I saw this story this morning on WPVI-TV, the local ABC O&O affiliate. Amy Buckman, the reporter on the scene, said that the victim’s family attacked and subdued and “injured” the gumna,. Without giving the “suspect’s” name, Miss Buckman said that he was a 23 year old man with eight prior convictions, including two for robbery.
-
N. Philadelphia pizza shop owner shot to death
By Robert Moran, Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Writer
A 43-year-old Egyptian immigrant was shot to death last night during a botched robbery as he was getting ready to close a North Philadelphia pizza shop he co-owns, police said.
Employees at Carnival Pizza at 3062 N. 23d St. just south of Clearfield Street subdued the gunman after he fired three shots at the victim shortly after 11 p.m., said Homicide Sgt. Charles Coan.
The victim, who name was not released pending notification of his wife, was rushed to Temple University Hospital where he was pronounced dead at 11:37 p.m.
Following an 11:10 p.m. 911 call, police responded to the location and discovered several shop employees restraining a man in his early 20s, Coan said. A gun was recovered from the scene.
Now, who is responsible for the murder of the pizzaria owner? Obviously, the man who tried to rob him, and who shot him, is responsible, and ought to be locked up for the rest of his miserable life.
But if Miss Buckman’s report this morning was accurate, there are some other people who bear responsibiolity as well. If this man is only twenty-three years old, and has eight prior convictions, two of which were for robbery, why wasn’t he still in jail?
This is hardly the first time I’ve asked this question concerning a Philadelphia murder. On October 31, 2007, police officer Charles Cassidy was gunned down by a thug who should have been in jail. The man who was arrested for that murder, and who has confessed to the killing, was the known suspect in an armed robbery less than two weeks previously. He lived with his mother, a Philadelphia Corrections Officer, and was known to the authorities. Yet when he was identified as the suspect in the previous armed robbery, no warrant for his arrest was sought!
Last February, I addressed the idiotic notion that we have too many people in prison. Our friends on the left were appalled that the American prison population is so high. One report said:
In addition, the report said, when it comes to preventing repeat offenses by nonviolent criminals — who make up about half of the incarcerated population — alternative punishments such as community supervision and mandatory drug counseling that are far less expensive might prove just as or more effective than jail time.
To which I responded:
- Sorry, wrong answer: their crime rate is zero while in jail. It might be less expensive to not incarcerate them, but there is no other program which reduces their repeat offense rate below zero.
If the details are as WPVI reported them this morning, then this shopkeeper is dead not only due to the actions of a brutal thug, but due to the actions — and inactions — of the people in what passes for a criminal justice system in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania.
