime committed by juveniles, and absolutely does in the current environment. Every person who works in the criminal justice field is aware that crime rates rise during the summer months. This is, of course, partially due to the better weather enabling people to go outside. But as this trend continues to show itself in areas such as Southern California, where the weather is very rarely a factor in this regard, it can also largely be attributed to young people having more free time on their hands. This would absolutely help explain a rise in juvenile crime during the pandemic. As we do not have data on the age of these perpetrators we can only speculate in this regard. But what data we do have shows that juvenile crime is not the predominant driver of overall crime rates.
Lastly, and feel free to offer more explanations if you have them, is the current soft on crime/demonizing law enforcement movement that is predominant in deep blue areas of the country. I have already explained my reasoning for why this would cause a spike in crime rates. This is bolstered, anecdotally of course, by my own experiences and those of friends. I have been told numerous times that "you guys can't do shit to us now". My friends who are parole agents have been told absolutely no returns to prison for violations, no matter how numerous or severe, unless the parolee committed a new crime. My friends who are probation officers have to jump through hoops to detain anyone on a violation, and permission is not often given at the end. My friends who are in law enforcement are forced to cite and OR people they would otherwise have detained. It will get even worse here now that Jackie Lacy (who was herself the victim of an attempted carjacking recently) lost the DA race to POS George Gascon, who was not content with ruining San Francisco and now wants to inflict his particular brand of progressive bullshit on Los Angeles County.
So feel free to disagree with the above, just don't ignore one of the most obvious reasons for this sudden, dramatic, spike in crime.
