Since I’ve started talking about our recent spate of murders, I figured that I’d toss another thought out.

I’ve been tracking the Jessica Wesson reports via the Peoria Journal-Star website and putting associated links on my Peoria 2008 murder map. So I noticed something that I want to point out.

First, a couple of quotes from this article:

John Meisinger, who retired in May as Richwoods High School principal, said he was sick with sorrow upon hearing news of Wesson’s death.

“She was such a fun-loving girl,” said Meisinger, who described Wesson as a big personality, who was quick to give a hug and was genuinely interested in people’s lives. “You see so much potential in these kids. It hits you like a pit in the stomach.”

Though small in stature, Meisinger said Wesson was one who wouldn’t stand for something she didn’t believe in.

“She was feisty, too,” he said of the woman. “She spoke out and spoke the truth. It’s just too sad it had to end this way.”

“It scares me to death,” said Jennifer Ryans, a mother of two teenage girls, 17 and 13, as she stood in her front yard on Westminster Avenue, across the street from the school, as she watched officers crowd around the body. “It makes me scared for my girls.”

And again, from this article:

At a vigil for Jessica Wesson behind Sterling Middle School, the same place where the 18-year-old’s body was found Wednesday morning, more than 100 adults locked hands and created a circle around several dozen children.

It was a symbolic embrace of the community’s youth, which speakers at the vigil said are too often left without love and supervision.

….

When the adults were told to look away from the children and into the Central Peoria community, it was a show of guardianship.

Carl Cannon, a former prison guard who led the vigil with his commanding voice, told the adults to repeat his words, to shout them into the neighborhood.

“Criminals, can you hear us now?” the adults repeated.

“Enough, enough, enough,” said the voices in unison, rising with each syllable.

What’s the picture that’s being painted here? A sweet girl, struggling with her past yet a vibrant part of her community, is struck down by a Criminal. You know, those Evil People who lurk in our cities. People? Nay, Monsters! They roam the streets at night, seeking to catch those who wander from the safe zones.

But now, look at the quotes from this article:

Jessica Wesson was seen hours before her death last week getting into a car with her alleged assailant, with whom she had an “unconventional relationship,” said Kevin Lyons, Peoria County state’s attorney.

…

Lyons said authorities learned of the relationship through friends. There had been no violent episodes between the two reported to police, but the prosecutor said Wesson’s friends confirmed that aspect.

“She was a young lady who may not have had the skills to resist (Coffey),” Lyons said, noting the larger man was trying to force the smaller Wesson into a lifestyle that “wasn’t a good one.” He didn’t elaborate.

Police have said Wesson was employed at Fantasyland, though a person who answered the phone at the adult entertainment club declined to comment.

(Emphasis mine)

And from the previous article about the vigil:

Wesson, who lived much of her life as a foster child and reportedly suffered sexual and emotional abuse, was left drifting at times. She told friends she didn’t feel loved in her latest foster home, those friends said.

(Again, emphasis mine)

This doesn’t sound like a sweet, innocent girl who was suddenly struck down by a Criminal without warning.

We saw this same process with Mary Finnegan. Initial reports painted her as a nice woman, quiet, and a good neighbor. But, as the story unfolded, other facts came to the surface, including a four-year consensual sexual relationship with the son that is accused of murdering her.

Again, it’s not exactly like a Criminal struck from the shadows there either.

To be fair, some of these more lurid details are coming from the State Attorney’s office. Government officials have been known to be wrong before, and certainly these allegations have not been proven in open court. But, if Kevin Lyons is even close to the truth, the point remains.

No one deserves to be murdered. In the case of both of these women, their murderers should be tried and, if convicted, executed. That is the proper penalty for one who takes a life.

