I live by a children's playground in Bed-Stuy with a setup similar to the one where the rape happened in Brownsville. Adjacent to a school, not locked at night, completely dark (no lighting whatsoever), hidden from the street by the school building. Our apartment is right against the playground, we can see all that goes on in there. Over the last year, myself and neighbors have reported to 911, police precinct, and park department the following: alcohol, drugs, sex, firecrackers, loud parties after midnight, open fires next to a private house's wooden fence, motorcycle gangs, fighting and gambling. The result? Zero. Police shows up a few hours too late (if at all). The park department doesn't respond, or sends generic info without any desire to change anything or help provide a safe environment for children.
A children's playground could be a great asset to a neighborhood, but once not managed properly, it leads to crime, public safety issues and a bleaker future for our kids.
A children's playground could be a great asset to a neighborhood, but once not managed properly, it leads to crime, public safety issues and a bleaker future for our kids.
10
One of the things that jumped out at me from this article is that Mr. Cherry did not go to court to resolve his ticket because he felt he did nothing wrong. That ill-informed decision starts wheels turning that can crush him later on. He caught a break in this instance, But people who feel that they can function outside the system (good system/bad system makes no difference) have to be prepared to live with the consequences. Small disregard for the rule of law, yes. But indicative of a larger problem in our society where each individual is often assumed to be the legitimate arbiter of all of his own actions.
17
It is not stated in the article what he was ticketed for. As far as we can tell he was ticket for being in his own neighborhood. From where I sit, that is not a crime. While the decision to ignore appearing in court does have consequences that become hyper imbricated, this unnecessary harassment leads to these decisions. Who could blame an 18 year old?
BTW, people are self arbitrating by the hundreds of millions everyday on the nations highways. The speed limit is the law. How many are self correcting and obeying the law? Yeah. That's what I thought.
BTW, people are self arbitrating by the hundreds of millions everyday on the nations highways. The speed limit is the law. How many are self correcting and obeying the law? Yeah. That's what I thought.
5
Ms Bellafante:
When (if?) you were in Brownsville, you might have looked up at the street sign by that "vacant lot on Chester Avenue" and noticed that you were standing on Chester STREET, where my mother and her two brothers were born in the early years of the 20th century.
This seems to be a recurring problem with the Times...getting wrong street names in zip codes not beginning 100- or 102- or some of the more lah di dah sections of Brooklyn.
Chester Avenue, by the way, is a short roadway in what is now known as the Kensington section, which to most of us born and raised in the borough still regard as Flatbush.
When (if?) you were in Brownsville, you might have looked up at the street sign by that "vacant lot on Chester Avenue" and noticed that you were standing on Chester STREET, where my mother and her two brothers were born in the early years of the 20th century.
This seems to be a recurring problem with the Times...getting wrong street names in zip codes not beginning 100- or 102- or some of the more lah di dah sections of Brooklyn.
Chester Avenue, by the way, is a short roadway in what is now known as the Kensington section, which to most of us born and raised in the borough still regard as Flatbush.
12
Good Point. Let’s see if the NY Times corrects the error.
If there is a point to Ms. Bellafante's article, it has totally eluded me. All I could ascertain is that Shamuel (?) Cherry feels he is above the law, and does not have to abide by the rules governing occupying taxpayer subsidized housing.
Citing the example of the "affluenza" young man's mother aiding him in getting to Mexico, well, at least she was there for her son, a quality that seems to be lacking in Brownsville.
Tom Franzson. Brevard NC
Citing the example of the "affluenza" young man's mother aiding him in getting to Mexico, well, at least she was there for her son, a quality that seems to be lacking in Brownsville.
Tom Franzson. Brevard NC
11
He may not have shown up to address the ticket he was given but exactly what rules of occupying subsidized housing are you referring to? Is there a rule that states you cannot visit a neighbor in the complex that you live without having an ID? This article indicates that he was approached by police for what exactly? Being in a building? Have you ever visited a person that lives in an apartment? I wonder if you are stopped and questioned by police for merely being inside of a building if your beliefs about things would be different. As soon as I see "taxpayers" I know what I'm dealing with. What in this article makes you believe this person or his family pays no taxes or broke ANY rule? Assumptions... Hmmmm.
11
The point is that people in these neighborhoods cannot control themselves when given the opportunity to commit rape, assault and other violent crimes, and that we may not regulate these peoples' behavior, or otherwise presume to judge them.
However, we may regulate others' behavior - municipal services, streets department, women who wish to pass through these neighborhoods - in order to prevent those crimes. And we may presume to judge those others - the assaulted woman, the streets department employee who did not install new lighting with alacrity - for the actions of the people who live in these neighborhoods.
