A more personal look at crime in Hampden

Ok. So I seem to offended the left (of which Hawker is unapologetically part of) in my last post. I meant no disrespect.

Hawker brings news about Hampden, and Last Reporter purports to have it. Plus irony is a hard thing to communicate via text, and Hawker thought his bio would speak for itself (though in the interest of full disclosure: my bio was once Tiny Tim's bio cribbed from Wikipedia.) Oh, and please note that I said this guy "apparently" puts together crime statistics. I apologize if my language was confusing and if by linking to him, I implied endorsement. See, this guy writes about Hampden too, and hope that by simply linking to him, you don't get the impression that I'm endorsing him in any way. (His thoughts, for the record, are highly disturbing, not to mention offensive to my awesome next-door neighbor who was born and raised in Hampden.) I'll be more careful about being clearer about my point of view in the future.

So if you go here, although the Baltimore City Police Department takes pains to let you know that it "cannot give any guarantees as to the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or correct sequencing of the information," you can query their database of reported crime.

For Hampden, from June 23 -July 7 (a similar period to the one broken down by Last Reporter,) you get 26 incidents:

6 stolen auto
2 home burgulary
10 larceny (from various places)
3 aggravated assault (knife and "other")
and 2 "Robb Highway"

You could write a song.

Still disturbing, but perhaps more accurate--depending on who you trust.

Truth is, crime is something that's part of big city life, but Baltimore seems to be having a tough time getting a handle on it, and it's disturbing to talk about. A discussion of crime taps into our worst fears about our personal safety and challenges our optimism and faith in our fellow man. At the end of the day, I guess the impact of crime in Baltimore comes down to two things a) your personal experience and b) your perceptions.

Seeing as when I was living in Chicago in the mid-to-late-90's, I was the victim of a) a break-in, b) an attempted robbery of my bike and c) a mugging at gun point, not to mention the times my boyfriend was held up by gun point at his job and I was assaulted/grabbed on the street in the Loop, Hampden feels pretty damn safe to me.

So, how safe do YOU feel in Hampden?