NYC Guardian Angels founder says police have been 'neutered,’ and inner cities have become ‘war zones’
Curtis Sliwa, founder of the New York City Guardian Angels, spoke to Fox News about the surge of violent crimes in New York City.
Over the month of June, New York City saw a 130 percent increase in shooting incidents compared to the same time last year. Despite the increase in violent crime, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has passed a budget slashing over $1 billion in funding from the New York Police Department and canceling the July recruit class, which includes almost 1,200 new officers.
Curtis Sliwa, founder of the New York City Guardian Angels, an unarmed civilian patrol group that was created to help combat widespread violence in NYC in the late '70s, is appalled over the direction his beloved city is headed.
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“This reminds me of what it was like when I first started the Guardian Angels in 1979. Between 1979 and 1993, when thank God Rudy Giuliani was elected mayor on a law and order platform and returned stability and a quality of life to the city of New York, we had six Guardian Angels shot and killed in the line of duty. And we're starting to move back in that direction,” Sliwa told Fox News.
While some may be looking to the police to curb the rise in crime in New York City, factors like bail reform and a judicial system frozen by the coronavirus pandemic, allow suspects to be released after being arrested, often leaving the police with their hands tied.
“Imagine you're a police officer you're risking your life each and every day, you see an Uzi-toting, dope-sucking, psychopathic killing machine who's back out on the street. And you look at your partner and you say, 'What's the point of arresting them?'" Sliwa said. "The court system cut him loose and the governors are all proud of their no bail laws--and yet none of them have to deal in the streets. None of them ever have conversations with the cops.”
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Sliwa said in New York gang culture has always existed but law enforcement had developed effective systems to keep that type of violence at bay.
“What’s happened ever since the demonstrations … we have seen the police throughout America completely be neutered, dissolved of their effectiveness and whole sections of the inner city, not affecting most parts of it, but the inner city have become war zones again, something I never thought that I would reexperience,” Sliwa said.
According to the lead Angel, those suffering are not the millennials and hipsters living in affluent neighborhoods while participating in peaceful protests. Rather, it is those dwelling in poorer communities who are now having to live in constant fear.
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“The people who have to hunker down, who have to duck and know that gang violence looms morning, noon and night, they are the ones who will be victimized, they will be the ones who suffer as politicians bicker back-and-forth,” he said.
No matter how dangerous the streets become, Sliwa assures New Yorkers the Guardian Angels will continue to patrol high-crime areas.
“If we have to lose lives in the process, we're prepared to do that and shed our blood because this is a war for our streets," he said. "This is good versus bad. When good men and good women do nothing we know historically evil will triumph.”
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