Burglary on Wallace Street - edited

[pbockelman.livejournal.com]

One of my neighbors on Wallace Street just shared this incident with me.  It happened a few hours ago at the Holland Street end of Wallace Street. She is very upset because the burglar stole some jewelry that had been in the family for many, many years. She is very fortunate to be safe given that she surprised him in  the house.

Please keep and eye out and report anything to the police.

Paul Bockelman

This is what she wrote:
At 11:15 am, Tuesday I found a tall black man, wearing a black down jacket
in our upstairs bedroom. I am not hurt (but very shaken up as you can
imagine). He ran out the back door.

Please keep aware of anyone lurking in backyards or acting suspiciously.  We might also want to be aware that when a person rings the door and asks for someone who doesn't live there (or some other random question), they may be looking for unoccupied residences to buglarize.  Detective John Oliveria was the officer that come to the house. Call 617-625-1600.

Comments

[aroraborealis.livejournal.com]

The police have asked if anyone sees a black man lurking around to please call the police asap.

...

Wow.

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

a tall black man?

umm, that describes a huge number of our residents....

could we have a little more description/what to look for??


--short white woman, but in a down coat

[closetalker11.livejournal.com]

I know, I kinda had the same thought. That's a kind of poorly worded alert, no?

I was like, the 1940s called, they'd like their opinion on race and crime back.

[closetalker11.livejournal.com]

My other thought is, I am sorry for your neighbor -- how scary!

Sorry, didn't mean to leave that part out.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

The police have asked if anyone sees a black man lurking around to please call the police asap.

I can't imagine that the police asked any such thing.

Does your neighbor have any further description about the man? Height, skin color, and jacket are all useful, but that doesn't narrow it down much. Facial hair? Glasses? Hair style? Approximate age? Hair color?

[pbockelman.livejournal.com]

I guess the idea here is NOT to form a search party and find the guy, but to alert others in our neighborhood that there have been several incidents of burglary in the neighborhood and that everyone should take precautions and keep an eye out for suspicious behavior.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

I saw a tall black man lurking around the other day! Bastard said he was running for President, if you can believe that.

[ron_newman]

I have to agree with the earlier commenters. As worded, this is license for people to harass passersby. How about a more specific description -- height, weight, hair color, does or doesn't have beard or mustache, etc?

[incontango.livejournal.com]

You win Livejournal.

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

I dunno, maybe its because I was broken into this year I'm sensitive to it but the description didn't seem that racist to me. If all she noticed that he was tall, black and had a black down coat - that seems like a decent enough description.

If a tall white guy broke in my house and I suprised him, I'd probably have a similar description - unless he had a mohawk or something.

Last summer the break ins happened on streets all near each other, so if someone sees a guy fitting that description acting weird, or lurking around a house, I don't think its racist to call the cops.

[ifotismeni]

lol, agreed. made me think of the south park joke where everybody's looking for "some puerto rican guy"

[rmd.livejournal.com]

i heard he was only in town to make sure his parking tickets were finally paid off.

[ron_newman]

The objection was not to the entire description, but to that particular sentence which said only "If anyone sees a black man lurking around" with no other details.

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

Oh, I just assumed she meant matching that description - ie, tall, lurking around, and wearing a down jacket.

[danger-chick.livejournal.com]

Will the registrar not allow him to run the primary until that happens?

Pretty much OT.

[lonelyholiday.livejournal.com]

This comment got me wondering, wait, is Obama tall? I mean, obviously I have seen photos and video of him standing next to countless people but I just never considered his height... So because I'm on my lunch break and dorking around on the internet, I decided to just google "obama height." And what do you know:
http://www.celebheights.com/s/Barack-Obama-4695.html

Seriously, there is a page for everything on the internet. Especially if you've finished your pizza and should be getting back to work. heh.

Re: Pretty much OT.

[daft.livejournal.com]

Wait, Obama is black?

[marphod.livejournal.com]

(Please don't use font color to highlight text. SOme of us read with alternate colors for high contrast, and the tiny-blue-on-black text means I've no idea what you said. Use italics or bold.)

[spatch]

poor butters

[ron_newman]

At least on my computer, holding down the apple key while pressing the "+" button will increase the font size.

