OPINION & EDITORIAL
Put transient threat in perspective
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Also by Gerald Cox:
- Vigilance key to preventing tragedy (April 7, 2008)
- Stick with seg fee pros in election (March 24, 2008)
- Obama to learn lesson in losing (March 10, 2008)
- Iraqis to UW for free? Bring 'em on (March 3, 2008)
- Ties to state key for UW's future (February 25, 2008)
Related Stories:
- Vigilance key to preventing tragedy (April 7, 2008)
- Campus crime must be addressed (February 1, 2007)
- Protecting our children (September 4, 2002)
- State must protect even worst felons (November 29, 2004)
- Media lost in diversions (September 8, 2006)
by Gerald Cox
Monday, April 14, 2008
Two unsolved murders near campus with startling similarities? Blame the homeless. And why?
Because Google Maps — in the hands of the inquisitive — is a damning device.
The unsolved murders of both Brittany Zimmermann and Joel Marino are being called “stranger murders” in which, as you may have guessed, a stranger seems the most likely culprit. Such crimes are harder to solve, and leads are far more difficult to come by than in your average crime in which a person who knows the victim emerges as a suspect.
However, any individual Internet-savvy enough to wield Google Maps effectively can produce a lead in the investigation of those unsolved murders. Search for “Joel Marino” and “2008 murder” in Madison, WI. Upon the digital map of the isthmus, a small, red-hued balloon will indicate a location. A search for both victims and the eerie proximity of their deaths cannot escape notice. Look more carefully, and one will notice that the locations flank — Marino to the southwest and Zimmermann to the northeast — a modestly sized, green expanse titled “Brittingham Park.” Upon discovering such, one has effectively found the thread that may link the one to the other.
And what is so special about Brittingham Park? How can its location, positioned neatly between the two murders, offer investigators insight into the possible identity of a murderer or murderers? The park, located just a few miles southeast from the Kohl Center and practically across the street from Meriter Hospital, is a veritable ground zero for Madison’s homeless endemic: a place of respite for the worst of Madison’s ill-behaved “transients.”
In appraising two cases that bear striking similarities — both were bereft of any obvious motive, at similar times of day, in the victims’ own homes — one cannot help but wonder if the stranger in these “stranger murders” was some transient who ventured out from Brittingham Park with too little reason in his head and too much violence in his heart.
The proximity of a recognized transient hangout and the two murders was far too obvious to be noted first by a curious op-ed writer at The Badger Herald. The Madison Police Department has been earnestly pursuing information within the so-called “transient population” of Madison since shortly after the Zimmermann murder was discovered. City officials from Mayor Dave Cieslewicz to City Council President Mike Verveer have been hearing dubious aspersions heaped upon Madison’s population of transients.
You know it. I know it. Messrs. Cieslewicz and Verveer know it. Madison has a homeless problem, and it just turned deadly.
Madison has faced this issue of homeless transients for years, but with a handful of unsolved murders over the past few months and years, Madison’s frustratingly annoying homeless population is being recast as a very serious threat to the safety of Madison’s residents.
It’s why the city of Madison is spending tens of thousands of dollars on extra lighting and cameras for Brittingham Park; it’s why the MPD has engaged in the winnowing and sifting of area transients. It’s why, in a matter of a week, as The Associated Press reports, a “couple dozen” transients have been arrested on outstanding warrants. It’s why the bad-smelling, ill-dressed guy in Five Guys trying to sell you that watch out of his coat isn’t just amusing, frustrating, scary or some combination thereof. He is, until the monster that killed Brittany is brought to justice, a very serious threat.
As Mr. Cieslewicz noted to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the homeless population of Madison “ebbs and flows, and right now, it seems to be flowing.” Spring has ushered in with it the seasonal influx of the Madison homeless. This spring, however, they are recast as panhandling, bad-smelling threats to our security.
The problem will persist. With the area around the Capitol serving as a veritable homeless hostel, and a friendly and generous student population to provide it sustenance, the transient issue is an issue of our own making. And it is one that is here to stay, to fester and frighten.
What is the solution? Is it lighter in Brittingham Park? Is it a crackdown on Madison transients? Do we take a page from Atlanta and Salt Lake’s books, and simply bus the homeless away, as the two cities did before their respective hosting of the Olympic Games? Do we fear them, hate them, ignore them or feed them? Do we blame them, as we seem to be doing even now?
Whatever it is we do, we must realize that, in the end, it was one man or one woman who killed Brittany Zimmermann. It was one man, or one woman, who killed Joel Marino. It was a person, not a population. So blame the homeless, if you so please. But know, that in doing so, you implicate an entire population that cannot be collectively guilty of the crime you charge them of.
Gerald Cox (gcox@badgerherald.com) is a senior majoring in economics.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 12:15am):
So how do you really feel about the homeless? The whole column characterizes transients as smelly, ill-behaved, threatening, and then at the end you pop in this half-hearted, "But don't blame ALL of them!" That sounds uneven, insincere, and dishonest.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 5:48am):
How long did it take to slap together this disingenuous piece of shit?
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 7:04am):
Brittingham Park is only a few blocks from the Kohl Center, not a few miles.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 8:33am):
Gerald, I can understand your feelings, but why do so many people of color still blame "whitey" for their own problems? I mean, every white person is blamed for everything.
Take the suffering of Native-Americans, slavery and the forced internment of Japanese-Americans, for example. Most Americans alive today are paying the price in money and in guilt for what happened long before they were born. Is that fair? When will minorities learn to stop thinking the same way?
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 8:59am):
I dont get the point. What is he arguing here? Gerald, you've done better.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 9:16am):
Homeless.
If you feed them, they will come.