And yet, I think that it’s important to break the myth of the Evil Criminals, roaming our streets like vampires, attacking random passers-by. Usually, murder victims are killed by people that they knew. In the cases of Wesson and Finnegan, they made themselves vulnerable to attack by the bad choices they made. It wasn’t because they just happened to live in a “bad neighborhood” or were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Why am I saying this? Seems dangerously close to speaking ill of the dead, doesn’t it?

I’m saying this because many people live in fear of crime while completely missing the underlying causes. So, let’s not sugarcoat the truth in these cases. Instead, let us learn from these horrible acts and do what we can do to prevent them in the future.

And what would that look like?

Here’s one angle. Did you notice that both of these murder cases have parental failure at their core? Oddly enough, it would seem that the Sunday vigil had a good point:

Community leaders called on parents and neighbors Sunday night to reign in, protect and show love to children who, if left alone, risk being lost to crime.

…you don’t live in University East!

Ha! I kill myself.

Yeah, the power is out in various places across the city, including University East. Quite the storm, eh?

Okay, I just went through the last month of violent crime reports from the Peoria Journal-Star and put them on Google Maps.

Peoria Violent Crimes 2008

And, as mentioned before, here are the murders for the year:

Peoria murders 2008

And, as a bonus, here are those two maps overlaid!

Peoria Crimes 2008

If I’m feeling particularly ambitious, I may do the non-violent thefts on a separate map. If you’re interested in helping put in the older stories, let me know, and I’ll get you set up.

No, I’m not doing drug crimes (e.g. possession and dealing). First, I’m opposed to drug prohibition, so I don’t really feel like putting the effort into reporting it. Second, it’s hard to tie a drug crime to a particular place, at least from the sorts of reports that I currently have access to. Third, the point of these maps is to try to chart some sense of the danger that crime presents to people in various areas of the city. Possession and dealing simply don’t present a threat of bodily harm to those nearby.

Actually, that leads into a good point about these crimes. “Random crime” often isn’t. If you look into the news stories, you’ll see that many of these crimes were perpetrated on victims known to the perpetrator. Even in crime, it seems that it’s all about who you know.

I’ve been reading The Great Neighborhood Book recently. One of the points it made is that “rough” areas of town aren’t necessarily less safe than “nice” areas of town. Instead, it is often a matter of reputation, not reality.

With that in mind, I’d like to offer this map: Peoria Murders 2008

Notice that two of the three reported murders occurred north of War Memorial Drive. You know, in the “nice” areas of town. Also, notice that none of the three reported murders on the South Side.

(Why am I emphasizing the reported murders? Well, there is that little place on the north end of town, where nearly 800 citizens were murdered this year. But no one really wants to talk about that.)

Yes, there’s more to safety than just the murder rate. I’ve taken to watching the papers, and I know that there’s a lot of violence reported on the South Side.

Yes, this is just for 2008. If I’m so moved, I might try to root around in the Journal-Star’s site and see if I can find the locations of the 2007 murders.

Nonetheless, I think that this is somewhat significant for the core neighborhoods to note, especially in the Heart of Peoria and on the South Side, as we try to address the city’s perception of where we live.

Murder #3 for the year.

Well, except for these murders, of course, which are kept off the stat sheets.

Maybe we weren’t doing as well as I thought.

If you’re reading this and consider yourself to be a gamer, please do me a favor and register at Nearby Gamers. I’m already on there (as “greatwolf”, of course).

Very specifically, I’m hoping that more Peoria gamers will use this tool, because I’m trying to find you all for Go Play Peoria, and it’s not easy. And, after all, it’s all about my ease.

So, take a couple of minutes and sign yourself up. Soon, you will be able to see the constellation of nearby gamers unfolding on a Google Map near you. Isn’t that an exciting thought?

So, yeah, I wrote Dirty Secrets, a detective noir game. And that meant that I read a lot of the source material. So, trust me when I say that this sounds like something that I would have expected to find in the pages of a Ross MacDonald novel:

Rolling Acres woman’s death remains mystery

Police are releasing few details regarding the homicide investigation of a Rolling Acres woman found dead in her home Friday morning, to the dismay of worried neighbors….”She was a quiet woman,” Lowe said Saturday afternoon. “But she was the most wonderful person you would ever meet.”

