Letters to the Editor — April 13, 2023
The Issue: The rise in violent crime against minorities since the passage of criminal justice reforms in cities.
Whatever your race, if you are a mother, your heart is broken: There are children being shot while in school, on their stoop or just walking to a candy store (“The cost,” April 11).
How can anyone justify defunding police and bail reform with stats that show 46% of shooting victims are black and 83% are boys?
The community is decimated by violence, and the two things that can reduce the problem are a strong and visible police department and an efficient judicial system that backs up the victim, not the criminal.
In New York, men like Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg have allowed our city to become a pool of crime and violence.
We are failing our youth and the citizens who made us what we once were. Every large city with progressive government is on a swift downward slope. We need to raise the bar and vote the inept leaders out, starting from the top.
Maureen Sharkey
Brooklyn
The biggest advocates of the defund-the-police movement and justice reform are white liberals.
Their reasoning is that by doing this, they can show solidarity with African-Americans.
But black people are the ones being victimized by this irresponsible and illogical thinking.
Everything the white liberals do backfires and creates a disaster. Then they blame Donald Trump.
Chris Tripoulas
Manhattan
Dear God in Heaven. When will Gov. Hochul and the intelligent people in Albany (if there are any) realize that legislative leaders Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Carl Heastie are destroying the state of New York, especially New York City?
Has no one yet seen the damage they’ve done and the carnage they’ve caused, as well as the deaths of innocents through their ideology and progressive agenda?
Say one thing about Gov. Andrew Cuomo: Despite his issues, he would have told these criminal-loving disgraces to sit down and shut up.
Ralph A. Manente
Yonkers
New Yorkers thought they had it bad with Mayor Bill de Blasio, and then along came Mayor Adams.
It’s puzzling that this former policeman refuses to reinstate the broken-windows and stop-and-frisk strategies that removed countless firearms from the streets.
Every mother whose son has been gunned down can only wonder if their child would be alive had the mayor taken a stance against the woke mob.
The problem with Adams is he has no foresight. He seems to lack the inclination to challenge Albany. He has never read Bragg the riot act. As a result, violent crime is out of control. He has wasted his resources, leaving a critical shortage in the police department and other vital services.
This is the new New York, and Adams owns it.
Nicholas Maffei
Yonkers
Any person with an ounce of sense could have predicted that defunding the police, eliminating bail, not punishing criminals, etc. would inevitably result in skyrocketing crime.
The Post’s article should be required reading for all New Yorkers. Unfortunately, it will have no impact on liberal lawmakers, judges or prosecutors.
At the end of the day, it was the voters who put these morons in office. When are the voters going to say enough is enough?
Joe Zeloof
Hamilton, NJ
Tuesday’s Post was filled with horrid headlines and stories about crime in New York City and elsewhere.
But what can a reader expect when the police have been downsized, prosecutors refuse to prosecute and judges will not punish criminals?
Americans, and New Yorkers in particular, have no basis to complain when voters exhibit an inexplicable obstinance by supporting a Democratic Party that permits crime and defends criminals.
Readers should honestly ask themselves how much they’re willing to take before demanding a responsive Democratic Party.
Rich Klitzberg
Boca Raton, Fla.
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