And they will stay as long as there is food - and drink, of course.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 9:27am):
Congratulations on putting so much effort into not saying anything at all.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 9:54am):
This article is crap. I can't tell the point you're really trying to make - and learn to read a scale bar on your google maps.
Bryan (April 14, 2008 @ 11:14am):
To echo many of the other comments, this story makes absolutely no point. It seems like halfway through writing it you decided to take the other stance. Next time, figure out what you think before you start writing.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 11:32am):
Your last paragraph goes completely against the rest of the article.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 11:36am):
Not ALL MINORITIES blame "whitey," it's mostly the blacks who use that excuse. I hate to be blunt..but yeah..
Look at Alicia Key's statement on gangsta rap..
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 12:19pm):
8:33am
What does race has to do with anything...I haven't read any where that race is the reason for the deaths. If any one pushing race its you. Anyways, the homeless are annoying, the ask for money, and sometimes follow you until they get some. Killers? Who knows! But I want the killer found, I could personally care less about the homeless, they should be dealt with.
Race...homeless people come in all shapes, sizes and yes colors...race has nothing to do with it!
Sam Clegg (April 14, 2008 @ 1:00pm):
I really can't see why this article is being disparaged. Gerald is indicating that while it is certainly feasible that a homeless person committed the murder, residents should be cognizant of the fact that only one individual is responsible and we should not export the fear many students feel in the wake of the Zimmerman murder to the homeless population in general.
Well done, Gerald.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 1:57pm):
I don't understand this article. You spend 90% of it characterizing the homeless population with very offensive and stereotyped language and then tell us not to blame them? You seem to be doing a great job of blaming them yourself.
We need to stop pointing fingers at a population that is quite possibly innocent in this terrible crime. The root causes of homelessness need to be addressed and it is well within our power to do so.
I would encourage you to take action to help solve the problem of homelessness in this rich nation instead of blaming those who are largely the victims of our society.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 3:47pm):
You are all to quick to attack Gerald's article. No argument is without flaws, and I concede his has a few. It certainly goes to far in characterizing the transient population based on stereotypes alone.
However, you seek to ridicule a columnist who, at the very least, is hoping to present a means to avoid another detestable act of violence in this city. Yet, you have no aversion to defending the population of people who, at the moment, are regarded by most authority as harboring the likely suspect for this crimes...and it is sickening.
To interpret the core of his message not as one of warning and caution for the citizens of this city--although flawed at times--but rather, one of only hatred and stereotype is to twist the meaning so far from the words he has written.
It is too easy to to take the side of the little guy, or the less fortunate. I suspect, you would not be so hasty to play the devil's advocate if it were an acquaintance, relative, or loved one of yours who was the unfortunate victim of these abhorred acts which have befallen Madison.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 3:55pm):
nice!!!
i like how you played up the feelings everyone feels the whole way through then just slammed down the common sense at the end: that we can't blame a whole population of people when only one or two are responsible.
good article.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 4:03pm):
I think that the point is obvious. Many people find the homeless annoying, but this does not justify casting blame on all of them for those murders. It is called the fallacy of composition: characterizing the whole by pointing out features of not-necessarily-representative parts. The author pointed out this simple fact, and a bunch of angry people ignorantly called him out for having an opinion that was insufficiently immoderate for their tastes.
Anonymous (April 14, 2008 @ 4:13pm):
Nice try, Sam-
Everything up until the very last paragraph reads as a justification for a massive crackdown on transient-dom. Then there's the incongruous last paragraph that meshes with your summary. But the way you depict the work as a whole is highly misleading, and I think you know it.
And there are valid complaints other than those regarding this odd argumentative structure. For one, Gerald's attempt at playing detective in the first section is laughable -- I can guarantee that it was not a Google Map search or geographical coincidence that prompted officials to investigate and monitor the transients. An interview with the police would've been very helpful.
I know that "Something Verbose" is already taken, but it be the perfect title for Gerald's column. As a political writer, Gerald would do well to follow his most illustrious predescessor, George Orwell, and his "5 rules of writing," in particular to "never use a long word when a short one will do." http://www.pickthebrain.com/blog/george-orwells-5-rules-for-effective-writing/
Sam Clegg (April 14, 2008 @ 10:09pm):
I don't intentionally mislead anybody about the piece; rather I:
a) Appreciated the fact that Gerald did not offer a solution that would take much longer than the week columnists have to put write a column.
b) Found that while he did give too much credence to the position he disagreed with - the stance that homeless people are inherently detrimental to the city - he was erring on the side of caution and indicating that the fear certain students may feel towards Madison's homeless in not unreasonable. In other words he was expressing sympathy towards those with whom he has a disagreement. Maybe he was a little too long winded about it, but that is far better than taking a stance he didn't necessarily believe.
-I don't really know if Gerald made an effort to contact local police, but from my experiences attempting to interview law-enforcement, it can be difficult to get in touch. That being said, I don't have perfect insight into Gerald's mind, I can feel myself walking further out onto icy ground.
Anonymous (April 15, 2008 @ 4:59pm):
Not ALL MINORITIES blame "whitey," it's mostly the blacks who use that excuse. I hate to be blunt..but yeah..
Look at Alicia Key's statement on gangsta rap..
What about whites who use the race card when they are pissed off at something. Blacks don't blame whites for their problems...but whites cause problems for everyone.
Anonymous (April 16, 2008 @ 11:06am):
How long till homeless people start showing up dead in the streets because of fear-fomenting garbage like this?
Anonymous (April 30, 2008 @ 11:54pm):
your conclusion completely undermines the rest of your article.
Anonymous (May 14, 2008 @ 3:14pm):
Irony, people, irony. Learn to recognize it.
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