Lowe met her neighbor when she moved in five years ago and said Finnegan would always check up on her and see if she needed help around the house.

Lowe returned the favor, recently watering the woman’s flowers while she was out of town. She said she’d planned to have dinner with Finnegan the night she was found dead.

“When I found out she was killed, I was so confused,” she said. “I can’t understand, why would someone kill her?”

Son arrested in Rolling Acres death

Police have arrested the son of a woman who was found strangled to death in her Rolling Acres home Friday morning.

Stark County deputies found John W. Finnegan, 20, sleeping in his mother’s car at a rest stop in Toulon early Sunday. He was detained in Stark County until Peoria police picked him up for questioning.

He was later booked into the Peoria County Jail on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of his mother, Mary T. Finnegan, 43, with whom he lived at 5513 Merrimac Ave.

Bond set for Peoria man accused of killing his mother

Bond was set at $2.5 million Monday for a Peoria man accused of strangling his mother last week.

The death occurred sometime Thursday, when John Finnegan, 20, entered his mother’s room, found her sleeping and “swiftly killed her emotionlessly,” Peoria County State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons said in court, repeating what Finnegan reportedly told detectives.

Mary Finnegan, 43, was found dead around noon Friday, when her other son, 23, stopped by her house and found her naked and wrapped in bedding.

During a five-minute bond hearing in Peoria County Circuit Court, Lyons said the situation had “peculiar” overtones. He cited a “consensual but inappropriate” sexual relationship that had existed between John and Mary Finnegan for about four years. John Finnegan said he and his mother had sex the day before he allegedly killed her.

Finnegan initially denied killing his mother but later told police he felt like he was “bottled up with rage.” He also told detectives he sexually assaulted his mother’s body and then tried to kill himself.

Lyons said Finnegan first tried to drown himself in the bathtub before trying to overdose on various household medications and pills. When that didn’t work, he grabbed some money and left the house in his mother’s car.

He was arrested about 1 a.m. Sunday by Stark County sheriff’s deputies, who found him sleeping in the car. He was then brought back to Peoria.

Billy Dennis reports on an accident at Sheridan and Main, as well as a nearby shooting.

Pray for this little girl.

I came across this on CNN.com:

Is America’s suburban dream collapsing into a nightmare?

Instead, they are looking for what Leinberger calls “walkable urbanism” — both small communities and big cities characterized by efficient mass transit systems and high density developments enabling residents to walk virtually everywhere for everything — from home to work to restaurants to movie theaters.

The so-called New Urbanism movement emerged in the mid-90s and has been steadily gaining momentum, especially with rising energy costs, environmental concerns and health problems associated with what Leinberger calls “drivable suburbanism” — a low-density built environment plan that emerged around the end of the World War II and has been the dominant design in the U.S. ever since.

Yep. We’ve been seeing some of this happening here in Peoria, too. And, generally, I happen to think that this is a positive trend. There’s something a little too sterile about suburban living, or at least the way that we’ve practiced it here in America.

However, this comes with its own price:

Yet Nelson also estimates that in 2025 there will be a surplus of 22 million large-lot homes that will not be left vacant in a suburban wasteland but instead occupied by lower classes who have been driven out of their once affordable inner-city apartments and houses.

The so-called McMansion, he said, will become the new multi-family home for the poor.

“What is going to happen is lower and lower-middle income families squeezed out of downtown and glamorous suburban locations are going to be pushed economically into these McMansions at the suburban fringe,” said Nelson. “There will probably be 10 people living in one house.”

In Shaun Yandell’s neighborhood, this has already started to happen. Houses once filled with single families are now rented out by low-income tenants. Yandell speculates that they’re coming from nearby Sacramento, where the downtown is undergoing substantial gentrification, or perhaps from some other area where prices have gotten too high. He isn’t really sure.

