Also, police reported that the text messages that have been circulating about gang initiation violence against woman in Brooklyn were false. In a statement to the press police commissioner Raymond Kelly said “Halloween is the season of rumors. We know nothing specific about this threat. We've heard it because people were talking about what's out there, on the Internet, but we have no specific information to indicate that there's any validity to this rumor.”
Quiet Haloween and Shabbos, Gang Initiations Scare False
CROWN HEIGHTS, Brooklyn [CHI] — Boruch Hashem Shabbos has passed and there were no reports of violence or egg throwing incidents. Shomrim reported that there had not been any calls to the hotline, and that members escorted scores of residents to their homes on the outskirts of the neighborhood.
Also, police reported that the text messages that have been circulating about gang initiation violence against woman in Brooklyn were false. In a statement to the press police commissioner Raymond Kelly said “Halloween is the season of rumors. We know nothing specific about this threat. We’ve heard it because people were talking about what’s out there, on the Internet, but we have no specific information to indicate that there’s any validity to this rumor.”
Gang initiation rumors are always circulating, but the predicted mayhem rarely comes to pass. On Halloween 1997 the NYPD deployed a massive presence throughout the city in response to warnings from street sources that Bloods members were planning an “initiation day” rampage. According to a New York Times story published two days afterwards, it turned out to be the safest Halloween in decades.
resident
Thank you NYPD, thank you Shomrim!
ch-er
Maybe it was a safe halloween because of the massive police deployment?
Heard it
The gang threats were also circulating Newark and Elizabeth
Safety first
better safe then sorry!
Thank you Shomrim
Thank you NYPD
GLAD our females were aware and careful
B“H
How can one say the rumors were false? A family member of mine works in a public high school, where the NON-JEWISH GIRLS were afraid to go home from school alone on Friday, because their GANG MEMBER FRIENDS told them to watch out because the planned initiation involved hurting ”31 [i.e., the 31st of October] girls“ — location, race, etc. was not specified.
Even if, B”H“, no one was a victim this time, the gangs’ own members themselves saying it in advance doesn’t make it a case of ”false rumors.“
Rather, it can as easily be called a case of terrorism, by creating fear in the female population.
What family member wants to discount such threats? What police department should discount such threats? It was, l’havdil, Halloween, after all.
It’s very easy to play ”Monday Morning Quarterback,” and say the concerns were not justified. But if the vigilance of families and police this past Shabbos prevented even ONE (let alone 31) girls and women from being victimized on what is, after all, a goyishe time of outrageousness, then OF COURSE the concern was worth it!!!!
TJC
No egg throwing because they became too expensive!
John
To “GLAD our females were aware and careful”:
You wonder how one can “say the rumors were false”. Do a little resaearch into “gang initiation scares” and you will find that these rumors have been around for years in many parts of the country and they are always false.
Even non-Jews have fallen for these rumors, including the person you know who knows people who know…
I’m not saying that people should not be careful, but there is no need to needlessly scare people.
be
The college i go to ended early because of it.