Tag: crime

  • Kids Do the Darnedest Things: Shoot Other Kids

    Kids Do the Darnedest Things: Shoot Other Kids

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    Brendan Barry
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    Last month, a 2-year old shot and killed his 4-year old sister whilst they sat in a car at a petrol station in Chester, Pennsylvania, a city just south of Philadelphia. Not surprisingly some people began to look at the data around kid-involved shootings. One such person was Christopher Ingraham who explored the data and…

  • America’s Crime Problem

    America’s Crime Problem

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    Brendan Barry
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    During the pandemic, media reports of the rise of crime have inundated American households. Violent crimes, we are told, are at record highs. One wonders if society is on the verge of collapse. But last night a few friends asked me to take a look at the data during the pandemic (2020–2021) and see what…

  • Delco vs Chesco

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    Brendan Barry
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    One of the things in the pop culture these days is an HBO show called Mare of Easttown. For those that haven’t heard of it, probably my more international audience, it’s a crime drama set in the near suburbs of Philadelphia, a placed called Delaware County that locals simply call Delco. Last Saturday, the show…

  • New York Is Still Beating London

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    Brendan Barry
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    So two weeks ago I posted about the graphics in a BBC article about how London has surpassed New York in terms of murders, due to a spate of stabbings in the British capital. Well, somehow I missed this: an article from the Economist that rebuts that point. And it does it brilliantly. Lies, damned…

  • More Murder in Merica

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    Brendan Barry
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    Today’s post was going to be something not this. But it is remarkable how many people die in the United States in mass shootings. It is, generally speaking, not a problem experienced in the rest of the developed world. The question is do we want gun violence to really define American exceptionalism? Anyways, the Washington…

  • Murder Rates in the US

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    Brendan Barry
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    Yesterday we looked at an article about exporting guns from one state to another. After writing the article I sat down and recalled that the copy of the Economist sitting by the sofa had a small multiple chart looking at murders in a select set of US cities. It turns out that while there was a spike,…

  • Exporting Guns

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    Brendan Barry
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    When I lived in Chicago, people back East would always ask if I was worried about murder and gun crime in Chicago. My reply was always, “no, not really”. Why? Because I lived in generally safe neighbourhoods. But on that topic, the second most numerous question/comment was always, why are the strict gun laws in Chicago…

  • How Serious Is the Rise in Violent Crime?

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    Brendan Barry
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    On Monday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Justice Department released figures for violent crimes in 2016. The administration talked about the rise in violent crime. And yes, such crime did rise in 2016. But, what was not raised nearly as much is that we are also living in an era of historically low crime.…

  • Metropolises of Murder

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    Brendan Barry
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    Quite a few things to look at this week. But I want to start with something that caught my attention last Friday. The Economist produced this graphic about the top-50 cities by the always pleasant metric of homicide. I bring it up because of the oft mentioned capital of carnage here in America: Chicago. (To…

  • The Trafficante Family

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    Brendan Barry
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    For the past few days I was in Las Vegas for a stag party. One of the things I got to see was the Mob Museum in old Vegas. As I am not a gambler, the other forms of entertainment garner my interest, and if you are like me, I would highly recommend the museum.…