Gun Shots

I’ve been sort of sick lately. Nothing major — just some headaches that I hope are not a signal of some growing mass in my brain. But when you don’t feel well, you’re thankful for peaceful good sleep.

Also, I have work in the morning. And when you have to get up to go to a job, you’re thankful for a good night’s sleep.

Both of which are reasons why I’m annoyed to be up with my heart racing due to the familiar sound of gunshots.

We’ve written before about how we were diligent when we moved here about dutifully calling the police after hearing them. We figured that the “time of call” would help the police pinpoint the exact time that the shots were fired, somehow assisting in the ongoing investigation. But the police seemed bored when we called, and it was, after all often 2 in the morning. So we made a note of it the first time we heard them, woke up, and rolled over and went back to sleep. It was like our cynicism deflowering. We were here now, and the gun violence was just part of the landscape — not even worth reporting.

It’s a familiar, if unpredictable routine by now: hear the shots, wait for the sirens, scan the paper the next day to see if it was anything the media discovered. I almost said, “See if it was anything major,” but it’s still major in the lives of the participants, even if it doesn’t make the newspaper.

When the shots wake me up, I still note the time, as if I’ll later have firsthand knowledge to contradict some sort of official report. I’ve decided that I can tell the difference in sizes of guns from the shots. Tonight’s were especially close and sounded closer to the AK end of the spectrum than the clipped bursts of an Uzi. And yes, they sounded fully automatic. Much different than the occasional pistol round.

One thing that made tonight’s shots memorable is it sounded like someone yelled something during the spray. Might have been the shooter yelling something like, “boom.” Might have been a victim crying out. Hard to tell when you’re groggy and it all happens so fast. Anything can get mangled if you replay it in your mind enough times, especially if it’s just a tiny fragment. Within a few minutes, it’s hard to know if there are six shots or seven, and you appreciate the hard work of the justice system (both lawyers and witnesses) trying to piece together little scraps of violence several months (and even years) after they happen. Memories fade, especially if they aren’t written down right away.

And I guess that’s why I’m writing now. We weren’t hit. No holes were punched in the walls or windows. The dog didn’t even wake up. We didn’t call the police. Shots were fired, almost certainly in anger, and the night sprouted a blurry sonic blanket of sirens. It sounds like they might be driving around in circles in the next neighborhood, either chasing a suspect or totally passing by a victim who is leaking life.

Anyway, I’m not sure what we can do. It’d be nice to do an interview with local law enforcement. Our police chief is Kevin Murphy. He is not to be confused with Chris Murphy, who heads our city’s Department of Public Safety. Chief Murphy was hired by Chris Murphy, who used to be the head of the Alabama Department of Public Safety (the state troopers). Our police chief from 2004-2010, Art Baylor, was appointed by Obama to be a federal marshal.

But an interview with local officers and leaders isn’t likely to be all that enlightening. I’ve interviewed cops before. They mostly just talk about how crime is down and how nobody appreciates how hard their job is. Both facts are unarguably true, although the current crime fighting strategy (cramming poor people into unconstitutionally overcrowded prisons) leaves something to be desired.

EOL

One rumor is that he lives in the dumpsters behind Tomatino’s and “Eats Only Lizards.”

One rumor is that she is a deranged botanist, seeking to conduct an underground marketing campaign for the Encyclopedia of Life.

And one rumor is that he/she is a hacker and a big fan of the movie Tron, in which “End of Line” is a phrase signifying terminal communication.

And maybe we just made up all of those rumors when we went out New Year’s Eve and saw that the main drag in Cloverdale had been tagged up by EOL.

We’re in a bit of a weird space since we love graffiti, but we also love our local merchants who, understandably, don’t want graffiti on their properties. And this isn’t really anything that merits the label “graffiti,” in the sense that the word can have positive connotations. It’s really just tagging. And there’s nothing all that artistic about it. The tags look like some 11-year-0ld got hold of a large-gauge Sharpie and ran down the street.

There’s a complex social history behind tagging, one that is way deeper than “so-and-so was here” and the usual uninformed stuff about marking gangland turf. But our observations were mostly in the vein of mocking EOL’s lack of talent. Sure, not every scribbler is going to throw up a major piece, a Montgomery-themed burner mural with wildstyle font and thought-provoking images. But seriously, EOL ought to practice in the ol’ notebook before going live and messing up the exteriors of some of our favorite establishments.