However, we may regulate others' behavior - municipal services, streets department, women who wish to pass through these neighborhoods - in order to prevent those crimes. And we may presume to judge those others - the assaulted woman, the streets department employee who did not install new lighting with alacrity - for the actions of the people who live in these neighborhoods.
4
I will try submitting this comment again:
"[Y]ou can hear the refrain of good liberals telling themselves that this would never happen among the chess-playing families of Park Slope."
How is it that a snicker tossed at Park Slopers can make its way even into an article about Brownsville? And besides, Park Slopers are way too busy trying to defend every miscreant in creation to congratulate themselves on their relative good fortune.
Come on, Ms. Bellafante. What, really, do chess-playing children have to do with your subject?
"[Y]ou can hear the refrain of good liberals telling themselves that this would never happen among the chess-playing families of Park Slope."
How is it that a snicker tossed at Park Slopers can make its way even into an article about Brownsville? And besides, Park Slopers are way too busy trying to defend every miscreant in creation to congratulate themselves on their relative good fortune.
Come on, Ms. Bellafante. What, really, do chess-playing children have to do with your subject?
23
I don't live anywhere near Park Slope but, indeed, Bellafante's gratuitously snide comment and stereotyping would be anathema had she made it against people of color in a minority neighborhood.
She should go back reporting fashion, since, clearly, social commentary is not her forté. And that the editor would allow such snark is reprehensible. Shame.
She should go back reporting fashion, since, clearly, social commentary is not her forté. And that the editor would allow such snark is reprehensible. Shame.
14
Just a thought, our Ginia is an ambitious person. And ambitious people at the Times, like ambitious officers at the Pentagon, know what they need to do in order to advance themselves.
Self-advancement at the Times today is facilitated through race-related narrative journalism. There are good guys and bad guys. It's not complicated. Is it journalism? Does it matter? What am I gonna do, read the Wall Street Journal?
Self-advancement at the Times today is facilitated through race-related narrative journalism. There are good guys and bad guys. It's not complicated. Is it journalism? Does it matter? What am I gonna do, read the Wall Street Journal?
8
Housing projects have proved to be a very bad idea. We should take the money we send overseas and on making war and policing the world and spend it in our cities correcting this problem. These places should be replaced by mixed income housing IMO.
9
Even in our own relatively safe borough the projects are a disaster. But only a fool would live in mixed-income housing.
6
Back in the 80's when I was still a spry and young renter, I lived in mixed income/mixed class housing. It was suburban rather than urban, but there were still problems. No, not guns or open drug sales or gangs, but truancy, vandalism, shady visitors, and starkly different lifestyles and expectations among residents living cheek by jowl. In theory wonderful, in practice not so much.
5
We need to focus our attention and resources on American families, many of whom have been dysfunctional, poorly educated, and without work for generations. Instead, we are giving asylum (and all of the government benefits that come with this status) to economic migrants from Central America.
How can we absorb and help the poor from other countries when we can't even help our own?
How can we absorb and help the poor from other countries when we can't even help our own?
15
Too many families have been "dysfunctional ... for generations" because we have enabled them to be so; have, indeed, encouraged them to be so. What havoc good intentions can sometimes wreak.
Not to mention government policies that encourage corporations and even mud-level manufacturers to relocate elsewhere.
Not to mention government policies that encourage corporations and even mud-level manufacturers to relocate elsewhere.
1
This story is is "woulda, coulda, shoulda." If the City had only fixed the lights or locked the playground, the father and daughter would not have been drinking in the playground, and the father would not have had sex with his daughter, and and teenagers would not have continued to have sex with her or raped her.
The reality is that there are unrepaired lights and unlocked playgrounds all over the city. But there aren't vicious predators (the father and the teens) in all neighborhoods. You simply cannot fix every light or lock every fence or have police in place to prevent every crime--especially if the mayor severely decreases stop and frisk, and the mayor and city council work to decriminalize low-level crimes.
The fault lies not with the lights or the locks, but with the criminals, and a City government determined to tip the balance in their favor.
The reality is that there are unrepaired lights and unlocked playgrounds all over the city. But there aren't vicious predators (the father and the teens) in all neighborhoods. You simply cannot fix every light or lock every fence or have police in place to prevent every crime--especially if the mayor severely decreases stop and frisk, and the mayor and city council work to decriminalize low-level crimes.
The fault lies not with the lights or the locks, but with the criminals, and a City government determined to tip the balance in their favor.
24
If adult father and adult daughter were having consensual sex, why does the author of this article say "the daughter has already been been horribly victimized"? What is the basis for that judgement?
