EDITORIAL/Restore law and order
Already impacting Neshoba County long before now, the murder rate in Jackson is three times worse than Chicago, worse than St. Louis, Baltimore, and Memphis.
A separate judicial district and more state police, as some are now proposing to the Legislature, are ways to combat the record crime that continues to spill over into our state and impact even quiet, distant places like Neshoba County.
The 2018 murder of two people at a Philadelphia convenience store by a Jackson man out on early release may have been prevented by treating central Jackson like the Green Zone in Baghdad and prosecuting the accused with hard-nosed judges.
Gov. Tate Reeves last week proposed doubling the size of the Capitol Police so there will be more boots on the ground in the Capitol Complex Improvement District that includes downtown and the historic Belhaven neighborhood.
Robert Leon Jackson, the man who killed the two people at the convenience store here, had gone into City Furniture on Bailey Avenue in Jackson with a weapon in 2010 with the intention of robbing the business, but a store employee shot him.
Weak prosecutors let Jackson, an habitual offender, off easy and he got out of prison on early release and came to Philadelphia and shot two people dead.
Treating central Jackson “like the Green Zone in Baghdad,” flooding it with police and creating a special judicial district to prosecute the accused with hard-nosed judges is a solution to restoring law and order, State Auditor Shad White told the Canton Rotary Club last week in response to a question about soaring crime, a growing threat even in the suburbs.
If our state is to thrive fully, we need a Capital City of law and order, one governed by laws, not abandoned to daily violence. We all have an interest in stopping this deadly cycle even here in Neshoba County.
Many on the state level agree that having a Capital City that is vibrant, full of life and safe is essential, a city where residents don’t have to fear for their safety, a city where parents can let their children run around in the yard without having to fear if they’ll be home for dinner.
We believe in a better Jackson. We have faith that our state has what it takes to make Jackson a city that is a hub for business and investment, a city where jobs are plentiful and opportunity is only limited by how hard one wants to work.
Reasonable citizens of all races need to take back control from those who have a different agenda.
Reeves and others have championed the expansion of state police to support local law enforcement and restore law and order to Jackson.
“To our law enforcement officers who wake up every day, put on the badge, and risk their own personal safety to protect and serve us, thank you,” Reeves said. “As long as I’m governor, I will do everything I can to provide you with the tools and resources you need to keep us, and yourself, safe.”
More broadly, the Auditor spoke to the underlying causes of crime. “Why is a young man, 19 years old, feel like he's got nothing to do in life except murder somebody?”
White pointed to a Junior ROTC program in the Jackson Public Schools that’s working.
“That program, inside JPS has a 100% graduation rate. 100% graduation rate,” he said.
A Gospel response to the mounting evil all around us even here in our own community is to repay evil with good, yet we can remain absolute in our stance for law and order and justice without compromise.