3 males carjack woman in Dollar Tree parking lot on Christmas Eve, return to store hours later in armed robbery attempt: Cops



Memphis police said three males carjacked a woman in a Dollar Tree parking lot on Christmas Eve — and then returned to the scene of the crime just hours later and tried robbing two people inside the same Dollar Tree store.

Police said the trio are still wanted, WREG-TV reported.

What are the details?

Memphis police said officers responded at 12:45 p.m. to a carjacking at a Dollar Tree in the 1200 block of Getwell Road.

Officers were told the victim parked her car when three unknown armed males approached her and demanded the keys to her black Audi A3. Police said the suspects took the victim’s vehicle and fled westbound on Rhodes — and the driver of a gold Mercedes, which also was taken in a carjacking, followed the Audi.

But it was Christmas Eve, after all — and the trio apparently was after a heftier gift tally.

Police said the same suspects came back to the same Dollar Tree at 5:36 p.m. on the same day and tried to rob at gunpoint two victims inside the store. Police posted surveillance video from inside the Dollar Tree showing the armed robbery attempt.

Police said the males fled the store in an unknown direction, and no arrests have been made.

Police added that those with information about this incident should call Crime Stoppers at 901-528-CASH to leave anonymous information or submit a tip at http://www.crimestopmem.org. Police added that tipsters may be eligible for cash rewards if arrests are made.

Carjacking kids try to rob customers, police say youtu.be

How are folks reacting?

Nearly 800 commenters and counting have weighed in on WREG's story on the crime spree published Thursday by Yahoo News. Here's what a few of them had to say:

  • "These ‘kids’ live in a different society where the rules and values of our society do not apply," one commenter said. "And by ‘our society’ I mean working, building, trying-to-do-our-best type. Physically we share the same time and space, but we cannot be further apart. This will not end well for our country."
  • "I'm senior and carry," another commenter said. "I never thought about carrying 25 years ago."
  • "They are someone's children, and they are out of control," another commenter observed. "I'm sure they know what they are doing; they don't know what the results and jail time will be. This is a new generation of young people, and the way they think, they don't value themselves or anyone, they don't believe in a future or been taught to plan and make goals in life and try to be a better person than the generation before them."

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3 teen girls, 1 teen boy arrested in violent 5-day carjacking spree



Police have arrested four teens in connection with a violent five-day carjacking and robbery spree, WUSA reported Monday morning.

The suspects are three teen girls, ages 13, 14, and 17, and a 17-year-old teen boy. Each faces robbery charges after being arrested Friday.

Thomas Hailu's son and his son's mother were treated at Howard University Hospital Friday after the suspects hit the back of their car, pushed it off the road, then fled. The boy's mother is being treated for a back injury, Hailu said.

"My son is six years old. He's shocked and he's traumatized," Hailu told the outlet.

The suspects were driving a silver Hyundai sedan when the hit-and-run occurred. Minutes later, they fled to the Washington VA Medical Center parking lot, where the quartet attempted a carjacking. The group's violent spree came to an end when they ran the sedan into a ditch near the VA.

Detectives from the Metropolitan Police Department's Carjacking Task Force say the teens are connected to 13 violent robberies in the D.C. area over a five-day period, the outlet reported.

Their alleged crimes in the northeast and northwest portions of the District include assaulting victims and taking victims' property.

Police say they were involved in four incidents the evening of April 3, one incident April 4, three incidents April 5, three incidents April 6, and two April 7.

Citywide, carjackings in the District are up 78% in the last 30 days, compared to the same time period last year, according to the MPD's interactive carjacking dashboard. Carjackings involving firearms are up 112% in the last 30 days.

So far this year, there have been 169 carjackings in the nation's capital city.

Among carjackings this year, 57% involve juveniles. Sixteen of the 21 people arrested this year for the offense were teens. The most common age for carjacking arrestees is 15, followed closely by age 19.

Juvenile carjacking arrests are down 65% so far this year, compared to the same time period last year, according to the dashboard.

"It's very discouraging. It's very sad situation recently happening in D.C. You know, carjacking is getting out of control. These incidents happen time and time again," Hailu said.

Watch WUSA's coverage of the arrest of four teens in connection with a violent five-day carjacking spree below.

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Defund-the-police Democrat calls for more police as her district continues brutal crime spiral: 'I feel betrayed by the department'



Another Democrat has been confronted with the disastrous consequences of the policies she once championed.

San Francisco City Supervisor Hillary Ronen announced last week that she is "begging" for more police officers for her crime-ravaged city, particularly in the district she oversees. This desperate plea comes just a few years after the Democrat called for the police to be defunded and suggested that half-measures amounted to a "slap in the face."

How it started

Ronen assumed office in 2017, representing San Francisco's District 9 on the 11-member city board of supervisors. The 47-year-old Berkeley Law graduate was re-elected in November 2020.