Could even not the daughter have seduced the father, she coming on to him? A video by one of the suspects records one of the boys indicating "she be a freak", presumably for having sex in public.
After all, she had only really known him a couple of months, having been raised in California since infancy. 20 years difference is not unthinkable. Supermodel Jerry Hall has just married billionaire Rubert Murdoch - a man 25 years her senior.
Let's not be so knee-jerk fast as to always blame the male!
Could even not the daughter have seduced the father, she coming on to him? A video by one of the suspects records one of the boys indicating "she be a freak", presumably for having sex in public.
After all, she had only really known him a couple of months, having been raised in California since infancy. 20 years difference is not unthinkable. Supermodel Jerry Hall has just married billionaire Rubert Murdoch - a man 25 years her senior.
Let's not be so knee-jerk fast as to always blame the male!
7
"She be a freak."
First, a young man watching a scene he had no business watching -- if what he's saying is true.
Second, a pre-lingual young man who cannot string together a rudimentary English sentence.
Education, both moral and intellectual, begins the minute you bring a child into the world.
First, a young man watching a scene he had no business watching -- if what he's saying is true.
Second, a pre-lingual young man who cannot string together a rudimentary English sentence.
Education, both moral and intellectual, begins the minute you bring a child into the world.
3
What does dialect have to do with this reporter's nonsensical comment that when two adults are allegedly having consensual sex, it is the female who is "horribly brutalized" by the male?
Did it ever occur to her that inebriated women often entice inebriated men?
Not only did this reporter gratuitously insult white children in Park Slope, she also assumes that it is the males who commit the victimization, if there is any victimization here at all.
(The way it is enfolding, it may actually be the boys who are the victims here: an adult woman voluntarily having sex with young boys may not be rape on their part, but statutory rape on her's)
Will someone please buy the reporter a moral compass as well as a soupçon of reality and a smidgen of common sense.
Did it ever occur to her that inebriated women often entice inebriated men?
Not only did this reporter gratuitously insult white children in Park Slope, she also assumes that it is the males who commit the victimization, if there is any victimization here at all.
(The way it is enfolding, it may actually be the boys who are the victims here: an adult woman voluntarily having sex with young boys may not be rape on their part, but statutory rape on her's)
Will someone please buy the reporter a moral compass as well as a soupçon of reality and a smidgen of common sense.
3
With any assumption whether the allegation is true: New York Penal Law § 255.25 Incest in the third degree - Class E felony.
1
If Shamuel Cherry felt he had "done nothing wrong," he should have made that case in court, not blown off a legal obligation. You can't blame the justice system for failing you when you don't make any effort to engage with it. Does anyone else think that the complete disregard for the law shown by even this Cherry-picked local might be more of a problem than an unlocked park?
43
As I write this Comment, there are 20 "Recommends" in response to @SD's comment. How many of those 20 individuals know how to initiate a court case without incurring expense? Was Shamuel Cherry guilty of "complete disregard" of the law, or ignorance of the law? A compassionate "system" might have sought to counsel him, and to see that he was spared punishment for his ignorance. It could be that he did nothing wrong.
5
Merely following the instructions on the ticket would initiate the court case - ever get a parking ticket or moving violation? He didn't get arrested, he got summoned to Court to tell his story and decided not to. He took the law into his own hands and there is a price to pay for that decision - lucky he had the Justice Center. Better he could also get an education.
2
A little more journalistic digging would have made this a much more meaningful column. Are the lights in the park out because of bureaucratic neglect or because miscreants break them as soon as they're repaired? Calls to the local council member, assembly rep, the precinct and the Parks Dept. would have come up with the answer and either more forcefully supported article's argument of neglect or added nuance. As to the park not being locked at night; again, a series of calls would have established whether the Parks Department ignored community requests to close it, followed community requests to provide night time access or made a decision (or gave it no thought) on its own.
45
The breaking of lights is common in these areas and in the apartment houses as a means to hiding illegal activity. When I worked in the South Bronx as a NY Telephone company I would never enter a building with no hall lights because it was a set up for a mugging.
Even as a boy in Bushwick I would never enter Suydam Street Park after dark as a shortcut to home. Better to walk around the park where the street lights could reveal danger.
It is nearly impossible for the city to keep these lights working. You'd have to make replacing them a standing job order for a daily visit. Vandals tear off the cages around the lights meant to protect them. Putting lights on taller poles would make the park look like an Interstate highway rest stop.
As much as we would like to enjoy neighborhood amenities people need to consider whether it is safe to do so. Sad.
