Verified by 
Turn on the television, consult the internet news, pick up a paper. The media is saturated with commentary about the spike in violence in many of our nation’s cities. As of August 17, 2015, the Washington, D.C. homicide rate had increased 29% over last year. Interviewed recently by the Washington television ABC affiliate about this subject, I cited three factors that I may be contributory.
One is simply that it is summer. Whereas crimes are committed in all seasons, criminals are on the streets and hanging out in warm weather. Moreover, receiving news through social media, they quickly discover where the action is and gravitate there to hang out and take advantage of a developing unstable situation.
A second factor is that there is the phenomenon of “copy cat” crimes. For most of us who watch or read accounts of street violence, this is just the news, alarming though it is. We don’t reach for a gun. A small minority who are fascinated by crime fantasize enacting what they are seeing. They are like the guy who told me, “Crime is like ice cream; it’s delicious.”
A third and relatively new factor that may be playing a role is that police officers are perceived as on the defensive. This perception may be linked to high publicity cases in which police misconduct is cited. Whereas the scrutiny that law enforcement practices are receiving is a plus, allowing for better training of officers and the rooting out of officers who should not have been hired to begin with, there has been at least a perception of the police holding back in enforcing the law. Moreover, some departments have insufficient numbers of police officers available. The Washington Post cited the police union attributing the violence to a “shrinking force trying to police a growing city.”
The criminal has a sense of invulnerability, expecting to prevail in any situation. Knowing the occupational hazards of crime – getting arrested, convicted, confined or injured or killed in a high risk crime – he is able to shut off all such knowledge long enough to do as he wants. His sense of invulnerability is enhanced if he thinks that the police are fewer in number or that they are reluctant to act.