During her time in office, she has lent her support to the George Soros-backed leftist district attorney, Chesa Boudin. Boudin, whose parents were members of a leftist terrorist organization, has been accused of overseeing a crime surge in the city.

Whereas in 2016 Ronen campaigned on making "police part of our community," in 2020, she jumped on the BLM bandwagon and pushed for reductions to police budgets.

Amid the devastating BLM riots, Democrat Mayor London Breed proposed a $35 million cut from the San Francisco Police Department's budget over two years. This 2.6% reduction was not enough for Ronen, reported Mission Local.

Ronen called the budget reduction "a slap in the face," saying, "We can't just give lip service to this time and this movement."

She also suggested it would be prudent to get "police out of the business of responding to homeless people for being homeless," to plan on reducing the presence of law enforcement at public schools, and to reconsider having mounted police officers at all.

Ronen underscored that defunding the police was ultimately about repurposing a "system that is rotten to its core."

In August 2020, Ronen clarified her position, tweeting, "I want to make it clear that I believe strongly in defunding the police and reducing the number of officers on our force. For decades we’ve had an imbalance in our city’s budget, with hundreds of millions of dollars going to SFPD to have them do work they are not qualified to do."

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Breed ultimately diverted $120 million from the police and sheriff's departments in 2020.

How it's going

Mission Local reported that Ronen got what she wanted.

The number of full-duty SFPD officers is at 1,514 as of last week, down from 1,840 in 2019 and 1,872 in 2017.

The San Francisco District Attorney's Office indicated that in 2022, only 3.9% of the 58,681 reported incidents resulted in an arrest.

San Francisco scores a 2 out of 100 (100 being safest) on Neighborhood Watch's crime index. The chance of becoming a victim of a violent crime is 1 in 186, and the likelihood of becoming a victim of a property crime is 1 in 20, as a CNN reporter recently discovered.

According to the SFPD, between Jan. 1 and March 12, there were 66 reports of arson; 5,505 reports of larceny theft; 1,062 burglary reports; 428 assaults; 525 robberies; 39 rapes; 1,123 motor vehicle thefts; and 9 murders.

Mission, Bayview, and Ingleside, all overseen by Ronen, accounted for 41% of arson incidents in the city during that time period; 18% of the larceny thefts; 29.8% of burglaries; 38% of assaults; 37% of robberies; 36% of rapes; 50% of motor vehicle thefts; and 66% of murders. At least half of San Francisco's reports of human trafficking this year have also taken place in Ronen's district.

Only In Your State ranks two zones in Ronen's district as among the "most dangerous areas in San Francisco," particularly after dark.

During a Budget and Appropriations Committee meeting on March 15, Ronen implored the SFPD to prioritize police presence in her district rather than spending overtime on an anti-retail theft program, reported Fox News Digital.

"I've been begging this department to give the Mission what it deserves in terms of police presence all year long," said Ronen. "And I have been told time and time and time and time again there are no officers that we can send to Mission."

Despite having previously suggested anything less than a major cut to police budgets was a "slap in the face," Ronen claimed Wednesday she felt the SFPD had let her down.

"It hurts. And I feel betrayed by the department. I feel betrayed by the mayor. I feel betrayed by the priorities of the city," said Ronen.

Amid her efforts to reverse the damage her previous recommendations have inflicted on San Francisco, Ronen is presently championing race-based reparations. She recently noted that she cannot "wait to get to work" implementing recommendations to hand out $5 million to select black residents, cancel their debt, and guarantee their income.

TheBlaze previously reported that Ronen has admitted the city does not have the money for these reparations.

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San Francisco Becomes A Criminal Paradise

San Francisco Becomes A Criminal Paradise

Meet Philly’s Youngest Hero | @LevinTV

Meet Philly’s Youngest Hero | @LevinTV

'Experts' warn against calling California crime spree 'looting' because of racial connotations



Amid a spree of smash-and-grab robberies terrorizing businesses and shoppers in California's Bay Area, "experts" are warning against using the term "looting" to describe the crimes.

Dozens of storefronts and businesses in California were ransacked over the weekend in what local police are calling organized burglaries. In Walnut Creek, just 25 miles outside San Francisco, police said a "criminal mob" of 80 masked and armed robbers raided a Nordstrom department store, assaulting three employees and stealing thousands of dollars in expensive goods. Three suspects were arrested, but dozens more escaped with the merchandise.

San Jose police said thieves made off with an estimated $40,000 worth of merchandise stolen from a Lululemon store Sunday night. At the same time, a bigger attempted robbery took place at the Westfield Valley Fair Mall.

Another smash-and-grab robbery was caught on video at a jewelry store at Southland Mall in Hayward, California. Hayward police said no arrests were made and the suspects fled in several vehicles, making off with an unknown amount of loot.