Even as a boy in Bushwick I would never enter Suydam Street Park after dark as a shortcut to home. Better to walk around the park where the street lights could reveal danger.
It is nearly impossible for the city to keep these lights working. You'd have to make replacing them a standing job order for a daily visit. Vandals tear off the cages around the lights meant to protect them. Putting lights on taller poles would make the park look like an Interstate highway rest stop.
As much as we would like to enjoy neighborhood amenities people need to consider whether it is safe to do so. Sad.
19
Off Cortelyou Road in Flatbush some years ago, a locked playground provoked a neighborhood civil war.
The homeowners and apartment dwellers nearby couldn't stand the shouting -- loud, usually obscene -- of young men every evening, every night, or the debris blown everywhere by the next day; and then there was the contingent who called the homeowners and nearby apartment dwellers elitists, racists, and child-haters.
(Child-haters?)
How that plays out in other neighborhoods, I don't know. In any case, it takes a very, very strong fence and a stout lock to keep out young men who should be at home sleeping or, better, studying, so that they can actually master a skill and get a job.
The homeowners and apartment dwellers nearby couldn't stand the shouting -- loud, usually obscene -- of young men every evening, every night, or the debris blown everywhere by the next day; and then there was the contingent who called the homeowners and nearby apartment dwellers elitists, racists, and child-haters.
(Child-haters?)
How that plays out in other neighborhoods, I don't know. In any case, it takes a very, very strong fence and a stout lock to keep out young men who should be at home sleeping or, better, studying, so that they can actually master a skill and get a job.
9
What fascinates me is the unwillingness for the majority of the people in these communities to take control over themselves. We can blame the police, but the more they do the more they are hated.. Sometimes the stop wrong people, sometimes they don't. The gentleman in the article received a summons and it appears to have been wrong, but he felt it was okay not to have to appear in court. One wrong begets another. The police need to know how to balance aggressive action with common sense community partnership.. It's not easy. The real solution is for minority neighborhoods to take full control of themselves.. allow the projects to become ownership driven. Give shares (like a COOP), make the people responsible for themselves. People invested in their home, will learn to take care of it. Immediately evict any person responsible for degrading the project development or drug dealing, other crimes, etc. Provide a budget to each building and let's see what happens when they must make their own choices on how and where to spend it, maybe it will become fantastic! The point being that until the vast majority become sick and tired of the insanity around them will any true change occur.
30
This story goes straight to the fundamentals of race, Justice, and housing in the US. It's about the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, but it could just as easily have been about Houston's Westwood neighborhood, or any number of similar places across the nation. Poor neighborhoods, particularly poor minority neighborhoods in big cities, have been neglected for so long that the problems have become generational. HUD's policy, reiterated by the SCOTUS last year, only worsens matters, as does the efforts of well-meaning but ill informed housing advocates who turn their back on places like Brownsville and Westwood in favor of fighting suburban communities over mixed income housing.
.
There is a huge irony when you talk about "broken window policing" in these places. As the shooting of Akai Gurley shows, and the crime in the park in Brownsville, fixing small problems can have a huge impact on public safety. Three lightbulbs and two padlocks could secure that park. Two dozen lightbulbs (assuming one light fixture per landing in a stairwell) and Akai Gurley might still be alive. This is what "broken windows" was supposed to be all about. Not only do the police not get it, the people who should actually be fixing broken windows in public and low income housing don't get it either!
.
There is a huge irony when you talk about "broken window policing" in these places. As the shooting of Akai Gurley shows, and the crime in the park in Brownsville, fixing small problems can have a huge impact on public safety. Three lightbulbs and two padlocks could secure that park. Two dozen lightbulbs (assuming one light fixture per landing in a stairwell) and Akai Gurley might still be alive. This is what "broken windows" was supposed to be all about. Not only do the police not get it, the people who should actually be fixing broken windows in public and low income housing don't get it either!
22
Billions of dollars have been sent to urban areas, just since the commencement of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society in the 60s.
Much of it was wasted - usually a euphemism for "stolen" - by people who presented themselves as the defenders and advocates of the communities for whom the funds, and attendant programs, were intended. I've voted for a number of them.
Today, schools in urban areas often receive more funding per student than wealthier suburbs as a result of state and federal funds which are (rightly) exclusively intended for disadvantaged communities. Those schools are still dying.
Inner cities aren't neglected; they're exploited.
Much of it was wasted - usually a euphemism for "stolen" - by people who presented themselves as the defenders and advocates of the communities for whom the funds, and attendant programs, were intended. I've voted for a number of them.
