Posted on 08/14/2006 12:03:17 PM PDT by My2Cents
Katrina victims blamed for Houston crime
By PAUL J. WEBER, Associated Press Writer
A letter to inmate No. 1352951 and a cell phone bill for $76.63, both found in a soggy New Orleans duplex ruined by Hurricane Katrina, led Louisiana bounty hunter James Martin to Texas.
Again.
It marked the seventh time since Katrina that Martin, whose pursuit of bail jumpers often begins with clues salvaged from abandoned New Orleans homes, has followed a trail to Texas.
"I don't think Texas really knows what they got," Martin said.
Katrina sent a lot of bad guys to Texas, as Houston is finding out.
Houston took in 150,000 evacuees the most of any U.S. city after Katrina struck on Aug. 29. Houston police believe the evacuees are partly responsible for a nearly 17.5 percent increase in homicides so far this year over the same period in 2005.
About 21 percent of Houston's 232 homicides through July 25 involved an evacuee as either a suspect or a victim, according to police, who attribute much of the bloodshed to fighting among rival New Orleans gang members.
"New Orleans allowed a lot of these guys to stay on the street for whatever reason or be picked up and released after 60 days," said Capt. Dale Brown, who oversees Houston's homicide division. "Texas law, I don't want to say it's tougher, but we take these offenses very seriously."
Judge Robert Eckels, chief executive of Harris County, which includes Houston, said Katrina evacuees arrested in the Houston have cost the county's criminal justice system more than $18 million. In June, Texas Gov. Rick Perry sent $19.5 million to Houston to help pay for additional officers and overtime to police the city after Katrina.
The police and the Harris County sheriff's department said they have no figures on how many Katrina evacuees have been arrested. Houston police said misdemeanor and felony arrests overall actually dropped last fall from the same period a year earlier. But the sheriff's department reported a 41 percent increase in felony arrests in November from the year before.
"I think some saw (Katrina) as an opportunity," Martin's bounty-hunting partner, Michael Wright, said of evacuees who fled New Orleans with criminal records. "No one knows who they are over here."
Katrina evacuees received fair warning when they arrived in Houston. Days after the storm, Mayor Bill White went on television, flanked by Houston police, and welcomed Katrina's bedraggled survivors with a stern warning that a jail cell was waiting for anyone who crossed the line.
Evacuee Vincent Wilson, a leader of the Katrina Survivors Association, was impressed. He said that in New Orleans before Katrina, "everyone knows that if the jail's crowded you get a slap on the hand and get released."
Eckels predicted the county's worst guests will go home once their federal assistance dries up. And if many choose to stick around, the county will be ready: "We don't put up with it here. If you break the law, you're going to be prosecuted."
Are you my Baskin-Robbins friend? If not, disregard. If so, you'll know what I'm talking about. I couldn't remember which FReeper it was. Still too new to remember names very well.
You have mail.
I also live on the west side of Houston (Kirkwood & Westheimer), and sadly our area has turned to total crap.. the teenage thugs are walking everywhere, all hours of the day and night, up to no good. We've made the decision to relocate to the Hill Country for peace of mind & quality of life,and to save our little boy from the gangs. Bill White ruined our city and I'm sure his legacy will be just that -- destroyed Houston for good. Houston will be the next New Orleans 9th ward.
Oh my gosh, that President Bush! Look what he did to his own home state of Texas! /sarcasm
Yet we are supposed to be feeling so very sorry for these people to this day.
Like I've said before, as long as those thugs OFF each other I have no problem. Alas, that has not been the case in all of the crimes. This ought to be a lesson to the politicians........be careful what and who you ask for.......you might get it.
In the past year, not one single low income project has yet to be built and/or remodeled in New Orleans,(yeah, that's Nagin for you, I guess he wants to be the only thug in town) ... HOUSTON WE HAVE A PROBLEM: These people are not leaving as long as we keep them on govt assistance, they are not used to working... they don't beleive in matrimony, their kids don't have a father figure, they feel no shame taking freebies, mooching off the system. These women have no self respect or dignity (except for very few). I was at wal-mart the other day, and there SHE is with 3 brats, cart full of groceries, and paying with some lonestar voucher.. And trust me this woman had NO SHAME. Why aren't we paying them to get vasectomies and tubuligations -- FREE??? That would be a good investment for the tax payers of Houston.
...no, good deed goes unpunished!
Have you heard any audio of last night's town meeting at Grace Baptist? Pat Gray is playing some on 950 AM.
Mayor White asked the assembled Houstonians how they wanted to solve the problem, and one woman says, "We just want the New Orleans residents to go home."
Pat's characterizing this as a little mean-spirited, but what are we supposed to say?
Houston opened our homes, our hearts, and our checkbooks to New Orleans residents, and they thanked us with a 25% spike in murders and a better than 30% spike in other violent crimes.
Are all NoLa residents like that? No. But just about all NoLa residents consistently vote to keep in place a system that fosters the welfare lifestyle and overlooks violent crime. So yes, it may not be every New Orleanian's fault, but it is their problem.
And now it's our problem, and I resent the hell out of that.
I believe it was Garrett Morris, of Saturday Night Live fame, who recited that line as the only English he knew when being interviewed as a major league ballplayer character he portrayed.
It's all comin' back . . . the character was Chico Escuela!
Damn, but Morris was funny. Thinking about him singing "I'm gonna get me a shotgun and kill all the whiteys I see" has me cracking up!
If he does he'll find some way to blame Bush for it.
"HOUSTON WE HAVE A PROBLEM: These people are not leaving as long as we keep them on govt assistance, they are not used to working.."
Ah, I see you are a candidate for Political Correctness re-education camps.
Remember: Gubmint Welfare Macht Free
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