L.A. Is a Scary, Crime-Ridden Place

Imoved to L.A. from Chicago in 1990 for work-related reasons. Since moving here, I have been through many disturbing incidences, including the theft of my car, the riots of 1992 and most recently the disturbances at Staples Center after the Lakers’ victory.

When I first moved here, I lived in the Panorama City area. I moved from there because guns were going off at night and the police helicopters flying overhead were like an enactment of Desert Storm, waking me every 30 minutes.

In my current Sunset Strip neighborhood bordering Beverly Hills, there have been four shootings in the past month, some of them fatal. I have been taunted and threatened by gang members as I walk my dog near my home in the hills just above Sunset, sometimes as they pee and break bottles against the wall of an estate at the top of my block.

Other times, cars full of kids are parked in darkened streets in the hills shooting up some kind of drug and leaving their needles and empty liquor bottles on the berm.

I call the West Hollywood Sheriff’s Department and the LAPD about the problems in my neighborhood. The West Hollywood sheriff says that this is LAPD territory; the LAPD says that it is the sheriff’s territory. My neighborhood is on the border, so it seems.

In any case it takes about 30 minutes for them to show up--if they ever do.

I grew up in Chicago and all my life I have never been subjected to such violence and torment. Even in a “nice” neighborhood, I feel very unsafe living here in Los Angeles.

On the news on the night of the Lakers’ mayhem, the anchors kept saying that this was only a “few” people who are ruining an otherwise joyous event. The riots of 1992 were started by this same “few” people and they paralyzed an entire city.

We, including the press, city officials and the police need to admit we have some serious problems here. Will the events at Staples Center be yet another wake-up call put on snooze?