Escapist on ‘Ludes?

Eat out, Losers!

Entirely Obligatory Landmark

Effortless Or Lazy?

Eschatology of Landscapes

Night Life in Montgomery

From time to time, I wonder why I don’t go out more in Montgomery. I have lived in a fair number of large cities and have visited countless others. I like going out to bars and clubs. Sometimes I like to go hear live hip-hop. Sometimes I like to go hear electronic music and go dancing. I like good beers, whether in upscale joints or places with sawdust on the floor. Other times, I prefer a more lounge sort of environment, with couches and tasty mixed drinks, maybe a pool table or some darts. Why don’t I go out more?

Then I read articles like this one in the Montgomery Advertiser, and I remember that I’m not in New York or Austin. I’m not even in Tuscaloosa, which has some problems with the police and some anti-drinking forces within the university but by-and-large tries to accommodate the young people and nightlife crowd with a variety of bars and live music venues.

No, Montgomery is no Tuscaloosa. Here, bars and clubs are the enemy (unless, of course, you are talking about The Alley and the Entire Future of Downtown Redevelopment). To most who live in this area, Montgomery must be fled by sundown. For those who stay behind, you’ve got what is discussed in The Advertiser’s article: a police-state crackdown with SWAT raids on local businesses. As if I needed another reason to be glad I’m not a student at Alabama State.

Let’s take a look at the article, from Feb. 10 by Scott Johnson. Headline: “City Uses Raid-Style Inspections on Nightclubs.” Well, that’s fantastic PR right there. Really just what you want to see when you are thinking about holding a convention in Montgomery or going out for a night of dancing. The thing is, the Chamber of Commerce types who that ought to bother are probably more mad at the newspaper for reporting the truth than they are at the police for turning local clubs into Gestapo Night.

So what’s behind the use of armed SWAT raids at local clubs (some of which have no history of violence)? According to the article, “through the years,” there have been shootings at some nightclubs. How many shootings? How many years? It takes some hashing through the article to discover.

From a careful read of the piece, we learn that one club was shut down by the city: Top Flight Disco … in 1997!

And another club, Celebrations, closed on its own in 2007 after some controversy.

Oh no! Two clubs closed in the past 13 years! Horror! Call in the SWAT team!

I’m frankly surprised they were able to get the owner of Rock Bottom American Pub to go on the record as complaining about the raids. Even money says that club gets the door kicked in just to make sure the liquor licenses are up to date. Oh wait, Rock Bottom already was raided, along with six other nightclubs on Jan. 16 and nine more the night before that. Fifteen clubs in two nights!

Maj. Huey Thornton, a police spokesman, said the SWAT team was necessary for the safety of the inspectors.

“These officers have specialized training in dealing with situations where there may be large crowds,” Thornton said. “We don’t want to send our officers — or any city or state em ployees — into any situation without providing them the safety and security to accomplish their mission.”

Damn, maybe that’s the kind of important crime fighting lesson we missed at the Crime Expo.

Three places were shut down for over-crowding — Frontstreet Entertainment, Magic Nights Club, and Club Rewind. For how long were they shuttered? Oh, for a whopping 16 hours, although the court has the option of suspending their business license for 10 days.

Frontstreet Entertainment was certainly a likely target of the raids. Montgomery residents will remember that there was a shooting there on Christmas night, injuring two teenagers. Horror. Freakout. Teens not old enough to drink were at a nightclub. Shooting. Christmas.

And yet while the article says the Frontstreet shooting “prompted” the city to take action, the quote from Mayor Todd Strange calls the raids “a proactive approach.” Either the article is wrong and the Frontstreet incident had nothing to do with MPD’s raids, or the mayor doesn’t know the difference between “proactive” and “reactive.”

But sure, we get the point. He’s explaining why the cops are raiding the clubs where there is no history of violence. They’re showing up with guns to prevent violence from happening. That makes tons of sense. Send ‘em a message!

Oh, but also, buried in the story was the fact that there was also a fatal shooting at something called Club O’s back in January. Club O’s then shut its own doors. So let’s recap the rationale for the raids:

1. Top Flight Disco was shut down 13 years ago.

2. Celebrations closed itself amid controversy three years ago.

3. Two teens were shot (but not killed) at Frontstreet Entertainment in December.

4. Two people were killed at Club O’s in January (and then Club O’s closed down).

Holy crap! Let’s nuke the Alley Bar! I might have seen a Huntington student use a fake ID to get into Bud’s and order a margarita at El Rey’s! Let’s burn something down!