(Emphasis mine.)

So, yeah, what about them poor folk that used to live in the urban cores? Where are they going to live?

We’re seeing some of that here, too. My neighborhood is poised to be a part of the ongoing urban renewal in Peoria, which means that real estate prices in University East are pretty high, compared to what they were just a few years ago. This is going to make it more difficult for working-class families to be able to live here.

Sure, this is really just a mirror development of the previous migration of the poor to the urban cores. However, there’s at least one significant difference. The urban centers actually had generally well-built buildings. For example, my home started its existence as a single-family dwelling, was divided up into three separate apartments, and then was returned to being a single-family dwelling by the time that we bought it. It’s a solidly constructed house.

The McMansions of the suburbs, though, are not so well built. The quality of materials and construction simply isn’t as good as the older homes. As the working class moves into the suburbs, are they also going to be trapped in rapidly decaying buildings?

And where will they work? If you live in town, at least you can use mass transit or hoof it yourself. If you’re out in the ‘burbs, your options are limited. After all, the suburbs only work as long as those who live there have automobiles.

Now, I say this as one who really enjoys the thought of living in the proposed Renaissance Park area. My idea of a good night is hanging out at One World Eats or Water Street Wines, Cafe and Coffee on the riverfront, both of which are the results of the sort of urban renewal that we’re talking about. Personally, I like the idea of living in a bustling urban area, filled with arts and music and coffee houses and restaurants, all within walking distance of my house. That sounds fantastic!

And yet, I have to raise the question: who are we displacing? Are we forcing the working poor into another migration, simply because we want to have our beautiful urban centers?

Or is there another way?

These are real questions. I don’t have answers. But I think that the time is rapidly approaching where we need to begin thinking about how to answer them.

So, there I am, working on my computer, when I get an instant message from Bryan. “Your blood pressure seems a bit low,” he says. “Maybe this will help.”

Great. Now I’ll have to blog about it. So here goes….

A Chicago suburb has just banned visible window-mounted air conditioners.

From the Chicago Tribune:

In an effort to improve Addison’s aesthetics, the Village Board in March passed an ordinance that prohibits window-mounted air conditioners on walls that face the street or on side windows within 12 feet of a street-facing wall.

My bedroom faces the street. Since we don’t have air conditioning upstairs, I’ve placed a window unit in my window to cool down my bedroom. If I lived in Addison, that would make me a criminal.

And for what reason did the village of Addison make this ordinance? Were they pulling a Berkeley and trying to save the environment from leaking coolant? Were they trying to impose some sort of energy efficiency on the citizenry? Not that I’d be pleased with these sorts of reasons.

Oh no. The answer is far worse.

Village officials said the ordinance is geared toward window-mounted units that tend to look shabby, especially when spaces around the units are jammed with cardboard or boards. Also unsightly, they said, are the slap-dash braces made of two-by-fours that support some units on outside walls.

(emphasis mine)

Yep. The government of Addison said that the window units were ugly. Therefore, “ugly” is now illegal. And, tell me, why is “ugly” now illegal in Addison?

[John Berly, assistant village manager said,] “The front yard is what the public sees. The condition of the front is a major factor in determining property values, and it reflects the community norms of acceptable maintenance.”

There it is. Property values. That constant bugaboo.

So, what’s the expected outcome?

[C]ontractors have advised the village that the cost of cutting a hole in a wall and installing a rectangular sleeve and an air conditioner would range from about $600 to about $1,000 depending on the type of wall construction and the complexity of the job.

[A local landlord Vito] Mossa said profit margins in apartment buildings have been trimmed to the bone in recent years because of stable rents but rising costs for heat, taxes, insurance, water and garbage removal. Retrofitting for legal air conditioners would cost too much, he said.

