Yes, DC can prosecute and arrest its way out of crime problem

It was a bloody week in America’s violent capital city. On Monday, police killed a man suspected of killing a motorist and maiming another while attempting four carjackings. This came after a weekend in which Washington, D.C., suffered 60 carjackings in just 72 hours.

A nation’s capital represents the nation, and Washington, D.C., is doing that to our national shame with its appalling upsurge in violent crime.

The victim of the Monday murder was a father of two who grew up in Woodbridge, Virginia, before moving to Washington two years ago. “He would never hurt anyone,” his parents said. The other victim, who was shot in the head while waiting to pick up his wife from work, had served as chief operating officer of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission under a previous administration. 

The night after this crime spree, the man mostly to blame for Washington’s failing crime policies, Councilman Charles Allen, moderated a discussion panel on juvenile carjacking. Many of Allen’s constituents showed up at the Old Naval Hospital to voice their displeasure with Allen’s approach to crime. One of those who gave Allen a piece of his mind was Kevin McGilly, a foster father who talked about how his 15-year-old foster son was arrested on suspicion of carjacking but was released the same day.

“By choosing, which is what we did here in the district for years, to minimize the problem, to ignore the problem, not to have consequences, not to try and suppress the problem before it spread, it has spread to very many more kids,” McGilly said. “I warned them that if they didn’t take vigorous action soon, it was going to explode, and it did.”

Allen and other elected leaders at the event were too arrogant to listen. “We as a city and community need to be much more focussed on prevention and surrounding young people and their families with resources if we want to be safer in the long run,” D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb said. “We cannot prosecute and arrest our way out of it.”

That is not true. Prosecution, arrest, and detention are the only way out now for Washington.

Almost 80% of homicide suspects in Washington were involved in the criminal justice system before their latest arrest, according to a report released on the day of Allen’s carjacking panel. In other words, they had been in trouble with the law before. The author of the report, the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform, found that these suspects had been in the criminal justice system seven times on average before their latest arrest.

No one wants to lock a young man up for the rest of his life. But a tiny minority is inflicting massive harm on communities in Washington. When impressionable young men see other young men let off after committing violent crimes, they conclude it is worth doing the same thing. 

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Until Washington’s criminal justice system starts inflicting tough consequences on young men enjoying a crime spree, the breakdown of law and order will only get worse, and the list of victims will continue to lengthen.

There is already a recall campaign to remove Allen from office. Perhaps Schwalb should be recalled, too.