And a San Francisco Louis Vuitton store was ransacked by robbers on Saturday.

Police have characterized these crimes as looting.

"The Louis Vuitton store was burglarized and looted. The Burberry in Westfield Mall was burglarized and looted," San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott told reporters on Saturday.

But others have shied away from using that term to describe the robberies, including experts who say "looting" is a term with racial connotations.

"We are talking about two incidents, we're not going to call this looting. This is organized robbery. That's what it is," said Sergeant Christian Camarillo with the San Jose police department, referring to the robbery at Lululemon.

KGO-TV reported Tuesday that under California Penal Code, the crimes committed do not meet the technical definition of "looting."

California law defines looting as "theft or burglary ... during a 'state of emergency', 'local emergency', or 'evacuation order' resulting from an earthquake, fire, flood, riot or other natural or manmade disaster."

A criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven said that the words police and journalists use to describe the crime matter.

"Looting is a term that we typically use when people of color or urban dwellers are doing something. We tend not to use that term for other people when they do the exact same thing," said Lorenzo Boyd, Ph.D., Professor of Criminal Justice & Community Policing.

KGO-TV observed that while there was no local emergency declared in the Bay Area cities where smash-and-grab crimes were committed this weekend, the identities and races of the majority of the suspects remain unknown.

Still, another expert who spoke to the local news station suggested the term "looting" has racial undertones.

Martin Reynolds, the co-executive director of the Robert C. Maynard Institute of Journalism Education, observed that after Hurricane Katrina, a large number of black New Orleans residents were labeled looters for "crimes of survival" — stealing water, food, and supplies before federal government aide arrived.

"This seems like it's an organized smash and grab robbery. This doesn't seem like looting. We're thinking of scenarios where first responders are completely overwhelmed. And folks often may be on their own," Reynolds told the local news station.

"People draw their own conclusions, if the terminologies that you use are tethered to people's understanding of how they have been used in the past," he added.

San Francisco residents don't 'feel safe,' turn to private security amid crime spree



With crime spiraling out of control in their city, residents of San Francisco's Marina District have turned to private security to patrol the streets and protect their families, with some saying they don't feel safe in their own neighborhoods.

"We don't feel safe in our neighborhood," resident Kate Lyons told KPIX-TV. "And we have an alarm, we have cameras on our property, but we want the extra security of having someone have eyes on our place."

Lyons and 150 other residents in the Marina District have hired the services of patrol special officer Alan Byard, who provides a measure of added security by patrolling the streets amid a surge in car break-ins and home burglaries.

"It's a nice area down here, people are afraid of what's been going on," Byard told KPIX. "They want a safe place to raise their kids. In the last year, I've had 10 of my clients move out of the city."

According to the news station, patrol special officers are private patrolmen overseen by the police commission.

Byard patrols the streets in his vehicle from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m., keeping on the lookout for suspicious activity. Since the pandemic began in 2019, he said his residential clients have more than doubled from 70 to 150 households in the district, as well as businesses. He charges $65 per residence for his services.

The security expert said car burglaries are the biggest problem in the area right now. He's also dealt with homeless people sleeping on residents' doorsteps. Petty theft and burglaries are also common crimes, Byard explained.

Lyons said she'll often find stolen property including empty luggage dumped right outside her home. She reported that car burglars commonly break into vehicles parked at the Palace of Fine Arts, near where she lives.

"Especially at night, I don't walk with a purse, I'll drive, or I'll take an Uber, and it's beginning to become a daytime problem too," she said.

Allan Brown, a 20-year Marina resident, was asked by KPIX-TV if property crimes have gotten worse over time.

"Oh absolutely, absolutely. This place used to be – nothing would ever happen here," he said.

Local law enforcement said that fewer than a dozen auto burglary crews are believed to be responsible for most of the car break-ins in the San Francisco Bay Area, according to the Associated Press. But news reports and viral videos of brazen smash-and-grabs have called attention to these crimes.

Over the summer, the San Francisco Chronicle reported a 753% increase in car break-ins in the city's Central District from May 2020 to May 2021, including in top tourist locations like Fisherman's Wharf and Chinatown.

On Oct. 15, TikTok star and Australian singer-songwriter Clinton Kane was the victim of an armed robbery in Cow Hollow. Thieves held him at gunpoint and stole more than $30,000 worth of camera equipment from his parked vehicle.

In response, last week San Francisco Mayor London Breed announced a reward of up to $100,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of "high-level leaders of organized auto burglary fencing operations."

"These break-ins hurt our residents, especially working families who do not have the time or money to deal with the effects, as well as visitors to our city whose experiences are too often tarnished after an otherwise positive experience," Breed said.

But even as she made the public announcement to fight back against break-ins, a couple visiting from Seattle were the victims of another car robbery just a few blocks away, KGO-TV reporter Lyanne Melendez tweeted.

