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Select     Notable New Yorker

Edward KocheEdward Koche
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Session:         Page of 617

black crime. It was clear -- there was no question about it. And it was this dichotomy. I mentioned black crime. There is no question but that in the city of New York crime, physical assault, is basically, overwhelmingly nonwhite-committed. Not only the people that commit it but the people that are the victims are nonwhites, but the blacks and Puerto-Ricans who overwhelmingly commit the physical assults do it on their own people as much as on the whites. Now, people don't like to talk about that, but if you go to the jails you find that over 80% of those that commit physical assaults who are captured and are facing jail are nonwhites.

I find if you talk to blacks and Puerto-Ricans, they are tougher on street crime than on whites, who worry about “gee, maybe they committed crimes because of social conditions, and we've been unfair here,” and will find all the reasons why you should excuse crimes. But the people who are the victims don't find those reasons, and it is not racist to deal with a real problem -- the crime in the city of New York where poverty is basically non-white are committed by those who are poverty-stricken. But not everybody who's in poverty commits crimes. The overwhelming number do not. So it was not an excuse to commit a crime and say, “Well, I'm a poor person.” That's ridiculous. By the way, what I'm saying now: we're discussing an attitude which existed much more prevalently before...

SIDE 2





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