Word: goetze
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...likelihood of avoiding it, is actually an incentive to commit crime. Out of 550,000 reported crimes in New York City in 1983, police made 106,000 arrests, but only 13,500 suspects wound up behind bars. Observes Circuit Court Judge Lawrence Richter Jr. of Charleston, S.C.: "The Goetz incident is just symptomatic of what's going on everywhere. People are just sick and tired of being pushed around by punks...
Indeed, many of those who defend Goetz say his indictment is really an indictment of the system, which they say is stacked in favor of the criminal. Two of the youths who accosted Goetz on the subway were granted immunity from prosecution as an enticement to testify against Goetz before the grand jury. Goetz, by contrast, was refused partial immunity and decided not to testify. Declared Barry Slotnick, one of Goetz's lawyers: "This is a case of the muggers against the muggees, and Round 2 was won by the muggers." William Kunstler, who is representing one of the wounded...
...initial praise for Goetz's dramatic act starkly underscored an increasingly hard-line attitude toward crime in recent years. More than 1,500 citizen crime-fighting groups have sprung up in 38 states, determined to be "nosy neighbors" and serve as the eyes and ears of police. Local spending on police increased by an impressive 65% between 1978 and 1983, according to one survey of some 600 U.S. cities. Despite some resistance to the huge costs, fully 35 states have embarked on prison-expansion programs. State legislatures are enacting laws to limit parole, stiffen sentences and provide new rights...
Sometimes, like Goetz, these potential victims make headlines by lashing out at their tormentors. When Laird Roy Roberson, 29, looked out of his Houston apartment window at 11:30 p.m. on Jan. 23 and saw two men and a woman trying to break into his car, he picked up a .22-cal. rifle and fired seven shots, killing Darrel York, 18, and wounding Jerome Marshall, 19. A grand jury decided that Roberson had committed no crime...
...Hall decided not to seek charges against Kindred, contending that the homeowner's retaliation was "perfectly justified." In the third episode, Ernest Leflore, 50, heard a man breaking into his home and shot him with a .357 magnum pistol. While critical of the trend, Hall conceded that "the Bernhard Goetz affair has had an impact. People are thinking more readily of using a firearm than in the past...