Today, schools in urban areas often receive more funding per student than wealthier suburbs as a result of state and federal funds which are (rightly) exclusively intended for disadvantaged communities. Those schools are still dying.
Inner cities aren't neglected; they're exploited.
15
The locals keep on breaking the park lights over and over again. Regular streetlights are too high to vandalize but even there criminals know how to disconnect them.
Report burnt out/damaged park lighting at this link -
http://service.nyctmc.org/alias3/park.asp
Report burnt out/damaged park lighting at this link -
http://service.nyctmc.org/alias3/park.asp
6
ZAW - "Not only do the police not get it, the people who should actually be fixing broken windows in public and low income housing don't get it either!"
Perhaps you don't get it! The "city" changes a bulb, the bulb is broken, the "city" changes a window, the window is broken. How often and at what expense do you want to continue this charade. Maybe, just maybe it's the people who live in low income housing that don't get it. It's called responsibility.
Perhaps you don't get it! The "city" changes a bulb, the bulb is broken, the "city" changes a window, the window is broken. How often and at what expense do you want to continue this charade. Maybe, just maybe it's the people who live in low income housing that don't get it. It's called responsibility.
11
For a more edifying (indeed fascinating) look at Brownsville, I recommend Alfred Kazin's classic, "A Walker in the City." With the razing of old buildings in favor of warehousing people in public housing comes the elimination of "neighborhood." Factor in municipal neglect, et voila.
8
Phoebe - "Factor in municipal neglect, et voila."
You forgot to factor the resident's neglect of their homes, their children, their neighborhoods. Do you really believe that low income housing people need their hands held 24x7 by "municipal" authorities for them to show responsibility?
You forgot to factor the resident's neglect of their homes, their children, their neighborhoods. Do you really believe that low income housing people need their hands held 24x7 by "municipal" authorities for them to show responsibility?
12
What goes on in the souls of these males? One psychopath is horrific enough but how can 4 others stand, watch, and participate? Some kind of feral biology? It's as if we live amoung frenzied carnivores. Even great white sharks don't attack with sadistic intent.
30
You have no idea what happened. How can you possibly conclude such nonsense?
1
We are living among people with little regard for others except as a source of revenue and entertainment and the law of the jungle prevails.
And you folks wonder why the rest of us are carrying firearms for protection? Why police chiefs are telling us to arm ourselves because they cannot be everywhere and protect us?
And you folks wonder why the rest of us are carrying firearms for protection? Why police chiefs are telling us to arm ourselves because they cannot be everywhere and protect us?
6
I thought the same thing when I watched Daniel Pantaleo choke the life out of Eric Garner's body.
8
The "gang rape" that probably wasn't a gang rape. The story didn't compute from the start and fortunately The New York Times' subsequently reporting has pointed out the oddities. Maybe some lessons were learned from the press hysteria and racism that led to the miscarriage of justice in The Central Park 5 case. (aka the Central Park jogger case). In the latter case, the woman was brutally attacked, just not by the five teenagers who were wrongly convicted of the crime, a mere technicality when the press and the public are up in arms.
I don't think it was a bad thing that the police didn't immediately report the crime. We - and they - don't even know what the crime was at this point, let alone who was actually involved in it. The playground looks passably lit to me, but maybe it's just because of the photographer's flash light. It seems quite easily visible from the sidewalk and street, and not shrouded by bushes or trees. This is one incident where it doesn't seem to me the city (and its citizens) bears any collective responsibility.
I don't think it was a bad thing that the police didn't immediately report the crime. We - and they - don't even know what the crime was at this point, let alone who was actually involved in it. The playground looks passably lit to me, but maybe it's just because of the photographer's flash light. It seems quite easily visible from the sidewalk and street, and not shrouded by bushes or trees. This is one incident where it doesn't seem to me the city (and its citizens) bears any collective responsibility.
14
The Times printed the names of the juveniles and still calls it a gang rape. I have no idea why you give them any credit for integrity.
1
The night playgrounds in ParkSlope [...like 1 block from me...] are as "beyond the pale" as any in NYC...
8
I wonder (speaking rhetorically) if the Times perceives how similar this article is to the recent pronouncements of the mayor of a certain German city...
7
The real problem is the people in these communities . The only solution is to tear down all of these projects and disburse these families through the 5 boroughs.
5
But where would they go? I'm not sure they could afford market rate housing.
1
" disburse these families through the 5 boroughs."
Sure, build low rent housing on the upper East and West sides and Yorkville. Maybe some more in Park Slope and Bensonhurst. Or Riverdale.
See what happens when you try that.
Sure, build low rent housing on the upper East and West sides and Yorkville. Maybe some more in Park Slope and Bensonhurst. Or Riverdale.
