Knives Out

It's not just guns -- New York is experiencing a knifing epidemic

In the many years of both living and working in New York, your narrator never recalls such a spike (sorry!) in knife-related crimes. The setting? The subways.

Is there something behind it?

New York’s knife laws are notoriously confusing — a hodgepodge of lists and questions of possession-with-intent.

That said, the knife laws are not the problem here — it’s all the usual culprits: bail reform, discovery reform, raise-the-age, and now Albany’s newest brainstorm: the Clean Slate Act, which will seal most criminal records, even from police.

Examples of the mayhem:

First, NYPD is investigating three slashings of women that may be related: Maniac possibly involved in three separate NYC subway knife attacks.

Here’s the image of the suspect, pulled from a city subway camera (they’ll get him soon):

Second, a 32-year-old man was found stabbed on the 4 train: Man found fatally stabbed aboard NYC subway train at Union Square. (This just in: transit detectives have made a collar. Perp is a homeless man, likely living in the subway, numerous priors. There’s a shock).

Third, a subway Good Samaritan slashed (warning: the image is graphic). Good Samaritan’s face slashed on subway after intervening in fight.

Fourth, another subway self-defense case: J Train stabber Jordan Williams released without bail after arraignment.

The NYPD is doing what it can: NYC knife arrests on subways skyrocket by 60% amid surging violence.

It’s not working.

This is yet another example of what occurs when the cops are forced to work within a system that is hostile to everything they do.

I’ve called the NYC subway a “rolling psycho ward.”

I forgot to add: “with knives.”

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They’re Even Stabbing Dogs

In New York’s Central Park: Dispute between dog walkers leads to pup’s fatal stabbing in Central Park.

They’ll get this guy, too. And when they do — just as in the above cases — he’ll have priors.

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The Murdaugh Family Chronicles

This guy is a one-man crime wave.

Alex Murdaugh, currently incarcerated for the murder of his wife and son, has just been indicted again — for defrauding the family of his dead housekeeper.

Murdaugh’s housekeeper, you’ll recall, died after reportedly falling down some steps on the Murdaugh family’s front porch. There have been questions about the murky circumstances of the death ever since. Alex has now admitted it did not happen as reported.

The initial story never made sense — and there are suspicions that Alex may well have been involved in the incident.

This one will be tough to solve as a murder, however — the only witnesses reported to be present for the “accident”? The two family members murdered by Alex.

Which sounds like motive to me.

Also from Murdaugh-land comes the news that a grand jury has been empaneled in the 2015 death of Stephen Smith, who was found dead on an abandoned highway in a case that was originally ruled an accident.

The circumstances around Smith’s death have also been murky from the start. The wounds and crime scene were not consistent with a hit-and-run, and the investigation suffered numerous bureaucratic snafus.

Rumors following the death pointed to a relationship of some sort between Murdaugh scion Buster Murdaugh and Smith, who was openly gay. (To date, no evidence of any such relationship has surfaced, nor of any wrongdoing by Buster).

In your narrator’s opinion, the empaneling of the grand jury points to a murder arrest at some point over the summer (there are reportedly at least “five to six individuals” with information material to the case — they will be pulled in to testify).

Having followed this case pretty closely, I believe there are likely two persons-of-interest on the prosecution’s radar.

I also think the prosecution will need to flip someone to make this case stick.

Stay tuned.

(That said, one is forced to ask: Why did it take the Alex Murdaugh double-homicide to get movement on these two cold cases? The rumors of the Murdaugh family influence down in Colleton County look pretty accurate at this point).

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Kohlberger Update

Is he kidding?

Word comes now that Bryan Kohlberger, the accused Idaho quadruple murderer, will challenge the indictment in his case.

As a quick primer: The standard for an indictment is “probable cause” — that is, the accused “probably” did it. It is not “beyond a reasonable doubt,” as it is at trial.

Essentially, the grand jury is just a safeguard in the legal system to ensure the police had that same probable cause when they made their arrest — and that the case can go forward.

Folks, there was MORE than enough evidence for this arrest to have occurred. WAY more.

At this point, this is just grandstanding by Kohlberger and his defense team, as they throw up every roadblock they can on a death penalty case.

The tell is in his lawyer’s statement. She says — somewhat defensively — that, “Mr. Kohberger has the right and intends to contest the indictment."

Sure, he “has the right.”

And the judge has the right to quash this nonsense and get on with it already.

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Things Must Be Bad….

When the NY Times runs a headline like this: “How ‘Defund the Police’ Failed.”

I’ll save you the trouble: It failed because it “wasn’t clearly defined enough.” And then of course because, “Republicans seized on the debate to paint Democrats as being recklessly soft on crime.”

Now why would Republicans think that?

Let’s see: crime in Minneapolis is through the roof, the transit system is a no-go area, the police ranks are down 40%, and there are “181 private security companies in Minnesota licensed by the state, up from 155 in 2020.”

Meanwhile, the police station BLM and Antifa burned down — the city’s most advanced — remains a graffitied, boarded-up hulk.

Funny, I don’t recall a January 6-like federal response to that. Despite both those groups being amenable to conspiracy or RICO charges.

Insurrections only run one way, apparently.

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And Finally…. The People Have Nukes?

Folks, having done a lot of domestic security work, your narrator worries about the coming “great powers competition.” China and Russia, particularly, have become very active in our hemisphere.

It’s a major challenge — perhaps the challenge of all our lifetimes.

But that said: Here’s a quick look at the Russian Animal Circus, deployed to entertain Ukrainian war orphans in Mariupol.

Maybe we have nothing to worry about?

Click here to see the amazing clip.

(source: Dailymail.co.uk)

(Personally, my favorite is the second little guy — is that a beaver? Or some weird little Russian bear?) (One of them decides to pee on the crowd at the 2:50 mark — a metaphor if ever there was one).

Until next time… stay safe.

Oh, and God save the Queen, man!

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