And if you like to shoot pool at Deja Vu, just keep in mind that your money is going into the pockets of an owner who makes apologies for the cops.

“I appreciate it as a business owner that they are coming out and making sure things are run right, but just make sure it’s fair across the board,” said Lithia Barber, owner of Déjà vu Billiards.

Barber, who said the raid was “kind of scary,” wondered why inspectors targeted her Burbank Drive business and overlooked other nearby nightclubs.

The SWAT team members came into the club wearing masks and carrying rifles, locking the door behind them, Barber said.

Oh, just masks and rifles? Well, I guess they have to “make sure everything is run right.” Hard to imagine they can do that with just masks and rifles and not actively kicking every patron of your establishment in the face, followed by cavity searches.

While Barber questioned the use of the SWAT team, she did say she supports the inspections and would welcome more of them.

The inspection only took 20 to 30 minutes and was not that much of a disruption, she said.

“We ended up having a really good night that night,” she said.

Presumably, by “we,” she means her cash registers still turned a profit, and doesn’t mean that her customers “had a really good night” as armed cops with masks locked the door behind them and searched through everything. Hey, what’s 20 or 30 minutes when you’re a paying customer looking to shoot some pool with friends?

The article goes on to say that our Mayor has promised to “keep conducting the surprise inspections for as long as they are necessary.” Oh. OK. Since they were so necessary before.

“We will continue doing them and probably be pretty aggressive until the message gets out there,” he said.

And what is that message? For me, it’s a good reminder of why I don’t go out and spend money in my hometown.

Crime Expo 2010

All the latest in crime fighting technology and fish taxidermy

Oh dearest reader, we have let you down. We, like Icarus, aimed too high. We wanted so dearly in the molecules of our cardiac fiber to respond to the alluring flyer we received promoting a “crime expo” at the Mann Museum here in town.

A crime expo? And what is the Mann Museum? Would there be rows of vendors selling burglar bars and pepper sprays and mace foam? Would there be self-defense experts teaching ninja moves to soccer moms worried about ruffians? And would there be wildlife learning at the Mann Wildlife Learning Museum?

After all, the electronic handbill carried with it a most nefarious image of a highly-dangerous criminal clutching a ring of keys and wearing a cartoonish “robber” mask. Where did he get those keys? If he is merely a janitor or custodian, why is he wearing a backwards baseball cap and that suspicious Lone Ranger mask? FEAR!!!!

So we put on our reporter hats and wigs and we Googled this “Mann Wildlife Learning Museum.” Turns out, it’s part of the city zoo complex. So we drove and we drove. With a 6 p.m. start time, we were in a mad post-work scramble. Must eat food! Must find hidden museum! Must be there before judo lessons and taser demonstrations!

We arrive ready to take notes. When people think of Montgomery, they often bring up crime. The image is that our urban area is full of crooks, thugs, hoodlums, and no-goodniks. Douse that gumbo with a healthy degree of classic new and old Southern Racism, along with very real poverty and urban decay, and you’ve got a lot of people talking about crime all the time. This talk fuels white flight and is the enemy of those looking to redevelop downtown. The fear monster is alive and well among folks of all races and walks of life. Oh, and there’s actual crime too.

So we were ready to be critical and yet honest in our time-tested Lost in Montgomery way. If we saw a creepy police state thing, we’d call it. If we saw a good deal on lethal and/or non-lethal weapons, we’d report those deals. (Note: The hot pink pepper spray was not a good deal). If the whole thing came off as a cheesy PR stunt for law enforcement, we planned on holding up the light of scrutiny to the whole scene.

So we got there at 6:05 or so. One way in, one way out. Single door. Sign in when you get there. And you walk in at the “front” of the room, meaning all of the chairs are facing you as you walk in. There are about 50 people there, maybe 60. We pass the empty podium and walk to the back. There in the back, amid a bunch of weird empty aquariums are the crime expo “exhibits.” Some of the aquariums are empty. Some are terrariums that have living creatures in them. They look to be in bad shape. Many have lots of moss growing on their foggy glass making whatever is inside super difficult to see. Some are labeled (newts, other swampy critters). Others are unlabeled. And an entire display case is empty as if undergoing renovations or something. It appears it once had poison dart frogs. The entire “museum” looked underfunded and sketchy. But maybe that’s because it was cleared out for this meeting. Clearly we’ll go back for another trip during normal business hours, in hopes that we will see more than stuffed turkeys lining a hallway.