[jadelennox]

While I don't have problems with font color, an extension of the point marphod was making is that many of us have accessibility issues with the Web, and unconventional ways of indicating text (such as using color instead of italics for emphasis) can disrupt the already awkward process of Web navigation for those of us with accessibility problems.

I remember way back when, back when Davis Square was a much wankier community, there was some conversation about lj-cuts, and no matter how many of us posted "because of my accessibility issues this is my problem with the so-called easy- for -everyone solution you have described" various people said "but you can just do this!"

Those of us who are dealing with the nightmare of disability and Internet access have already come up with workarounds for standard web formatting (as marphod said, italics and bold are fine), but unusual formatting adds frustration to our already difficult Internet experiences.

(Not to mention, visually impaired and blind users who are using screen readers such as Jaws have software that can parse meaningful HTML tags such as <em> -- making something small and blue isn't meaningful to the screen reader.)

(Dictated with Dragon NaturallySpeaking)

[ron_newman]

Oh, I fully agree that small and blue text is bad. I was just suggesting a possible workaround to marphod.

Re: Pretty much OT.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

More of a cinnamon color, to my eye.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

back when Davis Square was a much wankier community...

You mean it was once worse???

[closetalker11.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know what she was getting at, I just noticed that the wording probably could have been chosen better (as in, a guy who fits this description, not watch out for black guys!). I didn't think either the victim or the cop was singling out all black men.

[jadelennox]

Fair enough. *g*

[jadelennox]

hell yeah. We never reached b0st0n levels of wank, but it got pretty bad. Three cheers to our hard-working moderators.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

Amen to that.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Gods yes. I don't understand how making something tiny and -less- contrasty is supposed to emphasize it; it just makes it more ignorable, IMO, because it is nonstandard and harder to read.

[miraclaire.livejournal.com]

And even for those of us without accessibility issues it can be very difficult to read such text.

[marphod.livejournal.com]

I could.

But that grows everything on my friends page which just annoys me, and if I'm not at the top of the page when I do it, the resize may move the current text off screen, as the window grows.

Highlighting the text works, but why make me work?

[mattdm.livejournal.com]

A lot of black men could be considered tall; down jackets aren't exactly rare in New England this time of year; and what, exactly, constitutes "lurking"?

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

I'd define lurking as peaking in widows, walking around the back of a house, going up to several houses etc. as lurking.

Again, going back to my own personal experience, my apartment was broken into this summer the same day as several others on my street and nearby streets. I wish someone had reported if they noticed someone "lurking".

I think someone's height, skin color, jacket color, jacket type seem like fairly good details if you see someone matching those details in that neighborhood and they are acting suspiciously.

[starry83.livejournal.com]

Just trying to get some more relevant info here...
Do you know if the house was open or if the burglar forced entry? Did the person indeed ring the doorbell and ask for someone who didn't live there?

Re: Pretty much OT.

[an-art-worker.livejournal.com]

no, he is half black (and/or half white) We need to transition to a black president. Maybe that is Hillary's problem - we need a transexual president before we have a woman president.

[ron_newman]

Someone walking into one backyard after another is trespassing, and worthy of being reported to the police.

Re: Pretty much OT.

[daft.livejournal.com]

._O

Hillary is a woman????









Okay that one was just way, way too easy.

[tt02144.livejournal.com]

Sorry to hear of your loss, and what must have been real fear/trauma at actually encountering the person in your home. About a year ago when there was a rash of burglaries near Inman Square the police noted that the abundance of new residents who had lots of expensive (and easy to carry) technology was very inviting to thieves (computers, laptops, digital cameras, camcorders, etc.). When I'm walking I also see lots of first floor windows with computers or large screen TVs clearly visible through an un-shaded window. This is also an open invitation. Not to mention the easy exit provided by the Red Line in Davis Square. Somerville has also been experiencing a huge drug problem in recent years which isn't getting nearly enough attention. The cheap price of heroin and the easy availability of needles (thanks to a new state law-no longer illegal and easily purchased without prescription) has fueled the addiction problems. Addiction and crime rate go hand in hand, unfortunately.

[xuth.livejournal.com]

Is trespassing illegal in MA? I was under the impression that entering someone's property was legal until someone with authority over the property requested you not do so (I believe a sign is adequate though). There are separate laws against breaking and entering etc.

[somer-villains.livejournal.com]

no to mention that that would constitute discrimination against the color-impaired.