Daley blames lakefront violence on suburbanites and texting

By May 26 Mayor Daley was "concerned about (the) spate of North Avenue Beach arrests":

"The Chicago Police Department is concerned about that, sure...Lighting, safety, things like that you have to look at. Any time you have any [problem]  whether it's Humboldt Park or anyplace else, you are concerned about any type of criminal activity or gang activity."

That article specifically identifies several of the incidents as "gang-related", by the way, and also mentions the gang shooting on Fullerton that happened that same night.  The reporter dutifully quotes the official CPD spokesman who got trotted out to tell everyone there's nothing to see here:

We're obviously monitoring the activity at these lakefront locations and will be responding appropriately," said Roderick Drew, a spokesman for the Chicago Police Department. "A number of arrests have been made in response to a handful of incidents. At this point the incidents appear to be isolated."

Sure, maybe there were dozens of eyewitness accounts describing packs of marauding gang members, but those were just anonymous comments on some disgruntled cop blog.  And in an online runners forum, and in the comments section of every single story that's appeared about this event.  Officially, this "handful of incidents" "appear to be isolated".

CBS photo

Evidently Mayor Daley was not satisfied with the damage control, because he addressed the topic again during a press conference yesterday.  Mayor Daley knows what caused those isolated incidents: suburbanites and texting.

Yes, you read that correctly.  The real problem isn't gangs, it's not an understaffed police department, it's those darned kids from the suburbs with their beach drinking and their cell phone texting:

"You know they text people -- where people are going in congregation. ... We know there's texting going on. There's something going on in the suburban area with a lot of young adults. We know that," Daley said.

Not unexpectedly the administration says they're considering putting in more security cameras, which now seems to be their standard response to every crime issue.

The Tribune's Clout Street ran this post, which contains a wonderful juxtaposition at the end:

Weis...said it's unfair to draw conclusions about the safety of the beaches based on a bunch of arrests in a couple days...
 
"Sometimes you mix alcohol with youth and bad results happen," Weis said.

Daley recently got the City Council to more than double the number of liquor licenses along the lakefront, though most of the new licenses are not in effect yet.

Maybe Mayor Daley is right, and the problem really is suburbanites. 

Two weeks ago we investigated a near-fatal stabbing at a nightclub in our town.  The "isolated incident" started when a contestant in a freestyle contest disrespected the Gangster Disciples.  There were members of the Four Corner Hustlers and the GD's at the club, and up until that moment everyone had been more or less getting along.

The victim, the stabber and nearly every witness had rap sheets, and almost all of them were gang members.  They all lived in the suburbs--we counted seven different towns across the north, northwest, west and south suburbs.  And they texted!  I saw several of them texting at the hospital and in the lobby of our police station.

Those "suburbanites" we dealt with?  They used to live in Chicago, until Mayor Daley's Plan for Transformation and Section 8 sent them out our way.  Now he can call them "suburban".