See what happens when you try that.
8
Disbursing dysfunctional families throughout the boroughs was attempted in the 1960s, when Section-8 was introduced, and welfare families were placed into well maintained, middle-class apartment buildings. Well, the middle-class families left if they could because of the constant din, dirt, and criminality that accompanied the new tenants. No landlord could keep up with the vandalism.
Broken lights are usually broken by someone.
No thanks -- been there before.
Broken lights are usually broken by someone.
No thanks -- been there before.
12
I worked in Brownsville in the early 80s. I felt like I was in Dresden after the fire bombing. Doesn't sound like much has changed.
8
Dresden. That what the South Bronx was called in the 1970s. Block after block of burned buildings. The only respite was Arthur Avenue where the Italians and Albanians were doing their best to keep the neighborhood up.
5
Kudos to the mothers of those boys. I know, from experience, that some your your best efforts, on behalf of your children, just do not take.
19
This reads like damage control for the suspected rapists. Why mention an allegation of incest, made by the suspects. Blaming the victim. And what does a vehicular homicide in Texas have to do with this case?
20
Lighting is most basic and inexpensive - the city could start there.
These photos show a forgotten, neglected place.
Some philanthropy, cleanup and gardening would be a start. Plant some hope for these neighbors, make the effort.
These photos show a forgotten, neglected place.
Some philanthropy, cleanup and gardening would be a start. Plant some hope for these neighbors, make the effort.
10
Gun or no gun, incest or no incest, whether she is smiling on tape or not, even if she gave her consent (if she was inebriated or/and scared, she could say yes on camera it would still means no to me), innocent is certainly not the right word to qualify 5 young men who admitted to be on the scene.
and on another perspective, lets imagine she happily gave her consent, it makes it ok for 5 young men to have sex where toddlers and kids play during the day?
I live in east Flatbush and sadly the story didn't even surprised me. And I am fed up not to be able to bring my kids to the brand newly equipped playground a few blocks away because of people cursing, fighting and smoking weed next to the slides during day time, the feces and used condoms you can find on the floor. Gates and Fences should be closed at night.
On another hand what do we expect from people who don't have access to education and living in real poverty. Restaurants around my block are one dollar buffet. doesn't it say a lot? Some days when I am tired and depressed by the surrounding expressions of poverty, I will admit I dream of a gentrified east Flatbush... but then I would also be displaced. poverty or gentrification, are these my only two options?
and on another perspective, lets imagine she happily gave her consent, it makes it ok for 5 young men to have sex where toddlers and kids play during the day?
I live in east Flatbush and sadly the story didn't even surprised me. And I am fed up not to be able to bring my kids to the brand newly equipped playground a few blocks away because of people cursing, fighting and smoking weed next to the slides during day time, the feces and used condoms you can find on the floor. Gates and Fences should be closed at night.
On another hand what do we expect from people who don't have access to education and living in real poverty. Restaurants around my block are one dollar buffet. doesn't it say a lot? Some days when I am tired and depressed by the surrounding expressions of poverty, I will admit I dream of a gentrified east Flatbush... but then I would also be displaced. poverty or gentrification, are these my only two options?
42
"what do we expect from people who don't have access to education and living in real poverty."
Are all the city run public schools closed in this neighborhood? What is keeping them from getting an education besides themselves? How many of these families are collecting money from various programs for food and shelter?
Yes, they are uneducated and dependent on these funds but whose fault is that? The programs created the dependency and the attitude that one needn't work as long as you can find a way onto them. Those who can't end up with three hots and a cot provided by the same people who paid taxes for the schools and programs. No matter which way they go they will always be dependent on others.
Are all the city run public schools closed in this neighborhood? What is keeping them from getting an education besides themselves? How many of these families are collecting money from various programs for food and shelter?
Yes, they are uneducated and dependent on these funds but whose fault is that? The programs created the dependency and the attitude that one needn't work as long as you can find a way onto them. Those who can't end up with three hots and a cot provided by the same people who paid taxes for the schools and programs. No matter which way they go they will always be dependent on others.
11
Everyone has "access to education." The problem is that children are badly brought up from the get-go and have no interest in or aptitude for reading, math, and the laborious process of getting an education.
11
You're on a roll, NYH!
2
Would select sting operations be too successful and clog the juvenile and adult justice system, how bad is the neighborhood?
2
"how bad is the neighborhood?"
Bad enough that my mother wouldn't let me honor an invitation from a classmate in the SPE program to visit him. The program drew students from all over Brooklyn not just our own Bushwick neighborhood and this was 1962. I can't imagine how much worse it is now beyond my experience working in fort Apache in the 1970s.
