Editorial
A Crime Waiting to Happen
Two Stabbing at the Metromover
The two bloody incidents occurred within 11 minutes at two Metromover stations on Friday, May 24 — the Government Center Metromover Station and the Eleventh Street Station (NE 11th St. and 2nd Avenue). Both victims were transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center. The victims, whose names have not been released, are in stable condition, said Miami-Dade Police spokesman, detective Angel Rodriguez.
On Saturday afternoon, 27-year-old Christopher Coleman was taken into custody and charged with aggravated battery and carrying a concealed weapon in relation to the Eleventh Street Station incident. “The other subject is still at large,” added Detective Rodriguez.
Downtown NEWS: We have received several calls from residents who are concerned about their safety. Is it safe to ride the Metromover? Has security been increased?
Detective Rodrigues: Miami-Dade Police always maintains high visibility with regards to our public transportation system and they are safe. We will continue to maintain the highest presence at the Metro Rail and Metromover systems and we urge the community to also be aware of their surroundings. If you see anything suspicious, please, call 9–1–1.
Palpable Danger around the Neighborhood
Christopher Coleman has been in and out of jail, and each time his offenses took him a step closer to Friday’s stabbing. A resident from a building facing the Eleventh Street Station pondered how a man with such a rap sheet was free.
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“These two acts of violence are not isolated. An increasing sense of danger is palpable around our streets,” complained another resident, and related an incident. She was returning home from work last Thursday when a homeless man asked her for $2 in front of the 7-Eleven store, the corner of NE Second Avenue and Second Street. She told him she didn’t have any cash, the man tried to grab her glasses.
Did she call the police? She threw her hands in the airs, an eloquent gesture of helplessness: “For what?” Two weeks earlier a resident was hit by a bicycle and left bleeding. The cyclist, apparently a homeless man, simply took off. The resident called the police and waited in vain for thirty minutes.
Another resident chronicled last week for Downtown NEWS a short three-block trip to Starbucks to get a cup of coffee. He witnessed a drug deal, various instances of nudity, and he, his wife and young child were harassed by a homeless individual for half a block.
To further illustrate the presentiment of imminent danger, a Park West resident, witnessing the commotion over Friday’s stabbing, confided that earlier this week a homeless man spat on her mother.
A Rhetorical Question
The Park West resident added: “I’m very curious to know what the city’s responsibility is to us, the public, in dealing with these people that are perhaps mentally unstable and a threat to the rest of us?”
The official answer, at all levels, many residents perceive to be a resounding: Blah-blah-blah. It’s time to sit with pen and paper (a euphemism for laptop or tablet) and determine if downtown’s quality of life has improved. For those with too many negatives on the list, there is one mechanism available, it’s called voting.
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