Ahhh, life in a BIG City.

Since moving to Houston-a City and surrounding area that is home to some 6 million-odd people. Odd not meaning strange (with the exception of a few) frm Corpus Christi-which has only ONLY about 350,000 and some odd change) pople living in and near the City.

OK, some crimes I have been taking careful notes on here in Houston-murders and other type Homicides and such. On average, there are at least 4 murders here daily. On average, there are 2 kidnappings here per week. On average, there are several arson-related fireshere weekly. On average there are at least 8 or so bank robberies, convience story robberies and restaurant robberies here a week. A respected and longtime Police Sergeant in a nearby town was arrested by the FBI for robbing a bank that he worked off-hours at as security. Due to accidents of all-kinds, there are also another several deaths daily. A Policeman gets injured here on the average of 2 per week-according to the local news reports.

Corpus Christi, has with Homicides and other kinds of killings-on average of 1-2 per week. Kidnappings are far less, arson fires are also far less. Deaths due to one kind of accident or another-about 1 or less-per week.

Isn't it wonderful to live in such a huge city as Houston? Personally, im getting out of here and moving to San Antonio when it is possible-job wise.

I forgot to mention that the scale between Houston and Corpus Christi on child molestation and rapes rates, is that per capita-Corpus Christi is actually the worst of the two-to live in as well as to raise ones child in.

Also, since living here, there has been two incidents that happened to me. Incident 1-was when some guy decided to try to rob me as I was out doing my daily exercise. He got hurt for his effort as well as tossed into jail. I stabbed the bugger in his hand using several of the keys on my keychain as a weapon-and the only kind of ""weapon"" that I carry.

Incident Nr. 2 happened to me at a convience store one Friday afternoon while waiting for a taxicab to arrive. An older hispanic gentleman called me over to his car gesturing that he needed help with something. Being fairly knowledgable on the workings of older cars-I went over to offer my help no problem. While looking under the hood of his car-this coot tried to rip the wallet out of my back pocket to which I turned around and grabbed his right thumb and bent it so far backwards that he fell to the groud rolling in pain-and cursing me out in Espanole ;-)) all the while I rciprocated in kind by doing so to him in German.

Just on Saturday evening at a Mobilcom story here nearby my home-two men at approx 6:15 PM tried to hold up that store. The store owner was packing a "Heater" and fired at least four shots at one of them hitting him but the creep kept running into the VERY busy Barker-Cypress street-got hit by a car-landing and breaking that cars windshield, bounced off that car-landing on his feet and ran into a nearby parkinglot where collapsed and died. The other crook got away. This first crook would still be alive had he not decided to commit a crime. I was sitting in my war room reading Island of Fire by Jason Mark-when I heard the "Pop" "pop pop" "pop" and knew there was a shooting nearby. At the same time, and nly about two miles away, some other creeps tried robbing a McDonalds-weilding a Shotgun. Shots were fired but I don't think anyone was injured-thankfully.

 

To me, Huston is a different atmosphere than other "big cities".

 

Hi Rocket--my sentiments exactly. San Antonio and Austin have over my their problems but-the general feelings I get when being in those Cities is that I don't have to over my shoulder all the time like what it appears that im going to have to do while living here.

 

Do you think that a lot of that is caused by some of the migrants from Louisiana?

 

Crime skyrocketed here in Central Florida in Katrina's wake.

 

Hi Ike, some of it is. When I as volunteering at the CC Museum of Science and History--they and all City employees on every level-had to donate a week from their jobs-in some cases two weeks-in order to handle and take care of the several thousand katrina victimes who were moved to Corpus Christi.

A few days after they arrived, an increase in robberies, rapes, drug possession/sales and other theft type crimes happened. My ex-roommate and I on a Sunday, had decided to eat out for breakfast at a local "Stuff-you-face-place" and were dining on our first plate of food-we noticed a commotion going on outside the restaurant as well as most of the other eaters noticed.

Two large busses came into the parkinglot and discharged their passengers. Those people were some of the karina victimes that had been housed in an old Coliseum while staying here. There were at least 100 people coming in to get their free meals.

I've no problem with that but, when they came inside and were directed to the various food bars-what I saw disgusted not only my ex-roomie and I, but everyone else in the restaurant.

Those people went to the food bar and sarted eating right there while piling high food on their plates. We and the other customers knew we were not going to get what we came for and people started leavind. Bill and I decided to wait awhile to see what else was going to happen.

Well, after about 30 minutes, most of the people were sitting and enjoying theif food. Bill decided to go up and see what was left came back about a minute later and said that everything was gone with the exception of Salad Dressings and condiments. The Manag ement got on the loud-speaker and announced that breakfast was going to continue to be served-in order to keep from losing the "regulars" that frequented the place.

Bill got up to get some more food and I also got up to go wee what was available. As im almost as finicky as Cat when it comes to what im going to eat-I didn't find much of anything of interest. While we both were away from the table-and I was keeping watch of the leather bag I had sitting next to the wall and on my table-which had my portable DvD player in it along with a few movies.