Bad enough that my mother wouldn't let me honor an invitation from a classmate in the SPE program to visit him. The program drew students from all over Brooklyn not just our own Bushwick neighborhood and this was 1962. I can't imagine how much worse it is now beyond my experience working in fort Apache in the 1970s.
5
Pogo was right, " we has seen the enemy and it is us.....".
It is a certainty that the decrepit state of the playgorounds is the result of vandalism by the local residents. As in all other things, the locals know who the bad guys are, but do nothing to rid rhemselves of their presence.
It is a certainty that the decrepit state of the playgorounds is the result of vandalism by the local residents. As in all other things, the locals know who the bad guys are, but do nothing to rid rhemselves of their presence.
21
The basis for a lot of problems was the "warehousing of the poor" into housing projects back in the 1960s. Knock down the old projects and create mixed income buildings. By warehousing poor people you get clusters of bad behavior.
10
So does poor people=bad behavior?
2
U think crime/ poverty/ drugs is problematic only in Brownsville NY. Most inner city " minority" communities u go to: Problems! Still way too many problems with: Homelessness, poverty, drugs, racial profiling, etc. With Martin Luther King's B-day coming up on Monday. The dream continues( especially in the minority communities). Too many " Deadbeat Parents" out there who make kids and abandoned them. With President Obama pardoning a record amount of Federal Inmates( most of them minority) the problem stems from: Lack of descent jobs. As long as Lack of descent jobs continues and ignorance continues the violence shall perpetuate especially in the minority communities!
4
It isn't just the lack of decent jobs. It's also the number of people who are unemployable. People with little if any work ethic and less desire to learn a skill that would help them out of the situations they're in.
A few years ago a customer of mine needed to expand. The jobs were not skilled ones but it could employ almost 200 people. They bought a building near an ethnic neighborhood with a bus stop in front of the building. They canvassed the neighborhood announcing job openings. The response was poor. Those they hired were mostly undependable, not showing up for work with no telephone call and then showing up days later to work. Police would come to the bakery to arrest fugitives.
I hadn't been there for a year or so and when I did the place had changed. All the employees were illegals from Honduras. All day long cars would show up filled with people who wanted a job. The three shift supervisors who were Black preferred them over their own people because they came to work to work. Bookkeeping was a nightmare with massive fraud over the Social Security numbers but they could at last deliver the promised products to their customers on time.
Don't blame the employers, it isn't all their fault.
A few years ago a customer of mine needed to expand. The jobs were not skilled ones but it could employ almost 200 people. They bought a building near an ethnic neighborhood with a bus stop in front of the building. They canvassed the neighborhood announcing job openings. The response was poor. Those they hired were mostly undependable, not showing up for work with no telephone call and then showing up days later to work. Police would come to the bakery to arrest fugitives.
I hadn't been there for a year or so and when I did the place had changed. All the employees were illegals from Honduras. All day long cars would show up filled with people who wanted a job. The three shift supervisors who were Black preferred them over their own people because they came to work to work. Bookkeeping was a nightmare with massive fraud over the Social Security numbers but they could at last deliver the promised products to their customers on time.
Don't blame the employers, it isn't all their fault.
17
Broken Windows was never about broken windows, it was and still is about window breakers. And race. If only the police collaborated with other neighborhood agencies and groups to actually fix some broken windows, some crimes would be prevented. But no. In the modern policing model, really fixing broken windows has no value.
3
"Beyond that, two of the suspects were turned in by their mothers, women clearly unafraid of difficult lessons in consequence."
Perhaps, or perhaps they were concerned about possible consequences of having the NYPD come after their "armed rapist" children on the street.
Perhaps, or perhaps they were concerned about possible consequences of having the NYPD come after their "armed rapist" children on the street.
23
the depth of disfunction is freightening
24
you can't have it both ways. you don't like the crime and what not in Brownsville. you don't like people's rights getting violated by police officers. you call in the ACLU. then when places get gentrified, you complain that people are getting displaced and property values are skyrocketing and the common folk can't afford to live there anymore. gentrification or crime. I'll take gentrification every time.
62
It is a false dichotomy to claim that it is not possible to have a police force that stays within the limits of the law and low crime. Further, to argue that low crime leads to gentrification and displacement of the poor is to conflate two entirely different aspects of urban life. I seriously doubt there is going to be any sort of a push to Brownsville by the upscale if crime is reduced in the public housing area. The area can be made safer and the public housing can remain.
14
The idea that in order to be protected, people have to submit to having the police violate their rights is fascinating. Is that they way it is where you live?
