I awoke to a terrible text and email this morning: someone had been shot on Frenchmen Street last night by some idiots in a car in the 500 block of Frenchmen Street near Decatur.
The victim was Julius Dunn, 21-year-old man, who was shot about 1:20 a.m. Wednesday morning in a drive-by shooting. He died later that morning from a gunshot wound to the chest. According to the New Orleans Advocate at press time, neither a motive or a suspect was identified by police, nor a description of the car involved in the drive-by.
What a tragedy. Another young man murdered in cold blood, probably over something really stupid and inconsequential. However, this young man was apparently involved with a bad group, so it’s no surprise that he ended up the way he did. This isn’t to say that his death was something we should ignore. Any death of a young person is tragic, and in this case was indicative of the much deeper issues we have in this community.
This is what the Frenchmen bars and music clubs had been fearing, and why there has to be a police presence on Frenchmen Street. I’m not even going to go into the fact that the murderers used readily-available guns to end whatever stupid score the shooting supposedly “settled.”
These killers are, in all probability, other young men who think that killing another human being in cold blood is something that their “right” to a gun will allow. These guys are murderers and they are despicable.
I think the police will solve this crime because almost every business along Frenchmen, including 421 Frenchmen Street at Decatur (which houses an advertising agency, the Louisiana Music Factory, and OffBeat) has cameras attached to their building that survey the street outside.
In fact, as I write this, the NOPD was looking for the tapes from last night’s cameras’ recording from our building, and I’m positive they’re surveying the other camera tapes as well. The rumor is that the car was parked on Decatur, just across from my line of sight during the day, turned the corner and shot poor Mr. Dunn. If that’s the case, there’s a good possibility that one of the cameras on our building, at Mona’s, or the Maison got a clear view of the car, and perhaps even of the murderers themselves.
Now this is scant consolation to the victim or his family. Cameras don’t prevent crime, but they certainly help solve it. Just the presence of cameras should help deter crimes like this; but they do not stop crimes from happening.
Only a better police presence, one that’s there nightly and is evident to any moron that might want to start trouble, is going to deter the commission of crimes like this.
Oh, and of course, if the guys in the car hadn’t had easy access to guns, this would never have happened. But that’s a much bigger issue.
The bottom line is that while cameras can identify criminals, they don’t stop them from committing heinous murders. Only a police presence will help. The NOPD needs to step up its game and allow us all more protection from crime. Maybe the money that’s not been paid to the police officers who have left the force (there are 98 officers in 8th District versus about 150 three years ago) can be used to hire state police or National Guard. Protevction in a city like New Orleans cannot be scrimped on. That money needs to be spent. So do it, already.