While I was still away and also keeping watch, I was appalled at what I saw. Two kids of teenage years-at least 15 and above) walked over to our table and one kid proceeded to look insie my leather bag. I stopped what I was doing and walked back to the table and asked what the hell do they think they were doing? all the while their Parents were watching the incident from their table just over the half-wall from our table-saying nothing.

The reply I got from the older of the two kids was that they saw both of us get up and leave the table because they THOUGHT we were finished dining and were leaving the restaurant. They claimed that they were going to turn in my property to the Manager--uh hum. Not only was that a bold-faced lie, but where our table was-was less than 20 feet away from where I was standing and you can see who all is at the chow line as nothing was blocking the view.

Anyway, I told them to get away from our table and keep their sticky hands to themselves.

It also turned out that those two kids were the recipients of two board games that I donated. One being a combo of Risk and Battleship-the other game being Trivial Persuit with all the diffferent sets of subject cards.

Something else that irritated me to no end-was that I donated two sacks of food, a case of Dasani Water, a stand fan and $20.00 cash to help out katrina victims. Well, the local news stations were covering that story and interviewed many of the victims. Well, those who wanted to stay in Corpus Christi-were given first dibs on Public Housing-when many many people had been waiting in some cases-years to get into said housing.

Many business owners, Churches and such-donated Electronics, Washers & Dryers, furniture and all-and ran a few news stories interviewing a few hurricane victims-who in the case of two men in particular--actually complained that his brand new Microwave Oven had a dent in the side(not a bad one at that) and that the $400 or so dollar leather chair donated to him by Wilcox Furniture-had some minor scratches on one of the wooden legs-and said that if visitors saw that-that he would be embarassed.

I couldn't believe my ears at what I heard. Had I been in their shoes-i'd have been extremely greatful at what I would have recieved.

Shortly after a batch of about 3,000 people had arrived in Corpus, I was driving down a street (Water Street) and saw many many of them walking around-heading to or from nearby restaurants-including a favorite of mine and my ex-roomate (U&I Restaurant-which is owned and operated by Greeks) and at that time, they had been given a Govt credit card good for $2,000. I saw that quite a few of them were buying booze and smokes instead of necessary things like clothes-and finding shelter.

I made up my mind to never again donate as much as I did-to hurricane victims who came from where these came from. I will continue to donate to more local victims if that becomes the case in the future?

I almost forgot to mention that quite a few of them were arrested for attempted robberis of convience and liqour stores, as well as car-jackings and such. Four complete buildings at my Apartment complex had been empty of renters and katrina victimes were moved into those buildings-each building has eight apartments.

Well as you might have guessed it, more and more crimes started happening at the Plex-with more broken windows-car windshields, graphitti, to complex vending macines being vandalized to every pay phone at the plex either stolen or damaged and we lost the use of them if one was needed.

I know several Policemen in Corppus with them beings friends of mine or Bills-and they told us that it was like a major crimewave had happened just after they arrived. It also turned out that after the first thousand or so arrived-that same evening-when one would think that they would be trying to rest a bit-that no less than seven males were arrested for crimes they committed in and around the old coliseum they were staying at-as well as one female for prostitution.

Thankfully, there were enough honest and decenet people wh o were also hurricane victimes and one lady in particular-became a friend of mine. That lady was a talented lady who could play a Piano like one of the piano masters-as well as jus flat out-was a nice person. Thanks to meeting several like her-my opinions of people from Louisiana-is still a positive one.

 

C. Evans,

I was in Houston about two years ago, and all I can say is this... "on guard" - I actually enjoyed the city very much, but can definitely see the potential for things going very wrong. Especially after reading this article and knowing your own personal experiences... scary for sure.

I attached a statistical graph laying out the safest and most dangerous cities to be in, according to population:

Cities of 500.000 or more

Most dangerous:
1. Detroit MI
2. Washington DC
3. Baltimore MD
4. Memphis TN
5. Dallas TX
6. Columbus OH
7. Philadelphia PA
8. Nashville TN
9. Milwaukee WI
10. Houston TX

Safest:

1. San Jose CA
2. El Paso TX
3. Honolulu HI
4. Austin TX
5. San Diego CA
6. New York NY
7. San Antonio TX
8. San Francisco CA
9. Portland OR
10. Seattle WA

ref - City Crime Rankings by Population Group


Speaking of personal experience... I had my own personal wake up call in San Diego. And according to the chart - one of the safest cities. A buddy of mine were visting some friends for the week and we decided to head downtown to kill some time before meeting with them. We were using the metro train system for transport downtown and ran into an interesting character at the train stop... seeing as though we just flew in from Denver, we were excited to be out of the snow and in the warm sun! I said to the interesting character.. "whats up man!?" - I didn't really get a good look at him, but when he came closer, he was all tatted up, missing some teeth... just looked rough. He asked "what did you say to me?" I said>>> "what's up man?!" as he was walking our way for a confrontation, his body language changed and was flashing his shirt up and down... well in noticing that, he had a gun tucked away in his jeans!! scared the friggin crap out of me. We were able to explain the situation to him before he busted a cap in our melons. The experience was truly eye opening and crazy as hell.

