Last Murder Victim of 2007

posted by m.d.


I hope.

Nearly five months after robbers opened fire on seven people in an eastern New Orleans home, fatally wounding three, a fourth victim has died, the Orleans Parish coroner's office said.

Kiengkay Chomsy, 42, of eastern New Orleans, died Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. at Canon Hospice, a day after he was transferred from University Hospital, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said. Chomsy died of complications from gunshot wounds to his head.

Another name on my list, which is now 207 murders in the city of New Orleans in 2007. I count murders that I can find reported on in the media. The NOPD’s official number was 209. I do not know if they will count this death as a 2007 or 2008 murder.

As for this year, we have 11 murders in the first 18 days. Once again, about a murder every other day. That rate has been fairly consistent, even with more people moving into the city. If the population growth is slowing down, that might be the rate per day we are stuck with.

Cliff’s Crib directed me to the field negro’s blog (that is the title of the blog – I feel like I need to point that out). On it, the field negro (once again, that’s the blogger’s name) is tracking media reports of murders in Philadelphia which he calls the “Killadelphia Murder Count.” When I visited yesterday, there were 11 homicides in “Killadelphia,” three of which were vehicular homicides.

Philadelphia has around 1.4 million people in it. I prefer the New Orleans estimate that's around 300,000 people.

I don’t expect the total of Philadelphia murders (not including vehicular homicides) to stay lower than New Orleans for long. Last year, the city had 392 murders.

But my first reaction was: “Wow. We have more murders than a place called Killadelphia. What does that make us?”

At a ceremony to reopen NOPD headquarters yesterday, Superintendent Warren Riley:

"We will reduce our violent crime by year's end," Riley said.

I wonder if he means total numbers or per capita. It makes a difference.