“I would probably just tell [tenants] they can’t put an air conditioner in the window. . . . I’m going to lose tenants,” Mossa said.

(emphasis mine)

Let’s parse this out, shall we?

Who is most likely to be using window-mounted air conditioners? People who can’t afford central air conditioning or aren’t in a position to have it installed. In other words, renters and home-owners who are poor. Also, who is most likely to have “unsightly” improvised home repairs? That’s right; poor people. So, who is this ordinance going to affect the most? (All together now.) Poor people.

But, it’s okay if they leave, right? I mean, do we really want those sorts of people in our neighborhoods? Look what they do to the property values. It’s better for everyone, or at least, it’s better for property owners. And then, our neighborhood will be a better, happier, more prosperous place, right?

But will it?

Vito Mossa doesn’t think so. He thinks that he is going to lose tenants because he can’t afford to install air conditioning the way that the Village Council has demanded. So then what happens? In order to attract tenants, he will have to lower his rent. Assuming he can afford to do this, what quality of tenant do you think he will get? Most folk will want the air conditioning, so he will only get tenants who are too poor to afford the nicer apartments. Of course, the lower rent will mean that Mossa will have even less money to put into maintenance of the apartment building. Plus, the lower quality of tenant will probably attract its own trouble.

But what if Mossa can’t afford to lower his rent? Well then, eventually he will have to go out of business as a landlord. So then, what happens to the apartment building? Mossa will have to sell it, but how will he accomplish that? Eventually he will either have to sell at a loss, or he will have to sell to someone with enough money to pay for all the additional air conditioning updates. Do you think that this buyer will be a nice local landlord? I rather think that it will be a real estate holding company of some kind, who will probably be just another “absentee landlord” that the Village Council is already complaining about.

And what if he can’t sell? Do you think that he will be able to rent apartments in a building that is on the market? Again, only the really desperate would rent in that sort of situation. Or perhaps the building merely stands vacant. But, as I know from personal experience, a vacant building is a drag on a neighborhood, attracting all sorts of trouble.

And what about Mossa? His business is destroyed, and probably his personal finances, too. Where does this leave him?

But, hey, in the end, the village of Addison drives away all those nasty poor people and preserves their property values for good, decent people! Hooray! Another win for the middle class!

Another win against those awful poor folk.

Of course, the really sad thing is that this won’t work. In the end, Addison will probably be left with a worse situation than they started with.

So, I don’t live in Addison, right? I live in Peoria. Why am I so exercised about this?

It’s because I see the same pattern playing out right here in my neighborhood.

Last week, Code Enforcement came through the neighborhood, doing a “clean sweep”. The agent was fairly lenient on us, since she admitted that the purpose was mostly to focus on tenants, not on home owners. That didn’t save my neighbor, who managed to pick up a substantive fine for having front stairs in need of repair. Do the stairs need repair? Yes they do, and my neighbor (who I will call D) knew this. In fact, she had been saving money all year so that she could get them repaired over the summer. They are concrete, so you need to wait until the summer heat for best effect. But now, she has to pay a fine. Where is she going to get that money? That’s right: from the money that she saved to repair her steps.

D is a home owner. In fact, she’s lived in the University East neighborhood for a number of years. On top of that, she is raising her five grandchildren by herself, while working a job in the public school system. She’s not exactly made out of money. And yet, she was being responsible, trying to take care of her property as best as she could. She has covered her stairs, trying to decorate them to make the best of a bad situation. But it did not save her.

And then I hear people in the neighborhood who are happy about this. Indeed, they call Code Enforcement to inform on their neighbors. Then they vigorously defend the right of Code Enforcement to trespass onto other people’s property in violation of the Fourth Amendment. They want the city to keep putting pressure on renters. They want to enforce a certain standard of living on this neighborhood, using the power of the government to accomplish it. And their goal? The preservation of their property values. They want to force this neighborhood to be a nice, upscale neighborhood, without any of those “unsightly” rental properties.