Nav

 

Thank you for the nice compliments Jem/ Im not at all surprised to see both Dallas and Houston on that list. One of my Brothers lived for about a year in Dallas before moving to a nice quiet town of Waxahatchie. He had been a photographer for Lifetouch Studios and was more often than not-out of town for several days and even weeks at a time.

Well, during one such out-of-town job he had-his apartment was broken into and almost everything he had-was stolen including furniture, all his electronics, his record collection as well as any photographic equipment he had there.

On arrival back home-he found his door kicked in as well as a broken window in his livingroom. None of his neighbors lifted a finger to stop the thieves from taking his things. It was at that time that I made it a mental note that i'd never live in or travel to Dallas for anything. If I ever manage to get a job that happpens to be in or near Dallas--im not going to live there and most likely-would live in Plano. The trouble with Plano is that it's growing very rapidly as well as it's crime rates have sky-rocketed.

I forgot to mention that so far here-I feel OK about living in the Sbburb I live in and have not yet ventured much around town--yet. I really don't feel threatened at all but I do keep my g uard up;-)) just in case....

 

I tell you what C, the world were living in is dark and unforgiving. I don't know if it's just because I'm getting older, but I see it's true colors through our society and it makes me sad. I wasn't raised by my parents to act this way... steal, murder, cheat, rob... these were not words in their vocabulary. Instead, traits of integrity, forgiveness, trust, love, honor, and most of all - respect were instilled. I had posted a thread a week ago or so on "is there hope for this generation" and your post, your experiences, your brother's experiences, ironically coincide. I recommend a dog... and a gun.... and a cup protector

" Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. This is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil. " ~ Albert Schweitzer

Civilization and Ethics, 1949



Nav

 

Hi Nav, well said and couldn't agree with you more. If I can give points-you got em.

 

I can tell you for a fact, San Jose and San Francisco do not belong on the safest cities list. My brother is a Police Officer in SF. Even though he worked in the quitest district, he still averaged nearly 250-300 calls per shift, 30 of them being aids to different districts. There are stabbing, shootings, rapes, homicides, theft, etc every day in SF. San Jose is just about the same. San Jose use to be a nice city, but now it's shit. I don't feel safe going there anymore, let alone drive through it. I know that those two cities are different from Huston and Dallas, but a city is a city when it comes to crime. In my city of 107,000 people, our Officers answer nearly 150 calls per shift. There are days where there is a lot more than that. On days like that, we require aid from the Sheriff, California Highway Patrol and surrounding cities. It's sad knowing that this once quiet town has grown into a somewhat "bad" city. Even our sister city that borders us, which has a population of just over 28,000, has a high crime rate. It's fricking unbelieveable.

 

I thought that message wasnt going to post. I'm at school and the internet is f***** up and is not wanting to work properly.

 

RF,

Kuddos to your brother for his service to the San Fran area... I commend any officer in blue that gives their service to the public. The sad part about all of this, safe city or not... crime and destruction will be anywhere. I guess more so in some areas, but nonetheless crime is crime. I work in Communications for the Fire Dept, and it's interesting to see how different the call types change from day time to night. More so at night with domestics, overdoses, suicides, and drunks. Everyone has their vice, and in worse case scenarios their life. Once again, a pat on the back for your bro.

Nav

 

I'm a Police Explorer up here in Fairfield and it suprises me every time I see the Patrol Logs of the day. There are some calls in there that make me want to cry, because they're so harsh. A lot of the times on calls, our Officers get attacked. I've been attacked a couple of times while out with an Officer. It's not fun. It hurts. People now-a-days are pathetic.

 

keep up the great work young man... I commend you as well. You are going into a field that very few people respect. It is pathetic, but we need those officers to enforce the trash of this world!

" Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile. " - Albert Einstein


Nav

 

Thank you sir.

People don't seem to understand that the Police are there to help them. All they think is that they're there to f*** them up by arresting them. It's ridiculous what people think about Police.

 

I guess a lifetime benefit at having once been a Trained C.O. is that the basic Judo lesssons one is tought during training-never leaves you. That's basically what I did when I had problems with that guy trying to rob me when I went to help him out with his car. I didn't have time to think about it before I had him on the ground and with his thumb pressed as far back as it could go before breaking bones-and his arm was behind his back. The entire time it took for me to go from looking at what was supposed to be a car problem to having this guy on the ground and unable to move due to the position his arm and thumb were in--took maybe 2 seconds.

 

Would have enjoyed being a fly on the wall for that Judo session. Thinking of taking some Tae Kwon Do classes....

Nav

 

Heh heh, I did have a small audience. That happened at the local neighborhood Convience Store/Gas Station/Laundry Service. After what I did happened, there were several people nearby who applauded me for what I did. Truthfully, im surprised at what I did as I never had to use any of that kind of training-during my tenure working for the State.

 

I'm a big guy, so when ever anyone ever sees me, they usually give up. If they don't, i just trip them and they're on the ground in less than a second. Police training is sweet.