14
There is no way to please 'progressives'. BTW Brownsville/ENY has been this way for 50 years. Hardly a new story.
11
Wait a minute.
A kid who lived in the same public housing project was given a ticket because he was in a different building and didn't have ID?
Do you mean he didn't have his freedom papers? Because that's what this sounds like.
A kid who lived in the same public housing project was given a ticket because he was in a different building and didn't have ID?
Do you mean he didn't have his freedom papers? Because that's what this sounds like.
75
The cops are trying to keep those who don't belong out of the projects.
The citation was entirely appropriate. It's no one else's fault that the kid couldn't be bothered to appear in court. When I get a speeding ticket, I show up as summoned even though I may not think I did anything wrong. That's called "obeying the law".
The citation was entirely appropriate. It's no one else's fault that the kid couldn't be bothered to appear in court. When I get a speeding ticket, I show up as summoned even though I may not think I did anything wrong. That's called "obeying the law".
25
He lived in the project, just in a different building. Are you saying he shouldn't be allowed to visit a friend who lives in the next building? Do you let your kid play with a friend who lives down the street? It may come as a big shock to you, but people who live in "projects" pay rent. And they are citizens, not prisoners. As to not appearing in court for a bogus ticket and for a non-offense, maybe he had something more important to do that day ... like school.
14
School Doubt it pay rent some do at a level so low taxpayer is picking up 80 per cent of operating cost..
3
The case, with bizarre and conflicting details as if from a Richard Price novel...
It's more like Franz Kafka novel.
It's more like Franz Kafka novel.
18
don't forget Ryûnosuke Akutagawa
2
I am born and raised in east New York. You just touched the tip of the iceberg in this piece Gina. We have suffered death & destruction for over 40 yrs. Why? How does the 75th pct lead the league in homocides for 30yrs? We have lots of parks that our children can't use after dusk here in the real hood. Who would dare walk the Pink Houses at night? Those projects are extremely scary. Why? How? It all started with blockbusting in the mid 60's and Brownsville and east New York have yet to recuperate . Our wounds are deep. Poverty here is real and has lasted decades. Throw in the Palm Sunday massacre, the Sckenk ave murders and of course , the mollen commission and those 30 dirty cops that ran amock for ten years adding to our woes . This lead to 900 mirders in. 1990. We haven't gone back to the parks since.
50
I guess the 75 leads in homicides because it is quite obviously a precinct filled with murderers. All the crime in the 75 is committed by residents of that area.
19
My husband taught industrial arts in a community center in Brownsville 62 years ago. There were poor people then in the area, no minorities, but gangs galore. In the Subway station once he saw two gangs confronting each other from opposite platforms. His male students made zip guns out of wood in class - he had never seen these before, and realized that their danger and banned them. Before class he had the students empty their pockets and put in a drawer any weapons, such as knives, etc. they had. Although he had taught for many years he had never encountered this culture before. There were some middle class families there - I visited a cousin there around that time and remembered that it was very far on the subway and isolated, but thankfully was accompanied by my relatives. The isolation might be part of the problem.
9
I used to take the L and E trains to work. I hated the Broadway Junction stop because the exit was at one end of the station. My first time I rode in the wrong car and had to walk the length of the station to the escalator. This was before the city replaced the old incandescent lighting with fluorescent lighting. The station was like walking in a cave with dark shadowy areas the length of the station. A scary place.
2
Thank you for stating the obvious which I had not seen said anywhere else: if she was having sex with her father she was already horribly victimized, and that certainly does not mean she was not later raped. Also, if she was inebriated, doesn't that mean that "consent" is not possible?
37
She is only 18 years old,under age.
1
The age of consent in New York is 17. Doesn't make an 18 year old not "under age" though.
On a short visit to NY last July, from my retirement down in Florida, I drove over to Pomonok. I hadn't been back in many years, and I wanted to see it, maybe one last time. I was appalled and saddened by what I did see. I drove all around the same neighborhood, by all the landmarks of my childhood that still exist. The place has morphed into a neglected, filthy, broken down slum. The shopping area down the street is a collection of closed storefronts, filthy, broken streets and obvious neglect. The green "manicured, rolling hills" I remembered are now untended fields of weeds, like what you see in vacant lots. Sidewalks, benches and fences were broken, in severe disrepair. Garbage strewn about the streets. Trees and plants untended. My cynicism about urban politics notwithstanding, it almost made me cry.
Whatever the reasons for this blight, it's a stark reflection of the governmental contempt in which the infrastructure and residents of the current Pomonok are held, and the contempt those residents hold for their own surroundings.