In the far back are walls covered with stuffed fish: Big bass, marlins, etc. There are four tables there. The first is from ADT, the home alarm company. They have the usual sales pitch handouts about crooks and the need for alarms. Another table is from MADD. They are against drunk driving. As usual. Another table is from a gun dealer. They have a few tasers on display and a few pistols. Nothing remarkable. And the final table is from Christ for Crime Victims. Evidently, this is a Jesus-based charity that involves bringing new doors and windows and other anti-crime fortifications to folks who have been victimized by crime. And then (I guess) they tell you about the Lord or something. Unclear. And that’s it for exhibits. Takes us about 10 minutes to make “the rounds” to all four tables. The meeting still has not started.

We find seats. The crowd is multi-racial. Many of the black folks there are wearing the red shirts of the “Enough is Enough” campaign that is pretty big here in Montgomery. It’s an anti-violence, anti-gang campaign run by Rev. Ed Nettles of the Freewill Missionary Baptist Church. Rev. Nettles himself was present, as were a ton of police officers and a bunch of old people. We were the youngest people there by a good margin.

So we sit. And sit. And it’s now 6:30. And we have to be somewhere at 8. We thought we could stay from 6 until 7:45 or so and hit the road. We thought we’d see some cool exhibits. Wrong. When it’s 6:30 and nothing has started yet and they’re telling people to go enter a raffle to win some ADT security package, we get worried. The doors we entered are soon going to close. Then people (possibly people in police uniforms) will stand in front of those doors and start talking. And we won’t be able to leave.

So, dear reader, we failed you. We did not stay for the informative law enforcement programming. We did not learn about crime in our beloved community and what the police want us to do about it. We did not get to ask our burning questions about the “Volunteer Police” who hilariously cruise our neighborhood. We have some brochures about what to do in case we see “someone suspicious.” And the back of the “Enough of Enough” shirts have the word “VIOLENCE” in a circle with a big slash through it … and under it says: “Try Jesus!”

So if that helps you, we are grateful. But we carry a heavy sense of guilt at our journalistic failings. You, the crime wary citizens of this body politic, deserve only the finest information about the doings of our order-preserving guardians.

The Dark Side of Montgomery

I saw Frank York last night on my way home from the airport.

Frank was lying face down next to his car as we drove by the gas station where he died. According to the newspaper, he was 25, from Selma, and killed in a drug deal. Police say they found some marijuana and a gun next to his body.

The killing was Montgomery’s 23rd of the year, which, from what I understand, puts us under the pace to meet last year’s mark. This group ranked Montgomery as the second worst mid-size city in the U.S. for crime, noting the high murder rate. According to WSFA, the local TV station, the cops reported 31 murders in 2005 and 28 in 2006. The city population was 201,568 as of the 2000 census.

I’m not really interested in diving into crime stats much more than that, or comparing Montgomery to Detroit or de-populated New Orleans. Frank York is dead and I saw the gas station parking lot where he died. It’s pretty close to my house. Dying on pavement next to a flithy gas pump seems terrible.

Frank York may have been a jerk. He may have been trying to rob the person who killed him. The gun and marijuana may or may not have been his. The killing may or may not have been about drugs much more powerful than marijuana. Maybe it was about romance. Maybe they argued and the gun went off accidentally. Maybe the police will catch the killer by looking at the gas station security cameras. Maybe not.

Meanwhile, the hyper-racist Montgomery Advertiser message boards will continue to spew filth like a punctured sewer pipe. Their discussions of crime and race by these anonymous posters make me ashamed to live in this city. And at the same time, we still hear gunshots from our house, even though it’s in a lovely area of town. And the white people continue to flee to the east, where they refuse to pay for city schools and build enormous and vile big box stores and strip malls.

I don’t want to get off on a digression, complaining about how Montgomery has lost luster over the years. I don’t want a reflection on murder in Montgomery to become an elegy for the Blue-Gray Football Classic.

So seeing the lifeless corpse of Frank York, a 25-year-old from Selma, really made me think about Montgomery. Big problems. No easy solutions.