Yay! Another victory for the middle class! Another win against those awful poor folk.

But what have we won, really?

Is this how to accomplish our goal of living together peacefully as neighbors? That is our goal, isn’t it? A neighborhood? But how can we form a loving community if we found it on the suffering of the poor? How can we form a trusting community if we enforce it with anonymous calls to government agencies? How can we form an open community if we are constantly watching each other for infractions?

Are we looking to form a neighborhood? Or are we just looking for a nice place to live, regardless of who pays the price?

In this post, I mentioned an arrest. So, here’s some more info from the Peoria Journal-Star:

Floyd C. Tribbett, 39, 539 S. Schweer Court in Bellevue was arrested about 5:50 p.m. Saturday in the 1100 block of North Orange Street and booked on charges of possession of a controlled substance and possession of less than 2.5 grams of marijuana.

So there you are.

HT: James

I owe a more extensive report, but I’ll say that this went really well. In this thread, there’s a link to pictures, too!

Today, I’m announcing the opening of the Go Play Peoria site.

The goal of this site is to be a gaming portal for Peoria and the surrounding area. Ideally, we’d like this site to be a place where you can locate other gamers, have intelligent game discussion with folks in the area, and (perish the thought!) maybe make some new friends!

We have our forum up and running, and we’re starting to plan for the February 2008 Go Play Peoria minicon, to be held here in Peoria.

So, if you’re interested, please check it out! If you have questions, feel free to post on the Go Play Peoria forums, or ask me here.

So, this Sunday there’s an event called “Sing-A-Long Messiah”. Essentially, the church hires four professional vocalists to lead the four parts, and the people gathered form the choir, singing the various parts. A number of people from my church are planning on going. That’s cool. They love singing, and I’ve heard that this is quite the getup.

I don’t really want to go. I don’t like singing in public, and such an event would largely stress me out. Mea culpa and all that. Not criticizing the event.

But today, at lunch, it occurred to me that this is an excellent example of a new trend in the arts that I think is good. Rather than people merely being spectators to art, they are becoming performers of art. Rather than going to hear the “Messiah” sung, they are going to sing the “Messiah”. Just like in roleplaying, they are simultaneously performer and audience. It’s great! It’s a wonderful trend, encouraging people towards active creation. It’s avante garde. It’s subversive.

I still don’t want to go.

But I’m glad that it’s happening!

(The “Sing-A-Long Messiah” will be held on Sunday, December 9, 2007 at 2:30 p.m. at St Paul’s Episcopal Church, for those who are interested.)

Last night, around 6:00, my family left the house to visit with the Evans’ family.

Last night, around 7:30, a neighbor named John was mugged in front of the neighboring house. Essentially, it happened at the base of my driveway. They took his wallet and his keys and left him on the sidewalk. You need to understand that John is in his 60s, plus he is autistic (or somesuch thing). Attacking him was the act of cowards, looking for an easy hit.

Another neighbor met him just after he was attacked. She called the police and then called us to let us know. I’m still a little unclear on all the details, but that’s really close enough.

I saw John last night. His cheek was scraped up and he had a nasty bruise under one eye. He was with a social worker from White Oaks who was trying to help him find his keys. Without them, he couldn’t get back into his house. I helped the social worker look around, but we couldn’t find the keys, which probably means that John stayed the night in a shelter last night. The social worker told me that the police had captured two of John’s attackers but the keys were still unaccounted for. So, honestly, it may have been better for him to be elsewhere last night. If someone unfriendly still had his keys, then he might not have been safe in his own house.

I prayed with John. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time. And I prayed for vengeance on his attackers.

I guess this is why we moved here. That whole “being a light in a dark place” thing. And I’m glad that I was able to try to be helpful to John and to pray for him. Feels like a first step in following my calling in this neighborhood. But still, I would rather that it hadn’t happened at all.