This happened just a few blocks from where mayor @LondonBreed announced a new plan to cut back on break-ins in… https://t.co/sxBTXdAEiY

— Lyanne Melendez (@LyanneMelendez) 1634669982.0

Officials warn San Francisco residents and tourists should hide their belongings and park their vehicles in staffed lots wherever possible.

Police: Coordinated mob of juvenile criminals — some as young as 12 — traveling across state lines to commit violent crimes in Delaware Valley



Police in Delaware Valley are warning residents to be on high alert for a band of young criminals responsible for carrying out a litany of violent crimes in the tri-state region, multiple news outlets reported this week.

The group of juveniles and young adults — some as young as 12 years old — have reportedly been crossing over state lines from Wilmington, Delaware, in recent weeks to commit carjackings, robberies, and assaults in areas of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and even Maryland.

The young criminals generally travel in groups of two to six and are sometimes armed with handguns, Carneys Point Police Lt. Joseph Racite told NJ.com recently.

"The M.O. of this group is they will target you if you are near your vehicle and you're not paying any attention, and they have been known to assault people," Racite said.

"They're punching, kicking, they threw one of our victims to the ground last week. They're pulling guns," he explained, according to WPVI-TV.

He and other area law enforcement believe the crimes are being carried out by the same carjacking ring that rocked the region late last November and into early 2021. After a few months of lull, the crimes appear to have picked up again.

"Probably a lot of these kids were in custody and now they're wreaking havoc again," the lieutenant noted.

WPVI reported on a recent incident in which a group of juveniles attacked a Pioneer gas station employee, Varinder Singh.

"He comes behind me, hits me in the head, I fall down on the floor. They got my hoodie and keep punching me," Singh recounted, noting that they stole about $400 cash from him but thankfully were unsuccessful in stealing his car.

KYW-TV reported that a group of three rushed into a Conoco gas station in Carneys Point on Oct. 14 and stole $6,000 in cash. A worker at the station said all three suspects were armed.

Days later, a violent robbery happened in broad daylight at a J&J Carwash in Penns Grove. Surveillance footage reportedly showed the group attacking a woman as she exited her vehicle, pummeling her to the ground and taking off in her car.

"It was pretty frightening," said the carwash owner, Jeff Robertson. "She was here not even a minute. [It was a] wrong place, wrong time kind of scenario."

Racite said that there have been 13 pursuits in the last month in Carneys Point alone, with only one arrest. He added that law enforcement suspect, in all, there are more than 20 members of the criminal band.

Here's more on the story:

CRIME SPREE: Teen robbers wanted in violent crime spree that spans across state lines www.youtube.com

Chicago shooting spree ends after man with concealed carry license takes down attacker



Chicago police said this week that if it weren't for a good guy with a gun, a criminal who shot and killed one woman and injured two others on Independence Day may have gotten away with the heinous attack.

What happened?

According to the Chicago Tribune, officers were alerted to an active shooting in a South Austin alley at around 10:45 p.m. Sunday. A police notification said that a man in his 30s had approached the area and "began shooting at the victims."

By the time police arrived, they discovered four people wounded by gunfire. But after assessing the scene, officials reportedly determined that one of the wounded individuals was the gunman who had opened fire on the three others before an uninvolved bystander had stepped in to neutralize the attacker.

The uninvolved bystander — a 49-year-old man with a concealed carry license — had reportedly witnessed the attack and quickly responded by drawing his weapon and shooting at the gunman, striking him in the arm and the hip.

Woman Killed In South Austin Shooting, Concealed Carry Witness Shoots Offender www.youtube.com

The Tribune reported that the three victims in the attack included a 45-year-old woman, Janina Ford, and a 32-year-old man and a 49-year-old man whose identities have not been made public.

Ford was shot in the head during the attack and was pronounced dead at the scene, according to police. The two others suffered gunshot wounds to their bodies. They were both taken to a nearby hospital where their conditions have stabilized.

The attacker, later identified as 34-year-old Calvin Gonnigan, was also taken to nearby Stroger Hospital and listed in serious condition. While at the hospital he was "placed in custody," police said.

On Wednesday, the Chicago Police Department announced that Gonnigan had been charged with one count of first-degree murder, one count of aggravated assault, and two counts of attempted first-degree murder — all felonies.

Anything else?

The violence came as a part of a particularly bloody Fourth of July weekend in the Windy City as more than 100 residents were shot and 17 were killed. Sadly, the holiday violence was only a continuation of what Chicagoans have been experiencing for over a year.

Yet in the face of soaring crime, Democratic Mayor Lori Lightfoot has continued to blame guns and systemic racism for the city's woes and has called for increased gun control to help curb the violence. However, in this case, taking the gun out of a good guy's hand would only have led to further violence.