I am sure he would REALLY feel unsafe today.
Your comment made me recall an incident my brother told me about when he was a supervisor at a company specializing in facility and home repair in the greater Metro DC area. This company was fairly large and did everything from simple repairs to complete gut and rebuild of interiors that were smoke and water damaged following major fires. The company hated working in DC for the same reason you give: very dangerous. However, it was part of their service area and the money was good.
One day, he received a call from an upset worker. The worker had been repairing the front porch of a home in south east DC. He was midway through the job when he realized he needed some additional materials to complete it. His tools were all laid out on the porch being repaired. Rather than break everything down and put it back into his truck, he asked the homeowner/occupant to keep an eye on them while he went to get the materials. The homeowner/occupant agreed and the worker left . When he returned, all the valuable tools were gone. The homeowner/occupant knew nothing, saw nothing and had no explanation for what had happened to the tools.
Not only was the worker unable to complete the job, he was personally out several thousand dollars in professional grade carpentry tools (sliding radial crosscut saw, Sawzall, grinders, sanders, etc.).
My brother drove to the job site and consoled the worker. He also reminded him about where he was working at and the character of the people living there. They canceled the job for the day and got a work crew (as in more than one carpenter) scheduled to resume it the next day.
Not sure how (or even if) the company made him whole.